Lord of the Dance
Irish rugby player backs cyber security start-up as it launches €900k crowdfunding campaign
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Irish rugby player backs cyber security start-up as it launches €900k crowdfunding campaign

AN Irish cyber security start-up has launched an ambitious fundraising campaign to support its plans to grow the firm globally.

Dublin-based Binarii Labs, which is headquartered at NovaUCD, hopes to raise €900,000 via the Spark Crowdfunding platform.

The funding will be used to expedite the firm’s commercialisation plans across the US, Ireland, the UK, South Africa, and India.

Originally founded in Kildare by Steven Garner, Nigel Carter, Aidan Finn and Ciarán McNamee, Binarii Labs, which relocated to NovaUCD in 2022, is an Enterprise Ireland High Potential Start-Up (HPSU) company.

Already on board with its newly launched fundraising campaign is the Irish rugby player Ian Madigan.

Madigan, who plays for Ulster, has appeared over 300 times between club and country throughout his professional career across Ireland, France, and England.

Away from the playing field, Madigan has a keen eye for early investment opportunities.

He has previously invested in the Irish data security start-up Dataships, which now has offices also in NovaUCD and in San Francisco.

This week he explained his interest in Binarii, claiming he is “passionate about the ever-evolving world of Data Privacy and securing your own data”.

“When Aidan outlined what they are undertaking at Binarii Labs, it was a journey that I had to be a part of, and I am delighted to invest in one of Dataships’ neighbours at NovaUCD,” he explained.

Pictured (l-r) at the crowdfunding launch at NovaUCD, Binarii Labs' Ciarán McNamee and Aidan Finn with Chris Burge, CEO and co-founder of Spark Crowdfunding (Pic: Nick Bradshaw)

Established in September 2021, Binarii Labs is set to launch two proprietary cyber security products later this year that put document and data control back in the hands of their owners.

BinariiDMS is the firm’s unique document management solution, which enables its clients to maintain full access to their secured documents when their cloud storage has gone down or if it has been breached.

Cyqur, another unique product developed by Binarii Labs, enables users to securely protect sensitive secret information such as access credentials.

“With an attack on sensitive data happening every 11 seconds around the clock, and with documents and access credentials continuing to be the most targeted, it’s time for a new approach,” Binarii Labs, co-founder and CEO Aidan Finn explained.

“Binarii Labs is providing a new paradigm in protecting user’s data, so that it remains theirs and the funding raised in this campaign will enable the company to accelerate the roll-out of its technology on the global stage,” he added.

The company previously raised €1.4 million in funding and has secured US patent granted status whilst advancing with its UK patent application.

Its pilot clients include Sherwin O’Riordan Solicitors in Dublin; Arnall Golden Gregory LLP, in Austin and Washington DC; EA Capital in South Africa; dParadigm Capital in the British Virgin Islands; UniFees in India and the Millennium Chambers (The Barrister Network Ltd) and ZAC Consulting in the UK.

Speaking on their future plans, Mr Finn confirmed: “With investors in California already on board from the earlier fund raise and with the fantastic support of the Northern California Innovation District and the Greater Sacramento Economic Council, paving the way to help the company with US client engagement, the Californian state capital is our destination of choice for our forthcoming first US office.”

Regarding their funding campaign Spark Crowdfunding CEO and co-founder Chris Burge said: “This is an excellent opportunity for private investors to buy into a company that is solving a critical problem to which every company in the world is exposed every minute of every day.

“We are delighted Binarii Labs have made this investment opportunity accessible to the largest database of small to medium sized private investors in Ireland.

“Irish investors can recover 40% of their investment in the form of an EIIS tax rebate and the minimum investment is just €100, so it is accessible to everyone.”

The Binarii Labs crowdfunding campaign is live on the Spark Crowdfunding site here.