Inside Business with Ciaran Hancock The Irish Times

Last weekend, Tony O’Reilly, one of Ireland’s leading businessmen, died at the age of 88 after a short illness. He had a hugely successful career both on the rugby pitch, as a star with Ireland and the Lions, and in the boardroom where he founded the Kerrygold butter brand, ran the Heinz food group in Pittsburgh for decades, and had a portfolio of personal interests ranging from Independent Newspapers to oil explorer Providence Resources.
He was also the co-founder of the Ireland Funds charity which has provided millions of euros in funding for projects on both sides of the border for the guts of 50 years.
His business career ultimately ended in failure after bankruptcy in 2015. So, how should we view his career, and ultimately, what will his legacy be?
To debate this, host Ciarán Hancock was joined by Irish Times columnist Fintan O’Toole and Rory Godson, the founder and managing director of communications advisory group Powerscourt - Rory wrote about Tony O’Reilly as a journalist and later worked for him as an advisor.
Produced by John Casey with JJ Vernon on sound.

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Some 18,000 housing commencements were recorded in April. It’s a huge number and well up on the normal run rate. What was behind that spike?
 
And do we have enough construction workers to build these homes and get to the magic 50,000 new homes a year target that we’re told we need to hit in order to meet demand?
 
On this week’s episode of Inside Business, host Ciarán Hancock is joined on the line by director general of the Construction Industry Federation Hubert Fitzpatrick to discuss these issues.
 
Also on the podcast, this week saw Intel’s huge manufacturing campus in Leixlip, Co Kildare make global headlines with reports of an €11 billion refinancing and the possibility of investment in a new plant there. Local TD James Lawless of Fianna Fail joined us in studio to go through the details.
 
Produced by John Casey with JJ Vernon on sound.

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This episode of the Inside Business podcast looks at Ireland's commercial and residential property markets.
In part one John McCartney, Director of Research at BNP Paribas Real Estate Ireland, discusses a significant surge in Dublin's office vacancies and the factors affecting office space demand, including the global economic downturn, a tech sector slowdown, and shifts in workspace needs post-COVID.
In part two economics columnist Cliff Taylor looks at Sinn Féin's criticism of first-time buyer support schemes and the State's spending on measures to help people find homes.
The episode also explores the potential for repurposing vacant office spaces into housing and the challenges associated with these conversions.

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This week we take a deep dive into the issues impacting tech giant Apple. In the year to date, the iPhone maker's share price has fallen by more than 8 per cent, and about €300 billion has been wiped off its market value. Apple has ceded to Microsoft its status as the most valuable US company.
This drop was spurred by declining sales in China, regulatory scrutiny of its app store, and mounting concerns that the company has lost its edge on innovation, especially in the field of AI. 
But is Apple's recent decline likely to continue in the longer term? Business Editor Ciaran Hancock gets a range of perspectives.
Guests: Geoff Blaber, CEO of CCS Insight, Denis Staunton, Irish Times China correspondent, Karlin Lillington, Irish Times technology columnist and Ciara O'Brien, Irish Times business and technology journalist.

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On this week’s Inside Business with Ciarán Hancock we look at Aviva’s plan to re-enter the Irish health insurance market and what that might mean for consumers.
 
Will this deliver lower prices for hard pressed Irish consumers? Will it bring additional benefits in coverage? And is worth the hassle to switch for customers of VHI, Laya and Irish Life Health? To get some answers to these questions and more, Ciarán is joined on the podcast by Dermot Goode of Totalcover.ie, a Locktons Company, and an expert on Irish health insurance.
 
Also on the podcast, the Government published its Stability Programme Update. This is an update of budgetary forecasts provided to the European Union. It predicts a surplus for this year of €8.6 billion and a warning that the economy has slowed.
Cliff Taylor of The Irish Times has been through the document to break down the vast array of numbers and what they mean. How much of the budget surplus might be used to fund tax cuts or additional spending on key public services, given that €6 billion is earmarked for two sovereign funds?
Produced by John Casey with JJ Vernon on sound.

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On this week’s episode of Inside Business, host Ciarán Hancock is joined in studio by aviation entrepreneur Ulick McEvaddy. With his brother Des, Ulick has established a successful aviation business over the past 40 years called Omega.
 
He and Des also own a large parcel of land beside Dublin Airport. Along with two other landowners, it amounts to 260 acres and was put on the market for sale in the middle of last year.
 
With no sale agreed, they subsequently submitted a concept plan to Fingal County Council to develop the site for a third passenger terminal at Dublin Airport, as part of a €2.2 billion development.
 
He argues that for the same money as DAA is proposing to spend on its own expansion plan, his proposal would allow the airport to expand by an additional 20 million passengers while solving road access issues and providing a platform for Dublin to become a hub for sustainable aviation fuel.
 
Crucially, however, he doesn’t have access to the runway, something that was an issue for bidders in the land sale process.
 
You’ll hear Ulick address that issue and explain why his plan isn’t, as many believe, pie in the sky.
 
Produced by John Casey with JJ Vernon on sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.