Heidi Davis, Peri announced as ‘Founder of the Year 2024’ at Enterprise Ireland’s High Potential Start-up Awards

Heidi Davis, CEO of Peri has been awarded the Enterprise Ireland High-Potential Start-Up (HPSU) Founder of the Year for 2024. The company uses AI enabled technology to personalise the management of menopausal symptoms. The Peri, a wearable device helps users regularly update how they are affected by their symptoms and provides insights to guide women toward a personalised management plan. 

The Founder of the Year Awards acknowledges and celebrates the commitment that entrepreneurs and start-ups have made to build world class companies of the future. There were nine finalists for the 2024 Award, all of whom were voted for by their peers and have taken part in Enterprise Ireland’s High Potential Start-Up (HPSU) Founders Forum over the last year. 

Barry McCann, Nua Surgical, Mark Kirwan, Positive Carbon and Alison Liddy, Relevium Medical were also acknowledged for their companies’ achievements to date and voted as runners-up on the night. Other finalists include: Darren O’Reilly, Whole Supp; Criona Turley, Capella; Aidan Finn, Binarii Labs; Raj Lyons Chohan, Affinity EV2 and Mike McGrath, Kwayga.

Now in its sixth year the HPSUFounders Forum, continues to grow with over 450 founders having participated to date from a variety of sectors including digital technologies, medical devices, fintech, food, engineering and construction.

The Founder of the Year 2024 was decided by a judging panel which included representatives from Enterprise Ireland, VentureWave Capital, Endeavour Ireland and Credit Logic. 

Mark Barrett, Group CEO of APC and VLE Therapeutics, which specialises in the research, digitalisation and manufacture of medicines also joined the event to share his perspective on leadership and scaling a global business. 

On receiving the award Heidi Davis, winner of the HPSU Founder of the Year Award for 2024 said, “I am deeply honoured to receive this award, particularly as the nominees are selected by Founder peers. Enterprise Ireland has been with us all along on our start-up journey and we look forward to working them as we launch the peri to market in 2025. Our ultimate aim is to grow the business globally, bringing the peri to the women of the world, allowing them to live healthier and more productive lives.”

Addressing the Awards ceremony, Michael Carey, Chairman, Enterprise Ireland said: “The Founder of the Year Awards promotes Ireland’s ecosystem of entrepreneurs who have displayed the potential and commitment to building their businesses and set their sights on global markets. We are delighted to build on the success of the Awards which is now in its sixth year, and the Founders Forum which acknowledges and celebrates high-performance, innovative Irish start-ups. I wish to congratulate Heidi on winning this year’s Award and also pay tribute to the other finalists, all of whom were shortlisted by their peers, which is a real testament to their potential and future success.” 

ENDS

Contact:     

Nicola Corboy, Press & Media Relations, Enterprise Ireland

086 021 0114 press@enterprise-ireland.com/ nicola.corboy@enterprise-ireland.com        
       
Note to Editors: 

Full list of short-listed nominees: 

Heidi Davis, CEO & Co-Founder, Peri 

The business, founded by Heidi Davis and Donal O’Gorman in 2022, uses AI-enabled technology to personalise the management of menopausal symptoms. It can also help users to reduce the risk of disease in the future. More than seven million women across the UK and Ireland are going through menopause at any one time with over half of them negatively impacted by the symptoms. These symptoms can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and osteoporosis. The device is designed to ensure users can regularly update how they are affected by their symptoms and provides insights to guide women toward a personalised management plan. Heidi has extensive experience bringing products from concept to launch, backed by her academic background in Nutrition and Molecular Medicine.

Darren O’Reilly, Founder, Whole Supp

Whole Supp is a Dublin-based nutritional supplements firm that was founded by Darren O’Reilly, a former professional rugby player with Leinster, and Dr Brian Carson in 2022. After 7 years as a professional rugby player with access to the best nutritionists, Darren left the sports fields for the corporate world moving on to lead a US digital transformation business across EMEA.  With the pressures and pace of corporate life, Darren soon struggled to balance this new lifestyle whilst maintaining that health-focused, nutrition-first way of life he was so familiar with. He wanted a healthy, smart, convenient solution that delivered on the nutritionals but also tasted great too. The business has developed a shake that is high in protein and nutritionally complete. It provides over 30 vitamins and minerals along with protein, fats and carbohydrates in one supplement. Whole Supp has, up to now, been an entirely direct-to-consumer business but is now branching out to work with retailers to reach more customers. 

