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If you are a freelancer or small business who needs a bit of office space to run your business The Hub in Newry at present have a couple of private office spaces available within their collaborative environment.
The Hub can also be used as a meeting venue.
They have both a 2 person and a 4 person space with very reasonable monthly fee including rates, electric.
The Hub is located at 6 St Colman's Park in Newry.
You can contact Suzanne at 028 3026 0122 or check out www.thehubnewry.com for information on the facility.
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Autoline Insurance Group based in Newry has announced 60 jobs and Enterprise, Trade and Investment Minister Arlene Foster called at the Rathfriland Road Head Office yesterday to hail the success of the business.
The Minister said: “Autoline’s success has been built on innovation. It was the first broker in Europe to launch an app that offered insurance premium discounting directly linked to driving behaviour. As a result, it has significantly grown its customer base of young drivers. It is now planning to develop its own telematics and data analysis platform, which will help it to more than double its gross written premium by 2018 with almost 60 per cent of sales coming from outside Northern Ireland.
“The new positions being announced today, which will pay above the Northern Ireland private sector median, bring the total employed by Autoline to over 200. The additional salaries will contribute £1.5million a year to the economy.
“Invest NI is committed to supporting business growth and economic development across all areas of Northern Ireland and has offered Autoline £390,000 of support for the jobs, which will create employment opportunities for a wide variety of people. This expansion and the development of its data analysis platform will enable Autoline to remain at the forefront of the market, increasing and extending its market share.”
Michael Blaney, Managing Director of Autoline, said: “Since developing our app we have become a leading player in the telematics insurance industry. The telematics platform will enable us to analyse the data collected through our app. This will give us a valuable commodity that we can sell on to other insurers and brokers and which will help us to substantially increase sales, particularly in Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland.
“Invest NI’s support for the new jobs is ensuring that we can build our capacity quickly to take advantage of this opportunity.”
Arlene Foster added: “Autoline is an example of the many small and medium sized businesses in Northern Ireland which, with the support of Invest NI, are making an important contribution to our economy.
“Through Invest NI’s support over £21million was invested by businesses in Newry, Mourne and Down council area last year. As a result, 576 new jobs were promoted by Invest NI during the year, an increase of 111% on the previous 12 month period.
“Invest NI initiatives, alongside the activities of the local business community, are encouraging companies, such as Autoline, to bring forward activities that will enable them to compete more effectively and successfully, particularly in markets outside Northern Ireland.”
Speaking from the jobs launch today Conor Murphy MP said “I congratulate Autoline and Managing director Michael Blaney on the continued growth of this locally based company. This Newry based company currently employs almost 150 workers and these additional jobs will be a further boost to the local economy.
“I also welcome the support provided by Invest NI in this expansion. It is important that indigenous business receives the support of statutory investment agencies to stimulate the economy and job creation.”
Autoline is one of Northern Ireland’s leading independent brokers providing a range of insurance and financial services to both personal and business clients across Northern Ireland. The new jobs will support a further move into the wider UK and Republic of Ireland markets and form part of the company’s multi-million pound investment plans over the next four years.
The 60 new jobs will be based primarily in the company’s headquarters in Newry but there will be a number of opportunities in the other branches in Ballymena, Coleraine, Downpatrick and Enniskillen.
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Minister Arlene Foster was the keynote speaker at the inaugural NI Small Business Conference hosted by Newry Chamber of Commerce & Trade in Newry and supported by Invest NI and Newry & Mourne District Council.
Over 130 business delegates from across Northern Ireland attended the half day event which took place in the Canal Court Hotel. Other keynote speakers included Padraig Canavan, founder of Singularity which sold for £30m; Mark Gowdy, White’s Speedicook and Adrian Toner, First Derivatives, a Newry company with global success. Informative workshops were delivered by Invest Northern Ireland, InterTradeIreland, Stakeholder Communications, PKF-FPM, Labour Relations Agency and Ionology.
