Our March Business & Innovation Breifing takes place on Wednesday March 25th @ 07:30am  in the

Cork Internet eXchange/ CloudCIX, Hollyhill Industrial Estate, Cork, T23 R68N   Map It: CloudCIX

Click here to register: Navigating the AI Trilemma

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Ireland stands at a crossroads. 20% of the nation’s electricity already powers data centres—and with AI demand surging, how can we balance innovation, energy efficiency, and sovereignty in a world dominated by US and Chinese hyperscalers? The EU is making strides—Nscale’s €2B funding round and Mistral’s rise prove Europe’s ambition—but acceleration is critical.

AI sovereignty isn’t just about competition; it’s about protecting citizen data, from electronic health records to government services. The recent clash between Anthropic and the US government over LLM use in surveillance and autonomous weapons is a stark reminder: who controls AI controls the future. AI will disrupt entire industries, from healthcare to education. Countries, companies, and individuals must prepare—now.

Today’s Briefing is Titled: Navigating the AI Trilemma: Energy, Ethics, and Innovation

 Keynote Speakers:

 

Jerry Sweeney – Managing Director, CloudCIX Limited

Jerry Sweeney graduated from UCC in 1980 with a B.E. (Elec.) degree and later earned an M.Sc. from DIT (now DCU). His career included working in the semiconductor and computer manufacturing industries. In 2008, Jerry founded Cork Internet eXchange, Cork’s only commercial data centre. In 2019 the company launched a Cloud platform, CloudCIX, offering tailored Cloud (HPC) services to enterprise, government and education. Since March 2023, CloudCIX has formed a specialised team focused on machine learning.

 

Dr. Padraig Lyons – Head of Group, Irish Energy Research Centre, Tyndall Institute

Pádraig is Head of Group at the International Energy Research Centre (IERC) at Tyndall National Institute, Ireland. He has held roles across academia and in industry including a senior strategy role with the Irish Distribution System Operator (DSO), ESB Networks and as Lecturer in Electrical Power Systems at Newcastle University, UK. He received his BE degree in electrical and electronic engineering and an MEngSc degree in electrical engineering from University College Cork, Cork, Ireland in 1999 and 2002 respectively. He received his PhD degree from Durham University, Durham, UK, 2010. His research focus is on the integration of existing (electricity) and new energy vectors and storage to decarbonise the energy system. To support the research objectives in this area requires multi-disciplinary approaches and thus he has developed experience in and has worked collaboratively with researchers in adjacent areas such as new business models for decarbonisation, policy innovation, renewable generation, big data and artificial techniques for energy and social sciences. Dr Lyons is a chartered engineer, is a Fellow at the School of Engineering, University College Cork and is a member of the International Smart Grid Action Network’s Working Group 7 on Smart Grids Transitions.

 

Dermot O’Keeffe – Product Line Director, Smart Grid Solution Group, Analog Devices

Dermot based in Ireland, is currently a Product Line Director – Smart Grid Infrastructure at Analog Devices. Dermot O’Keeffe brings experience from previous roles at Analog Devices. Dermot O’Keeffe holds a 2016 – 2017 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. With a robust skill set that includes Applications, Microsoft Office, Semiconductors, Design, Mixed Signal and more.

The event will include a tour of the Boole Supercomputer – Ireland’s first liquid-cooled GPU cluster, showcasing cutting-edge HPC and AI infrastructure and a demonstration of Guiden, an EU sovereign AI platform based on Mistral technology.

Why Attend?

✔ Gain insights into balancing AI innovation with energy efficiency using technologies such as liquid cooling

✔ Discuss sovereign and ethical AI deployment in government, industry and research

✔ Network with tech leaders, researchers, and policymakers

✔ Experience Ireland’s most advanced supercomputer

 

Please pass this invite on to the person(s) in your organsition that will benefit from attending

We would like to thank Jerry Sweeney and his team at CloudCIX for hosting this very significant and pertinent business briefing and to Padraig Lyons (Tyndall) & Dermot O’Keeffe (Analog Devices) for taking the time from their busy schedules to come and speak with us.