🔥 The Torch Passes
2026 Issue 2 - Equal1’s $60m leap, the Harvey AI arrival, and a reality check on the "Efficiency Era."
Welcome to Issue 2 of 2026 for “The Land of Saints, Scholars, and Techies”
It has been a minute! 👋 If you have been with me since the early days of 2021, welcome back. If you are new here, you’ve joined at an exciting time.
I hope you enjoy this revived edition. As always, if you get value from this, please share it with your network or forward the email.
If you aren’t subscribed, why not join the growing community (250 +) enjoying a concise, curated monthly e-mail covering Irish start-ups and tech directly to your inbox for free!
Here is what mattered and happened in January.
The Big Story: Quantum Leaps > Silicon Valleys
For the last decade, “Irish Tech” has been synonymous with the Big American HQs. But January 2026 has made it abundantly clear that the era of easy Big Tech growth is no longer guaranteed and we need to look elsewhere.
The headline grabber this month wasn’t a layoff—it was a war chest. Equal1, the UCD spin-out, secured a massive $60m to turn standard silicon into quantum computing gold.
While the rest of us were trying to survive “Dry January,” Equal1 was proving that Ireland isn’t just a place where we regulate data; it’s where we invent the computing power to process it.
We can’t ignore the elephant in the room around the oncoming "efficiency era”. Amazon confirmed large-scale layoffs, with ~300 roles impacting Ireland, and Zendesk showed that they halved their workforce in Ireland over the last while.
The narrative from Seattle is that they are “cutting layers to fund AI.” It is a brutal calculus. For the Irish market, this is a reminder: relying solely on FDI job creation is a strategy for 2015, not 2026. The safety net isn’t the multinational anymore; it’s the startup ecosystem and expanding our expertise beyond SaaS.
Homegrown Heroes
While the giants stumbled, the locals sprinted.
Luminate Medical (Galway) raised $21m to stop chemotherapy-induced hair loss. This is “Tech for Good” with a hard commercial edge—and zero AI buzzwords required.
Boundless has been acquired by Payoneer. Founders Dee Coakley and Emily Castles have shown exactly how you build, scale, and exit a world-class remote work platform from Dublin. A massive win for the ecosystem.
The Round-Up: Luna raised capital to keep scooters safe, and TeamFeePay is proving that sports-tech is recession-proof. Additionally, Overpath and Project Eleven secured fresh pre-seed funding to kick off their journeys.
The Round-Up: Speed Read
Too busy for the details? Here is the cheat sheet.
The Silicon Valley Arrival: OpenAI-backed Harvey AI is officially setting up shop in the Docklands. The legal-tech unicorn (valued at $8bn) is kicking off a hiring spree to anchor its EMEA operations. If you’re a lawyer worried about AI, now might be the time to make it your new co-worker.
The Builders: CeADAR has opened applications for its 2026 AI Ecosystem Accelerator (aiming to turn 12 startups into “investment-ready” machines), while the government just signed off on a massive €100m expansion for Tyndall to build “Silicon Ireland.”
The Buyers: Integrity360 and Uniphar are still on a shopping spree. Integrity360 just hopped the Atlantic to buy Calgary-based Advantus360, while Uniphar snatched up Limerick’s TouchStore to digitize the local pharmacy.
The Hubs: Qualcomm is dropping €125m to turn Cork into a global AI pillar (aiming for 1,000+ staff), while Siemens Healthineers just cut the ribbon on a new €10m R&D centre in Swords to reinvent how we test for diseases.
The New Kids: CoinJar (Crypto) and Block (Fintech) have both doubled down on Dublin as their regulated gateway to Europe. CoinJar is backing its move with a €5m investment and 30 new roles to navigate the new EU digital asset rules.
Quick Poll 🗳️
With a bit of uncertainty in the Irish market are you considering making a job change this year?
Career Moves
Ed O’Riordan’s Talent Tracker In the spirit of ecosystem-building, I have to give a shout-out to Ed O’Riordan. He’s just dropped a massive list of 112 VC-backed startup roles hiring right now in Ireland. What’s impressive here is the signal-to-noise ratio as a number of these aren’t even on LinkedIn yet. If you’re looking to jump into a high-growth team (or know someone who is), this is the definitive January shortlist. 👉 Check out the full list here.
Shameless Plug - TA.guru
It is time for a shameless plug - I do have to pay the bills somehow.
If you are struggling to navigate the current hiring landscape—whether you are a scale-up needing to build out a team quickly or an established company with a hiring surge —check out TA.guru.
We provide embedded Talent Acquisition expertise and recruitment enablement to help you scale without the headache of expensive agencies.
👉 Need hiring help? Check out TA.guru or drop me a note here or on Linkedin.
My Story and The Land’s Background
👋 To quickly re-introduce myself to anyone new … My name is Seán. I am in my early 30s, born and raised largely in Dublin so apologies if my capital bias may sometimes show up.
I work in the tech industry and believe that the Irish ecosystem is surprisingly dynamic for such a small country. I originally started this newsletter to capture the biggest stories with a bit of commentary. After a break, I felt the ecosystem was moving too fast to ignore, so I’m back to documenting it.
Thank you for taking some time out of your busy lives to read!
Got feedback? I’m constantly looking to improve this. Reach out in the comments or on LinkedIn.
💬 Contact me: thelandsst@gmail.com
🤝 Want to be friends then connect with me on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/se%C3%A1ngalligan/
Cheers,
Seán