President Deborah Loughran, Newry Chamber stated, “we are delighted with the success of this event. The vast majority of companies in Northern Ireland are SME’s whose biggest challenge is winning new business. This event provided a wealth of exceptional advice from industry leaders to delegates on meeting this challenge head on. The Minister’s support in attending this important event is evidence of key role that SME’s provide to the NI economy’.
Enterprise, Trade and Investment Minister, Arlene Foster said “Today’s conference provided an ideal opportunity for small businesses to expand their network of contacts and to learn about the support services available from Invest NI and others that are committed to achieving economic growth and job creation within the region.
“While there is no room for complacency, recent indicators for the local economy have been positive and it is encouraging that businesses are beginning to see signs of recovery. Our companies are continuing to broaden their horizons and Northern Ireland continues to be an attractive location for globally mobile investment across a range of sectors. Expansion plans announced recently by businesses in the area, including the announcement of 60 new jobs by Autoline in Newry, are proof of that.
“Improving economic competitiveness can only be achieved by working in partnership with the business community. As Northern Ireland is a small business economy, I want to continue to help small firms grow through export success and innovation.”
Mayor Daire Hughes, Newry & Mourne District Council stated, “Newry & Mourne District Council was glad to support the NI Small Business Conference. Newry & Mourne is renowned for its entrepreneurial spirit with 7% of all of the North of Ireland businesses located here, yet only 5% of the population. Hosting this conference in Newry has helped showcase our successful indigenous business sector”.
Mark Bleakney, Invest NI’s Southern Regional Manager, said: “One of our core priorities is to help small businesses grow and develop through export success and innovation. This conference provided an important opportunity to highlight the contribution these businesses make towards growing the Northern Ireland economy.”
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Last week's UTV Business Eye Awards with Flybe saw three Newry companies and a Newry-based business leader picking up some of the top accolades.
The Awards ceremony took place at the Culloden, Holywood and saw Norbrook Laboratories win the International Award for its continued achievement in export markets. It was a poignant achievement for the company which lost its Chairman and Chief Executive, Edward Haughey, in a tragic helicopter accident earlier this year.
The Rug House, based at a 60,000 sq.ft warehouse in the Carnbane Industrial Estate, was named as SME (Small & Medium-Sized Enterprise) of the Year from a hotly-contested category. The company sells rugs online to customers in 30 countries around the world. See their Website at www.therughouse.co.uk
Another young Newry entrepreneur Joseph Doherty, the driving force behind ReGen Waste, one of Northern Ireland's most innovative waste management companies took the Young Business Personality of the Year title at the Awards, which were attending by almost 500 people.
Lastly MJM Marine, also based at Carnbane, were awarded the Deal of the Year Award for its job-saving acquistion earlier this year of key elements of the former Mivan business, which had entered administration.
Flybe’s UK General Manager (North and RoI) Andrea Hayes, a member of the judging panel, commented that the entries for the 2014 awards were of a higher quality than ever before. “We were delighted with the calibre of entries this year from right across Northern Ireland. The spread of winners both sectorally and geographically reflect the breadth and depth of business talent inherent locally.”
Michael Wilson, Managing Director of UTV Television, said “The calibre of entries for this year's awards show that there are plenty of ambitious, confident and well led companies operating in Northern Ireland. UTV is delighted once again to recognise and celebrate these top achievers and organisations in such a positive way. These awards represent all that is good about business in Northern Ireland and it is great to see growth and success in so many sectors in spite of the tough times.”
UTV Business Eye Awards with Flybe Full List of Winners
Digital Company of the Year - Total Mobile
Business Consultancy of the Year – ASM Chartered Accountants
Young Business Personality of the Year – Joseph Doherty, ReGen Waste
SME of the Year – The Rug House
Agri Food Innovation Award – Wilson's Country
Employer of the Year - Novosco
Green Company of the Year – Linergy
Business Education Award – Ulster Bank
Research & Development Project of the Year – PathXL
Waste Reduction Project of the Year – Council for the Homeless NI / Fareshare
Tourism/Hospitality Project of the Year - Giro D'Italia Grande Partenza
Retailer of the Year – Lidl Northern Ireland
International Award – Norbrook Laboratories
Deal of the Year - MJM Marine / Mivan
Business Personality of the Year – Eamonn Donaghy
Company of the Year – Decora Blind Systems
Fleet Manufacturer of the Year - Nissan
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At last week's Newry Chamber of Commerce and Trade AGM Deborah Loughran was re-elected President for the second year.
