The overnight success of entrepreneurs such as Leah Busque Solivan (founder of TaskRabbit, an online marketplace for services, which was sold to IKEA in 2017), or Max Levchin and Peter Thiel (founders of PayPal, sold to eBay in 2002 for $1.5bn) is almost as envy inducing as it is inspiring. The narrative of the underdog — in this case, cereal-box scribbled ideas with hopes of being brought to fruition — is compelling. So how does the impossible become possible?
LaunchBox has the answer to this David-and-Goliath paradox.
The programme was launched in 2013 by Portal, Trinity’s professionally managed department dedicated to innovation and entrepreneurship. It has since gone on to boast startups that have collectively raised €150m and created 350 jobs. It was initiated by Vinny Cahill, the current Dean of Research, and is privately funded by the “Trinity Angels”, a group of business leaders and entrepreneurs made up of a network of Trinity alumni and friends. Prospective teams can consist of students from any college so long as they have at least one current Trinity student as a member to apply, making it accessible to the wider community.
Once accepted the programme kicks off with phase one, which occurs during term time over an eight week period commencing in February and March. Phase one provides the teams with expert advice and product development, and supports fine-tuning business pitches. If successful, teams then move onto phase two: a summer residency programme in the heart of Dublin’s Silicon Docks for the duration of the summer. That time is used to round out the sharp edges of projects with bespoke support and mentorship for the teams.
Two notable alumni of LaunchBox 2021 who Pavilion Bar frequenters may be familiar with are Oliver Feeney and Pat Joyce, founders of the alcoholic beverage brand X-LITE. The drink markets itself as a low-calorie and sugar-free alternative to your standard cocktail can. It’s now available in over 400 stores across Ireland including Supervalu, Centra, Tesco, and Dunnes Stores.
Trinity News spoke to Alison Treacy, manager of Student Startup and Innovation at Trinity and director of the LaunchBox programme, to understand what LaunchBox looks for in its applicants and if she thought there were any common characteristics across previous successful teams.
For Treacy, there was no definitive “secret to success”. As she asserted, “every team is different, [which] is the true, if clichéd, answer to this question.”
“I personally always look for a solution to a real-world problem, something that pings in my brain: ‘Oh yeah, why doesn’t that exist yet?’” Treacy told Trinity News. “We look for a strong team with a varied skill profile… we love to see teams applying from a couple of different degree subjects.”
“Listen to advice and feedback, and seek out validation from future customers instead of working in a vacuum”
Like any entrepreneurial programme that instills the honourable value of “people over product”, Treacy was keen to emphasise that success is more often found in “inherently coachable” applicants who are willing to learn from interactions with the consumers of their products. As she argued, aspiring entrepreneurs are those who “listen to advice and feedback, and seek out validation from their future customers instead of working in a vacuum”.
LaunchBox allows founders to see progress over the course of a relatively short period of time. But Treacy and the LaunchBox team also enjoy witnessing participants’ personal growth, as well as their project growth, as a consequence of the programme. Treacy recalled: “One of my favourite parts over the years I’ve been running LaunchBox has been seeing the co-founder [of a proposed project], who got so nervous public speaking in week one, then standing up and pitching, not a bother on them, to this huge audience by the end of the programme.”
But is individual growth and optimism enough to get your ideas off of the ground?
Brian Kelleher, LaunchBox alumnus and the founder and CEO of MicroDoc, gave his insight into the programme and what it takes to build a business.
“The big draw for me [of Launchbox] was the people and the accountability. It gives you a sense of how much more you could be doing… it helps you accelerate faster,” Kelleher told Trinity News. “The value of cohort based programs are two fold: firstly, you meet an impressive group of people and [secondly] there is an accountability mechanism.”
“The thing that really drives me with this is making something that changes people’s lives”
Kelleher’s company MicroDoc, an AI assistant for medical professionals that helps them to process paperwork more efficiently, grew from his desire to unburden his parents (both doctors) from tedious bureaucracy. Kelleher said: “The thing that really drives me with this is making something that changes people’s lives. Often existing products are so bad that making something that feels like magic makes someone’s day.”
Although he admits that passion is a component of success, he concluded that it doesn’t entirely constitute the two pillars of success. In his experience, these are “endurance and intelligence”. He added that “the third thing is being comfortable with a large amount of risk… If you are trying to innovate and try something new, it’s in many ways uncharted territory, and so you have to be comfortable with the uncertainty”.
“Entrepreneurship is in many ways like a marathon, an endurance sport – who can last the most rounds and still be willing to keep going”
For Kelleher, resilience and a strong work ethic are critical to success: “Entrepreneurship is in many ways like a marathon, an endurance sport — who can last the most rounds and still be willing to keep going.”
Unfortunately, startups don’t exist in a vacuum, and require funding. According to StartUpBlink’s Global StartUp Ecosystem Report, startup funding has been declining since 2021. Ireland places 17th in startup success globally. Dublin sits much further down for cities globally, at 54th. Despite these less than favourable stats, Kelleher’s Launchbox cohort from 2023 saw six out of the ten teams achieve long-term success, either making significant revenues or successfully receiving funding.
The 2025 programme begins at the end of January; a new generation of LaunchBox teams begin to take their first steps into the world of startups. LaunchBox has helped countless alumni bridge what Kelleher refers to as “the disconnect between the day-to-day and the grand ambitions” with the “execution of the thousands of small steps in between” that bring post-it note ideas and cereal box scribbles to fruition.
