25 MONEY & JOBS Irish Examiner Friday 27.08.2010 XX1 - V1 any other business... GRAPEVINE with JOE DERMODY [email protected] on the prime numbers ... Shop assistants will soon send messages to the mobiles of passersby via a hypertag. At Hickey Fabrication Services, Kilmacthomas, Co Waterford, from left: MD Ger Hickey, business development manager, Pat Coldrick, and Savana Engineering’s Wayne E Yeager and Wyatt E Yeager. Picture: Patrick Browne ■ MICHAEL LILLIS has joined aircraft leasing group Avolon as chairman of its Latin American advi- sory board. He is a former Irish diplomat and former head of GECAS’s Latin America and Caribbean business (since acquired by GE), fi- nancing over 180 aircraft, valued at in excess of US$6bn ( 4.7bn). He also headed up Irish aircraft lessor GPA. He has fi- nanced aircraft for Latin American airlines Avianca, Aeroméxico, Gol, LAN and TAM. ■ JOHN GAFFNEY has joined Donegans Solicitors as a partner. He brings 19 years experience, having worked with Freshfields in Paris, with Skadden Arps in London, and with the United Nations Compensa- tion Commission in Gene- va. He has practiced com- mercial law as a partner with firms in Dublin and Cork. He graduated from NUI with BCL and LL.B de- grees, and from the Uni- versity of Amsterdam with an LL.M in EU and Interna- tional law. ■ SARAH CUNNINGHAM has been promoted to ac- count executive at Pem- broke Communications. Ms Cunningham joined the consumer division in 2009, working with client such as Bord Gáis Energy, Crown Paints, Connacht Gold, Children’s Miracle Net- work, Vintners Federation of Ireland, Novartis and Teagasc. Ms Cunningham holds a BComm with a major in Marketing and holds an MA in Public Relations from the Dublin Institute of Technology. ■ JOHN HURLEY has joined the fuel supplier GreatGas as business de- velopment manager. Mr Hurley joins from Halcrow Barry Engineering (National Roads Authority) where he was a retail con- sultant. Mr Hurley has also worked with Topaz Energy as a network development manager and he has also held positions with Shell UK and Irish Shell. GreatGas has headquar- ters in Churchtown, Co Cork, and is part of the DCC Plc group. ■ DR PETER STAFFORD has joined the Society of Chartered Surveyors as its new head of policy and public affairs. He joins from the Construction In- dustry Federation, where he was head of research and policy. Dr Stafford has also lectured in the Urban Institute Ireland in UCD and the Geary Institute. He holds a doctorate in Poli- tics and an MEcon in So- cial Research Methods from the University of Manchester, and a Masters in Political and Public Communications, DCU. ■ MIRIAM O’NEILL has joined the Automobile As- sociation of Ireland (AA Ireland) as product PR ex- ecutive. Ms O’Neill joins from the An Post-Fortis joint ven- ture, Postbank Ireland, where she was a commu- nications executive. She was also previously a marketing executive with Banqueting Food Systems. Ms O’Neill holds a BA in European Business, and a HDip in PR and Events Management from the Public Relations Institute of Ireland. COLD FRONT: The ESB are cutting off power to 900 households a month — or 30 a day — because people cannot pay their bills. Bord Gais has disconnected an average of 230 people a month in the last three months. Meanwhile, the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Economic Regulatory Affairs is inviting the Commission for Energy Regulation to an emergency meeting next week to discuss concerns over a planned 5% increase in electricity prices, due in October. Hundreds of thousands of domestic customers will be affected by the price hike, which has already been authorised. Shoppers soon to receive mobile ads sent by new hypertag device WALKING by tech-savvy stores will soon result in you receiving adverts on your mobile phone. Irish mobile-phone mar- keting company, Adikat, is partnering with British-based proximity marketing specialists, Hy- pertag. Shop assistants will wear a hypertag de- vice that will send passers-by messages, via Bloooth, about the store’s video clips, links and event notices. Companies like Unilever and Co- ca-Cola are already using this new marketing tool. Adikat owner, Vince Do- herty, says: “Permis- sion-based mobile mar- keting is increasingly pop- ular, so this strategic al- liance will be highly ad- vantageous to us. We will have access to first-hand experience in deploying major campaigns for top brands in Ireland.” Doherty says that global partnerships like these will help kickstart the Irish economy. International companies can offer new products and a chance to expand the marketplace a compa- ny works in. “There’s a huge market- place to be accessed and we need to think outside our shores,” says Doher- ty. “We live on an island, but we can build bridges.” Doherty says that he had to overcome legal barriers in order to secure the partnership, as British partnership law differs from Irish law. He was also unable to find any State schemes that offer financial assis- tance to companies look- ing for international part- nerships. Number of work days lost to strike in EU halved since 2008 RECESSION has given those still in employment cause for cheer — the av- erage number of working days lost, per 1,000 em- ployees, due to industrial action fell from 50.5, in 2008, to 24.3, in 2009, says a report from Euro- found’s European Indus- trial Relations Observato- ry (EIRO). The EIRO report covers the year period 2005–2009, in the Euro- pean Union member states and Norway. Pay disputes remain the most common cause of indus- trial action across the EU. Manufacturing was most prone to conflict, followed by the broad public sector, and trans- port and communications. The most ‘strike-prone’ countries were Denmark, France and Belgium, while Austria, Estonia and Latvia were essentially strike-free. The level of in- dustrial action in the new EU member states was only about a quarter of that in the former EU15 countries. O’Keeffe wins coaching award BUSINESS coach Kevin O’Keeffe has been select- ed for a coaching excel- lence award at the presti- gious 2010 ActionCOACH Global Conference, held recently in Barcelona, Spain. ActionCOACH founder and chairman, Brad Sug- ars, said: “Kevin has al- ways embraced our 14 points of culture. He is a great coach and business- man, with an approach that connects with clients.” O’Keeffe, who