Speaking on the night Deborah stressed the importance of a strong pro-active Chamber in Newry ‘It is an honour and privilege to be re-elected as President of such a dynamic, pro-active and highly respected strategic lobbying and networking organisation’.
‘My first year’s tenure as President at sometimes challenging but very rewarding. The next 12 months will have a significant long term bearing on the Greater Newry Area. Newry Chamber will do all that it can to help local businesses to grow and prosper during this time’.
‘Newry Chamber seeks to represent the interests of its members and the wider community at a local, regional and national Government level. It is imperative for local businesses to have a strong pro-active Chamber fighting for their interests and those of the Greater Newry area’.
Deborah added, ‘Newry Chamber will continue to deliver value added services for members with an exciting calendar of networking events planned for the next 12 months catering to meet the needs of all, providing important business information, advice and networking opportunities. Chamber Officials led by Chief Executive, Orla Jackson, will continue to work in partnership with other organisations to provide members with services and resources which will help their businesses to grow and flourish’.
The President finished by thanking the Executive members and office staff for their continued support and added that she looked forward to another busy year ahead at the helm of Newry Chamber of Commerce and Trade.
The election of the Office Bearers and Executive Committee was presided over by Mr Art Magennis MBE. Mr Declan McChesney, Mr Michael McKeown, Mr Frank O’Connor and Mr Aidan Malone, were elected for the following positions respectively, First Vice President; Second Vice President; Honorary Secretary and Honorary Treasurer.
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A cloud-based software development company has announced that has moved its base from Dublin and is creating six high quality jobs in Newry over the next two years.
ShotClip is a recently established company which has created social movie-making software that enables users to plan, record and edit a professional looking home movie through an interactive story-building app on their Smartphone or tablet device. The software enables multiple users to collaborate to make movies at special events, such as a wedding, or for larger scale global crowd campaigns.
Welcoming the company’s decision to locate in Northern Ireland, Barry McBride, Invest Northern Ireland’s Executive Director of International Business said: “ShotClip is the kind of innovative technology company that has the potential to be a world player. It has decided to relocate to Northern Ireland because of the quality of the talent pool here and the opportunities for raising investment quickly to support its scaling plans.”
Invest NI has offered £48,000 of support for the jobs, which will have salaries significantly above the Northern Ireland private sector average.
ShotClip has been developing its software product to beta status during the last 24 months and currently has 70,000 users, of whom 90 per cent are in the Americas and 10 per cent are in Europe.
ShotClip’s Managing Director, Conor McNally, who also founded the company, said: “Our aim is to make ShotClip a mass market global product with one million users by the end of 2015. That will require an extensive marketing campaign as well as further development of the product. We will therefore be employing skilled technical, design and marketing professionals.
“While we will continue to have a small presence in Dublin, we decided to move our base to Newry because of the availability of high quality personnel and the excellent support from Invest NI, both for the jobs and through the Growth Loan Fund.”
ShotClip has secured £200k funding from the Invest Growth Fund along with £150k from Jenson Solutions Ltd to allow it to undertake some additional product development and marketing activities.
ShotClip’s new crowd movie making app is being released in November 2014.
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Newry based award winning retailer the Rug House takes it's virtual business into the real world this weekend with it's opening sale offering customers 25% of all their rugs!
The event this Saturday 1st of November takes place at their Carnbane Business Park premises, the largest rug store in Ireland.
