Changing Ireland
Unemployed win enterprise awards
From a house in Donegal to the Departure Lounge of Dublin Airport T
BY BEN PANTER
op prize of €1,250 and a crystal glass trophy went to an unusual high-tech business venture, uPilot Teoranta. The Donegal based business - set-up by John Paul Boyle & Kevin Boyle, no relation - four months ago won the award to the surprise of its founders. “I said to my business partner Kevin Boyle that if we won a runnerup prize we’d have a few drinks and when we saw the line-up we thought we had no chance. It was great to be recognised.” The company currently operates a B737-800 flight simulator in Dublin Airport’s Terminal 2. People passing through can now experience flying a jet, while trainee pilots can use it for interview preparation. “Since 9/11, the cockpit doors have been closed to the public – we open them up again,” said John Paul. It costs €45 for 15 minutes, with a 5-minute briefing beforehand Donegal’s Majella O’Donnell, wife of country star Daniel, tried it out and said it was “very nerve racking but great fun.” Children can even try it. The company recently sold its first flight simulator and the latest business request it received is for a ship simulator. John Paul’s interest in aviation goes back to childhood: “Dad had old war comics with aircraft from WWII and I was always looking at the airplanes.” While employed in the construction industry, John Paul had been working towards getting his pilot’s license, until that dream ended with the property crash. He decided on a career change, availed of the Back To Education Programme, learnt IT skills in Letterkenny Institute of Technology and, on completing the course, he set about building his own small flight simulator at home. Kevin is a childhood friend of John Paul’s with a background in
1st Place: uPilot Teoranta
John Paul Boyle and Kevin Boyle inside the cockpit simulator they built. audio/visuals. It was the convenient combination of aviation, audiovisual and IT skills the men possessed that made it possible for them to design and manufacture the flight simulators. The first one took two years of research and planning and six months to build. Parts were imported from America, France, Spain, Australia and the U.K. They brought the cockpit simulator to a local school to give pupils a taste of the pilot experience, much to the youngsters’ delight. They knew they had a potential business and embarked on their biggest challenge to date; building a 1:1 scale Boeing 737 Airliner flight simulator. So who would be the typical customer for such a niche product? John Paul said, ”Corporate events organisers might look for a simplified version and then there are people looking to set up in shopping malls and home enthusiasts.” Winning the award has brought publicity for the fledgling business and it has featured on local and national radio, as well as hitting the public relations jackpot – ‘Changing Ireland’. John Paul takes a pragmatic approach to the firm’s future saying he wants to “grow the business slowly” and is open-minded as to what direction the company will take in the future. There are plans to hire up to four employees although getting people with the right skills and credentials to get security clearance in Dublin airport can be a challenge. uPilot Teoranta is a remarkable and a worthy winner, that proves, yet again, the benefits of a bottom up approach to national economic recovery. Changing Ireland wishes John-Paul, Evan and all the other contestants at the Border Regional Enterprise Awards all the best for the future.
“When we saw the line-up we thought we had no chance,” said John Paul
W: www.upilot.ie
“Nerve-wracking but fun,” said Majella, pictured here with husband Daniel. You can either be informed and your own rulers, or you not ignorant, rule over you. – Julian Assange.
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can be ignorant and have someone else, who is