coaches companies throughout Cork city and county, was one of 20 global award winners. ActionCOACH has more than 1,000 offices in 32 countries. To learn more, visit: www.actioncoach.ie. Waterford company shows its metal with mining equipment contract W ATER- FORD-based industrial steel product manufacturer Hick- ey Fabrication (HF) has struck gold with a contract to build mining exploration equipment for an ambitious new American client. Savana Engineering MD, Wyatt Yeager, says the new gold extraction machines unveiled yesterday at HF’s facility in Kilmacthomas, Co Waterford, are the first of up to 15 new products coming on stream this year alone. These bespoke ma- chines have been pre-sold to clients in South America. It seems that there is no recession in the global busi- ness of exploring for pre- cious minerals. Wyatt Yeager explains: “During a recession, gold becomes more valuable than ever. Judging by the number of new mining companies calling me to order new ma- chines, this will continue for at least ten years. “Despite the downturn in the construction industry, there is still a need for min- erals in TVs, automobiles, computers and phones, so mining is something that will always be a growth in- dustry. We are just capitalis- ing on the industrial de- mand for gold, platinum and diamonds.” Mr Yeager says Ireland is an ideal location for this new manufacturing venture, as it is within easy reach of the US, Africa, Asia and Eu- rope. Clients in each of these zones are looking to develop new products with Savana and the engineering experts at Hickey Fabrication, who have been given a very wel- come lift by the unexpected arrival into their orbit of Sa- vana. Yeager says: “The people at Hickey Fabrica- tion will not know this, but they were part of my plans long before they ever knew who I was. I did extensive research on fabrication and engineering firms, and I chose them because of their qualified engineers, their professionalism and the fact that they were using the lat- est 3D modelling, and I had ideas I wanted to develop into new products. “What sealed it for me was the way they treated me like royalty from day one, walking me through every piece of equipment long be- fore I had given them so much as a penny. Plus, their fabricators can think for themselves and solve prob- lems without turning to me every time. That has been unlike anything I could have hoped to find back in the States.” Hickey Fabrication yester- day unveiled the first of its range of highly efficient, be- spoke, purpose-built ma- chines for Savana’s mining industry clients. On display were a 100-ton wash plant that includes a rotary dual screen trommel and two pan-American gravity con- centration mineral jigs, plus a 35-ton portable gold and diamond sampling plant. While this is a first foray into mining products for Hickey Fabrication, the company is built to respond to changing demands. All of its products are bespoke, one-off orders, such as the award-winning glass and steel staircase and balustrades at Waterford Institute of Technology’s nursing educa- tion building, plus car show- rooms in Cork City, Mal- low, Waterford, Kilkenny, Clonmel and Dublin. The company has a proven ability to adapt to change. Prior to the current recession, 80% of the com- pany’s fabrication orders came from the construction sector. Now, 80% of its out- put relates to pharmaceutical companies and plant main- tenance. It has been a finalist in several Small Firms Asso- ciation annual awards, and has also been named Water- ford Business of the Year, accolades which helped catch the eye of Savana En- gineering. Having launched in 2001, Hickey Fabrication sought Waterford County Enter- prise board’s help to build a 2,400 sq ft workshop in Lemybrien in 2002. Over the next few years the com- pany built up a business ser- vicing the pharmaceutical, chemical, food and building industries. Hickey Fabrication em- ploys 35 full-time employ- ees, and company MD Ger Hickey’s main goal in the current economic climate is to ensure that he brings in enough orders to retain all of those highly-skilled staff, comprised primarily of qualified electrical and me- chanical engineers, fabrica- tors and Autocad 3D mod- elling designers. Ger Hickey notes: “This work for Savana Engineer- ing is something new, some- thing no other company in this country is doing. It gives great encouragement to the lads on the floor, and lets them know that their jobs are safe. I want to keep my people employed. They are all highly-skilled people. “They all have technical skills, but everybody in this company is also effectively in a sales role. When Wyatt Yeager visited, the lads took him through every step of every piece of technology, from hand-drawn sketches of the product to Autocad and onto the fabrication processes. “That is a tedious enough hand-holding approach, but we’re used to that. Every- thing we do is bespoke. We never produce the same thing twice. The customer comes first, and in this cur- rent climate, survival is all about your ability to change and adapt.” Hickey Fabrication has certainly proved itself on that front. The mining ex- ploration machines unveiled yesterday will shortly be used to extract gold, dia- monds and other precious minerals from mines in South Africa. Savana Engineering has placed orders for a suite of further machines. Some will be river-based alluvial ma- chines, dredges, barges and flotation devices used in the extraction of gold and pre- cious gemstones in relatively shallow explorations, others will be for deeper explo- rations into hard rock, crushing quartz and digging down deeper for zinc, titani- um and platinum. For Hickey Fabrication, things are certainly looking up. For this Waterford com- pany at least, all that glitters probably is gold. RTÉ enlists recruitment firm WE understand that RTÉ has enlisted a recruitment agency to help it find can- didates for the post of di- rector general, with a view to attracting applica- tions from overseas. Outgoing director gen- eral, Cathal Goan, has agreed to remain in the seat until a successor is appointed. The most like- ly contenders are internal senior executives — chief financial officer, Conor Hayes, managing director of news, Ed Mulhall, head of radio, Clare Duignan and the head of TV, Glen Kilane. 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