The company has invested £350,000 in its very first bricks and mortar store in Newry and already ships a record 150,000 rugs per year to 30 countries worldwide is capitalising on its major online success, which has powered business growth from selling on eBay to shipping over 3,000 rugs a week worldwide.
The new purpose-built Rug House in Newry will have more than 1,600 rugs on display in a bespoke showroom which will serve the needs of customers looking to enhance their home or office interiors.
Based in Carnbane Industrial Estate and with 23 staff, the local business has already doubled its work force in two years.
The 60,000 sq ft warehouse will stock more than 300,000 rugs, which the company will use to support a brand new sales drive across Ireland.
Currently 98 per cent of the Rug House’s sales are outside the province with the team sourcing rugs from China, Turkey and Belgium, to meet the diverse needs of a growing customer base in England, Spain, France, Italy and the USA. The new store in Newry will offer shoppers a chance to view the full range of quality rugs that have until now only been offered online.
Paul Vallely, owner The Rug House, said, “Our focus to date has been on growing the business online and this has definitely paid off both through increasing sales and job creation. Customer requirements are changing and while we will continue to deliver our products globally and invest in our online sales, we recognise that there is a demand from customers who want to see the rugs before they purchase.
“The new store will showcase somqe of our own range of rugs that we have invested in developing with global partners as well as give us the chance to display a wider range of accessories that compliment the trends in interiors.”
Started by ambitious brother and sister team Paul and Clare Vallely and now employing 23 full time staff to cater to the demands of the fast-growing business, the Rug House was initially an online venture that has grown rapidly through the dedication of the pair who took on their first employee in March 2009.
Mayor of Newry and Mourne, Councillor Daire Hughes helped Paul and Clare Vallely officially open the store last week.
Daire said, “I am absolutely delighted to officially open the Rug House, which is a great addition to the retail scene in Newry. It is great to see a local success bringing more jobs to the town and we will continue to support them in their endeavours.”
The Vallelys started working in a shed beside their parents’ house but rapid growth they made the move to renting a 10,000 sq ft warehouse to facilitate increasing stock levels. By 2012 they employed 10 full time staff and had built up supplier relationships in Turkey and China that has led them to becoming one of the UK and Ireland’s leading online rug retailers.
The driven team at the Rug House Newry were recently recognised for their exporting success at the DANI Awards and also won the coveted UTV Business Eye Award for SME of the Year believe that they must tap into both online and traditional retail to push for further growth.
Clare Vallely, founder of the Rug House Newry said, “We cannot wait to welcome customers to our store in Newry and will be celebrating with a 25% discount across all our rugs on Saturday 1st November.
“The success of our business has been down to offering excellent quality at an affordable price, we will continue to do this both online and in our new store, where we hope to showcase our products to a local audience. Our plan is to invest more both online and in our store to ensure that the Rug House continues to grow and deliver for our ever-expanding customer base.”
The Rug House is open Monday to Saturday from 9am to 5pm. Visit www.therughouse.co.uk for more information and to view the range of rug designs on offer.
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Newry based award winning retailer the Rug House takes it's virtual business into the real world this weekend with it's opening sale offering customers 25% of all their rugs!
The event this Saturday 1st of November takes place at their Carnbane Business Park premises, the largest rug store in Ireland.
The company has invested £350,000 in its very first bricks and mortar store in Newry and already ships a record 150,000 rugs per year to 30 countries worldwide is capitalising on its major online success, which has powered business growth from selling on eBay to shipping over 3,000 rugs a week worldwide.
The new purpose-built Rug House in Newry will have more than 1,600 rugs on display in a bespoke showroom which will serve the needs of customers looking to enhance their home or office interiors.
Based in Carnbane Industrial Estate and with 23 staff, the local business has already doubled its work force in two years.
The 60,000 sq ft warehouse will stock more than 300,000 rugs, which the company will use to support a brand new sales drive across Ireland.
