Dublin Chamber president Eoghan Quigley is a driven man. He is driven by a passionate belief in the need to support Irish business founders and indigenous enterprise.
“There are lots of good things about Ireland, but the way founders and entrepreneurs are treated is lacking,” he says. “The support and tax treatment are quite poor. We are top of the class for FDI but not in the way we support indigenous businesses. There are very few voices out there for founders and entrepreneurs and indigenous business, but Dublin Chamber is one of them. That’s one of the reasons I got involved with the chamber.”
That involvement began a little over a decade ago while he was a partner with KPMG. “I was a tax adviser with KPMG until I retired last year,” he points out. “I was very fortunate to be at the forefront of much of what was driving the Irish economy for many years. A little over 10 years ago, I was asked to contribute to the chamber’s budget submission. I got to learn how the chamber worked and became very interested in what it did and joined the council in 2015.”
The timing of his decision to stand for election for the vice-presidency, and ultimately the presidency of the chamber, was influenced by his upcoming retirement from KPMG. “Back in 2022, the opinion polls were pointing to a potentially interesting general election result in 2024,” he recalls. “I knew that I would be retiring in 2024 and that I would be an independent voice as president in 2025. That would mean I could be a strong advocate for business interests and indigenous business in particular. The election result didn’t turn out to be as radical as it could have been, but I’m still passionate about those things.”
The needs of indigenous enterprise aren’t the only things on his agenda, of course. “Clearly, Dublin has very pressing infrastructure needs,” he says. “I’m from the west of Ireland, but I love living in Dublin and I want to stay living in Dublin. I want my children to stay living here and to build their lives here and that means addressing those infrastructure needs. Dublin Chamber advocates very strongly for that and I am looking forward to adding my voice when I can. The Greater Dublin Area is the lifeblood of the economy and generates 60 per cent of the tax take. We need to focus on our strengths as a country, so when we are advocating for Dublin, we are really advocating for Ireland as a whole.”
‘We need to cut out the bureaucracy and the needless regulations. There are 20 pages of legislation and small print for Enterprise Investment Incentive Scheme’
His strong feelings about Irish business are partly rooted in personal experience. “I got involved in angel investing over the years and have been very fortunate to have backed a few highly successful Irish companies. I invest in early-stage scaling and start-up companies and am working with a number of very exciting companies at the moment.”
He says he became an angel investor “more by accident than design”. “Like many Irish people I lost a chunk of money in property investments in the financial crisis,” he recalls. “I had made a couple of small angel investments in 2006 and 2007. Looking back to 2012, all I was left with from the property investments was a nice wedge of debt, but the angel investments were still growing. That led me to pay more attention to investing in early-stage companies.”
One of his first investments was in Global Shares, the Clonakilty-based company that went on to become the most successful ever exit by an Irish fintech when it was acquired in 2022 by JP Morgan in a deal worth €655 million.
Another of his early investments was in Irish computer chipmaker Decawave which was sold to US-based Qorvo in 2020 in a deal worth more than €360 million. “Backing a few big winners like that early on got me hooked on the whole area of angel investing.”
It wasn’t just the financial returns. “I love being around entrepreneurs, they tend to be risk takers, and they are doing real good for the economy and the country. I took a picture of the Global Shares car park in Clonakilty in 2014. It was full of cars in the depths of the recession. The company was employing a lot of people in a small rural town. That was transformative for the town.”
He describes it as a remarkable story: “I invested with a group of friends in 2007. It almost went off the rails and was on the cusp of failure back in 2010 and 2011. But the group of angels took the business by the scruff of the neck and made some big changes. We rebuilt the management team and refinanced the business. It became an overnight success after 15 years. It shows what can be achieved and is one of the things I’m most proud of.
“It moved the dial for me from a personal financial perspective,” he continues. “But the double bottom line is very important. That day in 2014 when we saw the impact of what we had done and achieved remains a standout moment for me.”
‘The tailwinds that brought the FDI here have gone, and we need to support indigenous business’
That was just the beginning, and since that first investment he has backed more than 100 ventures spread across Ireland, the UK, Europe and the US. He sits on the boards of several companies including serving as director of strategic partnerships for Irish fintech Alt21 and is the chair of Evercam, the Irish construction visibility platform.
He believes a radical simplification of the tax and support regime for entrepreneurs and founders is required. “We need to cut out the bureaucracy and the needless regulations. We are so weighed down in bureaucracy. There are 20 pages of legislation and small print for the Enterprise Investment Incentive Scheme (EIIS), for example. That’s very, very hard on founders. The fact that early stage companies struggling to raise €100,000 have to pay €10,000 to get tax advice on it is outrageous.”
There is a need to return to the 20 per cent rate of capital gains tax for transactions involving active companies, he contends. “The 33 per cent rate incentivises Irish people to invest in internationally quoted companies like Google or Apple instead of businesses here in Ireland. And the tax reliefs we have are misdirected and don’t work.”
He believes the country is well placed to provide additional supports to founders and early stage businesses and should not allow the opportunity to pass. “We are in a fantastic place with super talent coming out of FDI companies,” he says. “We need to invest in that. The tailwinds that brought the FDI here have gone, and we need to support indigenous business as that is the only thing we are in control of as a country. What President Trump is doing will determine where FDI goes. We can’t do anything about that. But we can support Irish people to start businesses here.
“We are at a great starting point, if we don’t mess it up,” he continues. “We have a wonderful opportunity to build a great economy. We need to control what we can control and make it easier for early stage and scaling companies to succeed.”
‘Venture capital helps businesses that have already got out of the traps and are doing well. It’s how we support companies at the very early stages that matters most’
He points to the long-term benefits of supporting entrepreneurs and the downside of failing to do so. “People who set up successful businesses usually go on to set up other successful businesses,” he points out. “Our tax regime drives people out of the country. A huge number of Irish businesspeople are not tax resident here. Nearly all the successful people have been driven out of the country. They need to think long and hard about staying here. I could have moved abroad and bought a nice villa somewhere and paid no tax, but I love this country, and I had young children and wanted to stay here.”
He describes that decision as almost like paying a voluntary tax.
“Back in the noughties we had a 20 per cent rate of [capital gains tax] on M&A gains and pretty much nobody went offshore back then,” he continues. “Now it’s the norm rather than the exception for people with big windfalls to go abroad. It’s natural for them to spend and invest money near where they are living and not back home in Ireland. That’s a crazy financial and economic policy. Keeping them here makes so much sense.”
He believes a reduction in capital gains tax would be far more impactful than tax reliefs, regardless of how generous they might be. “Entrepreneurs and investors are going for the big prize,” he says. “They aren’t motivated by tax relief. If they are, they’re looking at the wrong thing. And the EIIS doesn’t apply to a lot of people who have the money to invest in businesses. Their capital is held in companies and other vehicles and income tax relief isn’t a great motivator.”
He acknowledges that venture capital availability has improved over the years but again points out that this is of limited value. “It’s founders and entrepreneurs that start businesses, not venture capital funds,” he says. “Venture capital helps businesses that have already got out of the traps and are doing well. Global Shares never got venture capital funding, for example. It’s how we support companies at the very early stages that matters most. We need to unleash the animal spirit of entrepreneurs. But we can’t do that if we overtax them and drive them out of the country.”
