Dublin Beta supporting the startup community, Gene Murphy explains more

By @SimonCocking. We spoke to Gene Murphy, regular Irish Tech News contributor and one of Dublin Beta’s most enthusiastic supporters and advocates since 2014, to find out more about it.

It's time to apply to demo at #DublinBeta18 and get your product in front of our audience! https://t.co/suUvz5DYaY pic.twitter.com/xFYmaJY7fl

— Dublin Beta (@dublinbeta) April 27, 2016

Gene, great to talk with you. You have been a familiar face around Dublin at numerous startup events for many years now. Tell us about what Dublin Beta is?

DublinBeta was founded back in 2011 and has been going strong for 5 years as a showcase for early stage tech startups to showcase their wares in a lively environment! DublinBeta founders Russell Banks and John O’Rourke began this journey in 2011 and I joined in 2014.

DublinBeta has a pretty cool format where between 10 – 15 Startups set up their mini stand and between 150 – 200 attendees over a 2 hour period get 3 casino chips to vote for their favorite team ie the ones with the most hustle as it’s all about pitching for those votes!

What great companies have come through DB’s doors? Where there any you wished you had invested in?

We’ve had people from Unituition to Soundwave and CurrencyFair to new startups like Huddle join the fray of high tempo pitching during our 5 years to date.

#DublinBeta 18 is back June 7th @HangarDublin! Apply to demo here https://t.co/sEDheGcAmm #Startups pic.twitter.com/05FfW614aJ

— Gene (@genemurphy) May 23, 2016

What tips would you give to startups coming to a DB night?

Get their early to pick a great spot to pitch from.

Plan out your pitch to be concise, show the value you create and be memorable! Also, make sure you do this all in under 60 seconds as you’ll have lots of people to pitch to on the night.

What are your roles in Dublin Beta?

John O’Rourke – attendee acquisition from afar (John’s based in San Fransisco so late night meetings are quite a regular thing for our team!)

Russel ‘Rusty Banks’ Banks – team chats. general startup whisperer to calm down the teams and all round operations guy.

Gene Murphy – On the day organiser with Russell mixed with some attendee acquisition with John. Kind of like the ginger glue of the team.

What is coming up for Dublin Beta? (tell us more about the 5 year celebration).

So this year is a big big year! This December 1st we’re coming up to our 20th edition of DublinBeta so we’ve planned something pretty cool. DB20 takes place on the 1st of December and will see our alumni unite on stage to chat about their experiences on growing their companies since demoing at DublinBeta. We’ve some great names coming back to say hello so make sure you get your name on the list at www.dublinbeta.com/db20

How does Software Placement’s support of the event help?

The gang at Software placements have been an awesome support over the past two years and are a lot of fun to work with on building DublinBeta. The support of Software placements has led to our first line of delightful DublinBeta swag and generally helps us make the attendee experience all the more delightful on the night! They really are a brilliant team to work with and we really do appreciate it.

Win 2 tickets #Ireland v #Italy #EURO2016 https://t.co/5F6TVv6zCO @SWPlacementsIre pic.twitter.com/CN8kVllpz6

— Software Placements (@SWPlacementsIre) May 31, 2016

Anything you’d like to add / I should have asked you?

We have DublinBeta 18 aka the Summer Party coming up on Tuesday June 7th so if you’r readers would like to attend to see what happens on a DublinBeta night or better still apply to demo then head on over to www.dublinbeta.com! See you all there on the 7th of June.

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