Criona Turley, Co-Founder & CEO, Capella

With a background in Workplace Design, Criona is the Co-Founder and CEO of Capella. Capella offers hybrid working solutions software and insights to organisations adopting or seeking to adopt blended working across their business. Using the latest AI technology, Capella offers a suite of solutions to optimise hybrid working including hot desk booking, office heat mapping, work-from-home risk assessments, as well as workplace analytical tools to foster greater collaboration amongst teams in the office. The company also offers critical insights and reporting to business owners and senior leaders, to enable greater decision making and future planning in relation to hybrid working. 

Barry McCann, CEO & Co-Founder, Nua Surgical

Barry is the CEO and co-founder of Nua Surgical, an award-winning women’s health company based in Galway. His career spans 20 years across healthcare, not-for-profit and professional sports industries.  He co-founded the company in 2019 with Marie-Therese Maher (COO) and Padraig Maher (CTO). The company has developed the SteriCISION C-section Retractor to improve access and visualisation during Caesarean Delivery.  

Aidan Finn, Co-Founder and CEO, Binarii Labs

Aidan Finn, Co-Founder and CEO of Binarii Labs, harnesses over a decade of expertise in deep tech and cybersecurity to drive innovation in data security with their patented solutions, ensuring transparency and protection for clients.

Binarii Labs introduces a revolutionary, proprietary platform patented in the US and UK enabling seamless integration for enterprises, providing unparalleled control over their and their stakeholders' data through cutting-edge encryption and multi-cloud distributed storage. This zero-knowledge system ensures complete ownership and security, offering automated cloud contingency, assures business continuity and mitigates and potentially eliminates any disaster recovery actions if ever breached. 

Mark Kirwan, CEO and Co-Founder, Positive Carbon

Mark Kirwan is the founder and CEO of Positive Carbon, dedicated to transforming the foodservice industry through innovative sustainability solutions. Positive Carbon has created automated technology that helps businesses in the hospitality and foodservice industries to reduce and track food waste. With a passion for using technology to tackle global challenges, he leads the company’s mission to reduce food waste by 50% with cutting-edge AI-powered sensors. Under his leadership, Positive Carbon is expanding globally, partnering with leading organizations to create a more sustainable and waste-conscious future for the foodservice sector. 

Alison Liddy (Ph.D), CEO and Co-Founder, Relevium Medical

Alison holds qualifications in Chemistry (B.Sc.) and Biochemical Engineering (M.Sc. & Ph.D.). She has worked for major multinationaland companies including ROCHE, Cook Medical and Boston Scientific; and most recently completed the BioInnovate Fellowship in the prestigious Stanford BioDesign-affiliated programme at University of Galway, Ireland. Alison is the named inventor on 21 patents and have raised over €16.8 Million in public and private funds to date. Relevium Medical is creating a pipeline of novel pharmacological hydrogel treatments and has developed an injection-based form of pain treatment for osteoarthritis of the knee.

Raj Lyons Chohan, CEO AND Founder, Affinity EV

As the founder of Affinity EV, Raj has reimagined the EV ecosystem, creating a dynamic platform that unites Auto OEMs and Energy Charging companies. The business provides a fully managed solution for energy and home charger installation. With Enterprise Ireland’s support, Affinity EV empowers these sectors to collaborate seamlessly, fuelling innovation and accelerating the global transition to electric mobility.

Mike McGrath, CEO and Co-Founder, Kwayga

Kwayga is a sourcing engine for supermarket buyers to engage with matched suppliers of private label and trending food & drinks products across Europe Mike has 15 years’ experience in sourcing and procurement and prior to Kwayga, Mike was Managing Director of Arvo since he founded the company in 2010. In 2012, Mike was appointed by the European Commission to the e-tendering Expert Group (eTEG), which defined a blueprint for public procurement within the EU and previously founded the eSourcing platform.