Paddy Cosgrave Announces Web Summit Offshoot For Dublin

The Web Summit today announced that its MoneyConf, will take place at the RDS, Dublin in 2018 .

The RDS was the location for the main Web Summit until a decision was taken in 2015 to move to Lisbon. That move sparked controversy, with the Web Summit founder Paddy Cosgrave accusing the Irish government, and the authorities here, of failing to respond to the needs of an expanding event.

MoneyConf has been hosted in Madrid for two years. It has become what the organisers describe as "a leading platform for fintech CEOs, investors and startups to meet.” Speaking at a press conference held to make the announcement official, Paddy Cosgrave said that they had scoped a number of venues, including the Convention Centre in Dublin – but that it would not be big enough for the event.

“That left us with one venue in Dublin, the managers of which I am great friends with,” he said, “even if I have not given that impression before. You should not be misled."

MoneyConf will take place from June 11-13, 2018, with the aim of attracting 5,000 delegates to Dublin. According to WebSummit, over 2,500 attendees have already registered for the 2018 edition. Attendees will be joined by hundreds of top names in the industry, from CEOs of global financial institutions to the founders of "the world’s most disruptive startups."

Some of the speakers already confirmed have been named, including Yoni Assia, Co-Founder & CEO of eToro; Jaidev Janardana, CEO of Zopa; John Sun, Co-Founder of Avant and Ismail Ahmed, Founder & CEO of WorldRemit. Attendees have access to 2 days of talks, including keynotes, fireside chats, workshops and panel discussions.

“Brexit has the potential to transform Dublin as a financial centre,” Paddy Cosgrave said. "Major banks, credit card companies and fintech startups have all signed leases in recent months. It’s an incredible moment for Dublin and it’s great to be part of it. The RDS is the perfect venue to grow an event like MoneyConf. After all, our partnership with the RDS put Web Summit on the road to where it is today.”

Cosgrave took the opportunity of the press conference to advance a series of ideas on the issue of corruption in Irish life, calling on the Irish government to introduce anti-corruption legislation.

"Over the past three years,” he stated, "quietly behind the scenes, I have done some very modest things to try to at least accelerate change around about how we think of white collar crime or corruption in this country...

“Often times,” he added, "I think the frustration that people feel when they see people who have very clearly been caught out doing things they absolutely shouldn't have done, when they see those people not being held to account, often times they are at a loss and they presume there is some sort of conspiracy.
“The fact is there isn't a conspiracy. It is actually just a lack of the necessary required legislation to deal with these types of thing. I want my kid to grow up in a very meritocratic Ireland."