QUB Dragons' Den
Apply for QUB Dragons' Den, where you could win...
- A share of a £20,000 prize pot, including £3,000 from the Engineers in Business Fund
- Hot-Desking space in 'SU CoWork' at One Elmwood
- Specialist mentoring and support
Shortlisted applicants will:
- Be in with a chance to walk away with everything you need to launch your business
- Master the boardroom pitch through training and first-hand experience
- Ramp up your business skills through pitching, networking and mentoring on: pitching skills, marketing, finance, and legal issues
- Meet ambitious and successful entrepreneurs
Applications now closed.
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This competition is sponsored by MCS Recruitment, Tughans Solicitors, Engineers in Business Fellowship, QUBIS and Santander Universities.
QUB Dragons' Den 2023 T&Cs (23 KB)
Meet The Dragons...
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Dragons' Den Quick Pitch Round - Judges
Kirsty Dillon
Head of Technical & Engineering at MCS Group with success in consistently delivering on challenging recruitment assignments across the Technical & Engineering industry. MCS Group is a market leading Northern Ireland specialist recruitment & talent acquisition consultancy. Our dedicated niche markets are; IT & Digital, Technical & Engineering, Professional Services, Accounting & Finance, Banking, Legal and Executive Search.
Andrew Kirke
Andrew is a Partner in the Commercial team at Tughans, and works with clients across a full range of commercial contract matters, with a particular focus on energy and technology law. Andrew is qualified as a solicitor in NI, England and Wales and the RoI. Andrew joined Tughans in 2013, having completed his training contract with another leading Belfast firm. After qualifying Andrew worked offshore as a corporate finance lawyer for a time, before returning to Northern Ireland. Tughans is one of Northern Ireland's largest commercial law firms, and provides legal advice to businesses throughout the UK and Ireland.
Gren Armstrong
As head of Entrepreneurship & Future Growth at Invest NI, Gren is responsible for leading Invest NI’s approach to supporting new start-up businesses, particularly innovation driven enterprises with the potential to become high potential start-ups. Gren and his team work with students regularly to refer them onto relevant Invest NI and third party sources for support by way of access to funding, introduction to relevant contacts, and growth support.
Ciaran Higgins
Ciaran is responsible for the strategic leadership and management of Queen's Students' Union ensuring delivery of a wide range of services and meeting the needs of Queen's students. Previous to joining Queen’s, he worked for 15 years in enterprise development and has been a judge on QUB Dragons’ Den for a number of years.
Dr. Cecilia Hegarty
Dr. Cecilia Hegarty, is Innovation Programmes Manager with QUB supporting commercialisation and innovation programmes including Lean Launch and ICURe, Cancer Research and EIT Food (Europe) working with Early-Late Career Researchers and Corporates and ecosystem partners across the UK, Ireland, Europe and USA (MIT, Boston). Before joining QUB, Cecilia worked extensively with industry in leading industry-led innovation growth programmes and R&D projects at scale. - Dragons' Den The Final - Judges
John McKee
John McKee is Managing Director of Linkubator, a Management Consultancy based in Belfast helping companies of all sizes to retain and upskill their people. John works with companies who want to plan for growth, develop their leaders and motivate their sales teams. He has been a Dragon on our panel for many years, so with his experience, he knows a winning business idea when he sees one!
Lindsey McArthur
As University Relationship Manager, Lindsey manages the relationship between Santander and 11 Universities in Scotland, England and Northern Ireland, QUB being one of them. As part of Santander’s CSR programme, the Santander Universities team helps students, staff and communities prosper. They provide links to Business, Corporate and Retail banking, support student entrepreneurs and SMEs. Santander aims to create a positive impact on, provide support to, and promote access to education though all of their programmes.
Anne Dornan
Anne's role is to support the development of the Queen's spin-out portfolio, connecting companies to relevant resources, advisors, funding and investment opportunities to accelerate their formation and growth. She supports Queen's commercialisation and innovation programmes, such as ICURe, working with academic and ecosystem partners across the UK and Ireland.
Kirsty Dillon
Head of Technical & Engineering at MCS Group with success in consistently delivering on challenging recruitment assignments across the Technical & Engineering industry. MCS Group is a market leading Northern Ireland specialist recruitment & talent acquisition consultancy. Our dedicated niche markets are; IT & Digital, Technical & Engineering, Professional Services, Accounting & Finance, Banking, Legal and Executive Search.
Andrew Kirke
Andrew is a Partner in the Commercial team at Tughans, and works with clients across a full range of commercial contract matters, with a particular focus on energy and technology law. Andrew is qualified as a solicitor in NI, England and Wales and the RoI. Andrew joined Tughans in 2013, having completed his training contract with another leading Belfast firm. After qualifying Andrew worked offshore as a corporate finance lawyer for a time, before returning to Northern Ireland. Tughans is one of Northern Ireland's largest commercial law firms, and provides legal advice to businesses throughout the UK and Ireland.
