Young Irish innovators in arts, business and healthcare named in Forbes ‘30 under 30’

A number of Irish people have been included in Forbes’s prestigious ‘30 under 30’ list of leading young innovators, entrepreneurs and leaders in Europe.

The ninth annual European list highlighted the achievements of people identified as young leaders across a number of different categories, including media, healthcare, technology and entertainment.

Marking her spot as the youngest person to feature in this year’s 30 under 30 list was Alisha Weir, the 14-year old Irish actress. Weir starred in the titular role in the popular 2023 film Matilda: the Musical, acting alongside legacy actress Emma Thompson. Weir is also set to star in upcoming vampire horror film Abigail. Weir features in the list alongside global star Paul Mescal.

Popular Dublin DJ and singer Jazzy (Yasmine Byrne) also featured in the entertainment list, likely attributed to her wildly successful breakthrough single last year 'Giving Me'. Jazzy hit no.1 in Ireland with her song and racked up more than 130 million streams on Spotify. This song was also nominated for best international single at the Brit Awards this year.

29-year old Oisín McGrath in the science and healthcare category. McGrath is an innovator in healthcare and co-founder of Galenband, a wearable system that monitors cardiac function over a number of months. The band works to detect silent atrial fibrillation, or AFib, and was designed by McGrath thanks to his own experience with AFib. Galenband has raised 8.8 million dollars in funding to date, and is based in Galway, seemingly home for the NUI Galway graduate.

Robbie Scott (28) and Cian Donovan (26) also featured in the science and healthcare ranking. The pair are two of the co-founders of Dublin-based firm Akara Robotics. The company, which was founded in 2019, has developed a disinfection robot which can decontaminate rooms up to 20 times faster than a human cleaner.

The three founders of Dublin start-up Kota were also mentioned in Forbes’ list of emerging leaders in the tech sector. Kota, which launched in early 2022, was founded by Deepak Baliga (28), Luke Mackey (29) and Patrick O'Boyle (28). The company enables employees to enroll and manage insurance and retirement benefits globally. The trio previously worked for Flipdish, Bolt and Bamboo respectively.

29-year old Tara O'Driscoll from Cork features in the science and healthcare category, alongside her Welsh colleague Sioned Jones. The duo are co-founders of Boobybiome, established in 2019 to develop infant formula with beneficial breast milk bacteria which prevent common infant health issues.

Xpress Health co-founder Sanjay Abraham also featured in this year’s ranking. Abraham, alongside Ian Morgan, founded the healthcare staffing platform in 2020. It now has over 25,000 healthcare workers on its platform and is connected with 2,500 facilities in Ireland and the UK. Alongside its Dublin headquarters, Xpress Health has an office in London. There are now plans to expand into Canada and Australia this year.

Dale Whelehan also featured on this year’s Forbes ranking for his work as head of the 4 Day Week Global Movement. The group held a six-month trial with 61 companies in 2022, with 92pc committed to keeping a four day working week. Forbes reported that the company now engages with over 300 companies.