10 DIA Start-ups to Follow in 2024 🚀

The struggles and successes of being a Founder have been well-documented, both in literary research and increasingly in popular culture. Shows like "Billions," "Mad Men," and "The Social Network," even the cautionary tale of Elizabeth Holmes in "The Dropout," portray Founders as complex figures, not always squeaky clean but undoubtedly intelligent, driven, and action-oriented, earning respect for their visionary ideas.

In my opinion, anyone with the vision to conceive an idea and the courage to build a company deserves huge admiration. But in my eyes, a Founder who chooses to do this after emigrating to a new country deserves even more kudos.

They often face additional challenges like adapting to cultural norms and language, building a network from scratch, and sometimes lacking basic credibility compared to locals. These emigrant Founders are simply forces of nature:

It's also no secret that Ireland has a long history of producing these "forces of nature" across the globe, and their stories deserve all the support and promotion the diaspora can offer (one of the reasons I launched DIA).

So to kick off 2024, I've compiled a list of Digital Irish Abroad startups and Founders poised for an exciting year. The list encompasses startups from the US, UK, Australia, China, and even Kenya.

The list hasn’t been ranked, but I am beginning with my favourite DIA startup at the moment, of how two Limerick lads are building the biggest bank in Africa.

My only ask is to let me know if I have missed any startups that you feel deserve promotion (reply to this email 😁), I would love to cover them in this blog, especially if they are off the beaten track.

Also, be sure to check them all out, follow them, and if you think you can add any value to their development, give them a holler! I’ve included links to their website and LinkedIn.

Happy reading ☕ 🍀

Umba 🇰🇪

• Founders: Tiernan Kennedy and Barry O'Mahony (excited the business last year)

• Locations: Nigeria, Kenya, San Francisco

• Stage: Series A (€15M), founded in 2019

• One Liner: Umba is an African digital bank, offering free bank accounts and financial services to customers in Kenya and Nigeria

2023 was a big one for Umba, as they utilised the money from their Series A raise in 2022 to enter the Kenyan market, where CEO Kennedy resides.

The company is not short of ambition offering no-fee current accounts, free payments and bill payments, as well as providing Umba users loans. Impressively Umba has millions of downloads from the Google Play Store.

If Umba are going to make good on its aspiration to be the biggest African bank by 2027, then 2024 will need to be a big one.

Imprint 🇺🇸

• Founder: Daragh Murphy

• Location: New York

• Stage: Series B ($75m), founded in 2020

• One Liner: Imprint is a full-stack payments and loyalty platform developer that offers payment processing services.

Daragh Murphy's startup Imprint has gained recognition for its approach to rewards allows for more personalised offerings than traditional bank cards, fostering increased customer loyalty and spending.

Hailing from Clane, Co Kildare, Ireland, Daragh began his journey by studying law at University College Dublin before making his mark in New York. He graduated from Duke University School of Law and gained admission to the bar in New York. Subsequently, he worked as VP of operations and strategy at WeWork before going all in on Imprint.

Having closed their huge Series B in November during the toughest fundraising environment for fintechs ever, it’s clear that Imprint has a big year ahead.

Lansil Global 🇨🇳

• Founder: Alan Coughlan

• Location: Founded in Hong Kong and HQ’d in Shenzhen

  Stage: Privately held, founded in 2015

• One Liner: Lansil Global redefines excellence in sourcing from China, ensuring customers access top-tier products.

The logistics fulfilment company specialises in the handling of e-commerce merchandise, including clothing, cosmetics, jewellery, and electronics from Asia and was set up by Alan after he completed his studies in China.

Just last month Lansil Global leased its second warehouse 32,069-square-foot space in the Mechanicsburg area, its first location in the Eastern U.S. after setting up its first operation in Nevada. Lansil also has locations in Shenzhen, China, and the United Arab Emirates.

The group has recovered very strongly from the COVID crisis recording $38 million during the financial year that ended at the beginning of April 2021. I love Alan’s story and he deserves huge credit for growing his business in a notoriously hard market for emigrants to set up in.

Odin 🇬🇧

• Founder: Patrick Ryan

• Location: London

  Stage: Seed stage (£2.4m) fintech, founded in 2019

• One Liner: Odin lets you raise money from your network seamlessly, in a few clicks. the platform handles all legal, payments, admin and regulatory cover.

The London-based investment platform raised $3m (£2.4m) in a seed round including contributions from 220 angels through its investment platform in May 2023. To date 5,000 have used Odin to invest in more than 300 businesses mostly at the pre-seed and seed level.

Patrick and Odin also run a great newsletter on angel investing, tech and economics that has 8,000 subscribers.