Currently 98 per cent of the Rug House’s sales are outside the province with the team sourcing rugs from China, Turkey and Belgium, to meet the diverse needs of a growing customer base in England, Spain, France, Italy and the USA. The new store in Newry will offer shoppers a chance to view the full range of quality rugs that have until now only been offered online.
Paul Vallely, owner The Rug House, said, “Our focus to date has been on growing the business online and this has definitely paid off both through increasing sales and job creation. Customer requirements are changing and while we will continue to deliver our products globally and invest in our online sales, we recognise that there is a demand from customers who want to see the rugs before they purchase.
“The new store will showcase somqe of our own range of rugs that we have invested in developing with global partners as well as give us the chance to display a wider range of accessories that compliment the trends in interiors.”
Started by ambitious brother and sister team Paul and Clare Vallely and now employing 23 full time staff to cater to the demands of the fast-growing business, the Rug House was initially an online venture that has grown rapidly through the dedication of the pair who took on their first employee in March 2009.
Mayor of Newry and Mourne, Councillor Daire Hughes helped Paul and Clare Vallely officially open the store last week.
Daire said, “I am absolutely delighted to officially open the Rug House, which is a great addition to the retail scene in Newry. It is great to see a local success bringing more jobs to the town and we will continue to support them in their endeavours.”
The Vallelys started working in a shed beside their parents’ house but rapid growth they made the move to renting a 10,000 sq ft warehouse to facilitate increasing stock levels. By 2012 they employed 10 full time staff and had built up supplier relationships in Turkey and China that has led them to becoming one of the UK and Ireland’s leading online rug retailers.
The driven team at the Rug House Newry were recently recognised for their exporting success at the DANI Awards and also won the coveted UTV Business Eye Award for SME of the Year believe that they must tap into both online and traditional retail to push for further growth.
Clare Vallely, founder of the Rug House Newry said, “We cannot wait to welcome customers to our store in Newry and will be celebrating with a 25% discount across all our rugs on Saturday 1st November.
“The success of our business has been down to offering excellent quality at an affordable price, we will continue to do this both online and in our new store, where we hope to showcase our products to a local audience. Our plan is to invest more both online and in our store to ensure that the Rug House continues to grow and deliver for our ever-expanding customer base.”
The Rug House is open Monday to Saturday from 9am to 5pm. Visit www.therughouse.co.uk for more information and to view the range of rug designs on offer.
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Newry Company First Derivatives have announced very healthy financial results for the six months ending 31st of August 2014 with profit (before tax) increasing by 24% from £3 Million in 2013 to £3.7 Million this year.
The profit came from an increased revenue of £37.5M up from £34.4M in 2013.
It follows increased investment in sales capacity, strong growth in consulting, a growing number of contracts won in Market Surveillance as well as a continuing investment in software products.
Last week the company announced their purchase of a majority stake in Kx Systems that will open up a range of new opportunities in Big Fast Data.
Seamus Keating, Chairman of First Derivatives, commented: “The high revenue visibility in our consulting division combined with the software deals we are working on or have signed during the first half of the year underpin our confidence in meeting market expectations for the full year. The second half has started strongly across the Group, both in terms of business performance and growth in our sales pipeline. We expect a modest enhancement to adjusted earnings in the current year from the Kx Systems transaction, with greater impact in the year to February 2016, despite increasing investment in Kx to maximise its growth potential.
In summary, the Group is well positioned to deliver in the current year and beyond with numerous business development opportunities to accelerate our growth. We view the future with confidence.”
Commenting on the outlook for the coming period Chief Executive Brian Conlon added "Our high visibility over revenue in our consulting division combined with the software deals signed during the year to date underpin our confidence in meeting market expectations for the full year. The second half has started strongly across the Group, both in terms of business performance and growth in our sales pipeline. We expect a modest enhancement to earnings in the current year from the recent purchase of a majority stake in Kx Systems, with a more positive impact in the year to February 2016 even after significant investment in Kx to maximise its growth potential.
"In summary, the Group is well positioned to deliver a solid performance in the current year and beyond with numerous business development opportunities to accelerate our growth."
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