Sunday Video: Niall Harbison on why he’s not moving to Silicon Valley
Niall Harbison is a Dublin, Ireland-based entrepreneur that I've followed for the past few years. I first found him through his video blog, NiallH.com,* where he published short videos with his opinions on social media and entrepreneurship.
He dropped out of school at age 16 to become a professional chef and he traveled the world cooking on Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen's yacht for several years. He's since turned his talents to technology entrepreneurship, co-founding both iFoods.tv and Simply Zesty. Additionally, he's the host of Food Mob, a weekly cooking show on internet television network Revision3.
In the short video below, Niall talks about the challenges the Dublin startup community faces, from the perception of being out of touch, to being overlooked by the United Kingdom tech publications, to losing talent to Silicon Valley. He briefly considers moving his company to Silicon Valley before deciding to stay and fight to improve the community in Ireland.
In discussing Dublin, Niall hits on a lot of the same issues that we feel in the startup community here on the Silicon Prairie. It's a good perspective for those of us in Des Moines, Omaha and beyond to see others around the world working on the same issues.
*Niall's video blog, NiallH.com, now forwards to the company site at Simply Zesty. The videos are still available on his YouTube channel.
ARCHIVED COMMENTS
Haha thanks for posting this, god that video was well over a year ago but the same thoughts are always in my head! Simply Zesty is growing massively as a company and my heart is very much here and creating something special for the next couple of years but having been in SF recently I just see the huge amount of possibilities over there and the hugely positive attitude towards entrepreneurship! It's an exciting place that I will more than likely end up in one day!
Funny to see that you guys have the same feelings over there in your community! I guess it is just the draw of the brighter lights that we all see in different walks of life but there is also huge appeal in building something special on your own turf at times as well!
N