SYKY 🇺🇸

• Founder: Alice Delahunt

• Location: New York

• Stage: Series A ($10.5m), founded in 2022

• One Liner: SYKY is a next-generation luxury fashion tech platform that allows users to create and share their own digital fashion designs.

2023 was huge for Delahunt and SYKY, It started with a large series A raise in January. Later in the year, SYKY launched its marketplace for buying and trading digital (and physical) fashion at London Fashion Week, debuting a capsule collection from one of the platform’s emerging designers.

Delahunt has amassed a hefty list of industry credentials in recent years including ‘World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer’, a Financial Times’’ OUTstanding Future Leaders award’, and has been listed as one of the ‘Vogue Business 100 Innovators.

The industry hype around this product is incredible, 2024 could see SYKY become even more prominent in shaping the future of fashion.

Keychain 🇺🇸

• Founder: Oisin Hanrahan

• Location: New York

• Stage: Seed (€16.8M), founded in 2023

• One Liner: Keychain’s AI-powered technology brings unprecedented clarity and convenience to the Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) supply chain, streamlining processes for brands in a vast and fragmented market.

The serial Irish entrepreneur based in New York has raised a whopping €16.8 million in heavily oversubscribed seed funding for his latest venture. Oisin's journey started with co-founding Handy HQ, a platform that reshaped the home services sector, culminating in a nine-figure exit to Angi and eventually taking over as CEO.

Keychain is in the very early stages of development, but given the team’s pedigree and experience big things are expected in 2024.

Expert 360 🇦🇺

• Founder: Bridget Loudon

• Locations: Sydney and Auckland

• Stage: Series C (€12M), founded in 2013

• One Liner: Expert360 Marketplace empower thousands of organisations to build, scale and manage flexible, on-demand workforces.

Just last month Loudon was recognised for leading the fastest-growing female-led tech company over $50M and placing Expert360 12th overall in the Deloitte Tech Fast50 in Australia.

Loudon's journey doesn't end with Expert360. Recently, at the age of 32, she achieved a milestone by becoming the youngest independent director of an ASX top 200 company—joining the Telstra board. Australia’s largest telecoms company.

CIM 🇦🇺

• Founder: David Walsh

• Location: Sydney, Dublin, London and Colorado

• Stage: Series A (€10M), founded in 2014

• One Liner: CIM creates innovative building analytics software that helps run large buildings at their peak performance.

A decade-old federal policy has given CIM a head start on global rivals in the race for energy efficiency leadership. The policy, which mandates disclosure of energy performance for buildings vying for government contracts, established nationwide standards that leapfrogged Australia over countries like the UK and the US. In fact, the UK only implemented a similar mandatory ruling in 2022.

This unique advantage has propelled CIM to a commanding position. The company recently reported having 500 buildings across the globe on its platform, generating $10 million in revenue in 2022.

While the majority currently stems from Australia, Tipp native Walsh predicts a significant shift towards overseas markets as CIM expands its US and European client base. This expansion prompted Walsh's recent relocation to the States to spearhead a major opportunity in the region.

Bobbie 🇺🇸

• Founder: Laura Modi

• Location: San Francisco

• Stage: Series C (€70M), founded in 2018

• One Liner: Bobbie offers organic baby formula to parents through a subscription service.

Bobbie announced a $70m raise in July, which was used to acquire cult US brand Nature's One. The acquisition will provide Bobbie with end-to-end control over formula manufacturing through a new manufacturing facility. It will also triple the size of its operations for the high-profile company that also recently hit $100 million in revenues for the first time.

Before Bobbie, Mayo native Modi was the Director of Hospitality at Airbnb, where she was responsible for host operations and community. She also held product operations roles at Google.

2024 has already got off to a flyer when the business partnered with Naomi Osaka for their first major TV campaign, which aired on Sunday on ESPN during the Australian Open, marking her return to the sport six months after giving birth.

Chemist4U 🇬🇧

• Founder: James O'Loan

• Location: Liverpool

• Stage: Series A (£12m), founded in 2019

• One Liner: Chemist4U is a multi-channel retail e-commerce company. Chemist4U is an online pharmacy offering prescriptions.

The Liverpool-based online pharmacy handles 190,000 orders a month and was on track to hit £29m turnover in the 12 months to September 2023, helping them close an impressive Series A round in 2023.

O’Loan said: “Our plan is for Chemist4U to become one of the biggest NHS dispensing facilities in the country as well as support partners with our outsourced dispensing services which is our fastest growing division.”

The already profitable group will use the funds provided by Pitalia Capital to acquire a c40,000 sq ft property to centralise its operations and increase its workforce from 120 to 150 in 2024.

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