LinkedIn delivers; winning and losing at Supermacs; and managing meeting monsters

Profits at the Irish arm of professional social network giant, LinkedIn, jumped more than threefold last year, writes Gordon Deegan. That allowed the company pay a $200 million dividend to its parent Microsoft.

Supermacs boss Pat McDonagh says Ireland's hospitality sector could take up to four years to recover from the Covid-19 crisis. Talking to Eoin Burke-Kennedy, he described the hit this year to the sector as "unprecedented".

Something is going right for McDonagh however. TheAlliance for Insurance Reform cheered his High Court victory last week over a refusal to release CCTV footage to a customer suing his group, writes Colm Keena. McDonagh asks why it was that the company had to take the case and that no insurance company had previously done so.

As RTÉ calls for pitches for a Saturday night family quiz show, the independent productions sector is anticipating a blizzard of call-outs for ideas from the public service broadcaster over the coming months as it looks to fill holes in next year's schedules and make up a shortfall in the amount it is obliged to spend each year on programming made by external companies. Laura Slattery has the details.

Covid-19 weighs on law firms as two in three see revenue drop

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Kinzen raises $2.2m as it helps clients fight ‘misinformation’

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Danish retailer Jysk on track to double number of Irish stores by end of 2021

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Take gaming to a new level this Christmas

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Bad times for law firms, according to a new survey by Smith & Williamson, with almost two in three Irish firms report a decline in revenue over the last year and 60 per cent worried about staying profitable over coming years. Laura reports.

But Chris Johnsis more optimistic, arguing that we could be heading for a repeat of last century's roaring twenties as economies emerge from Covid in an era of low cost financing.

Not everyone is feeling the love right now though. Veteran tech investor and mentor Brian Caulfield says early-stage Irish start-ups are suffering a funding crisis this year as cautious investors put their money in fewer, larger later-stage businesses.

Finally, Pilita Clark takes aim at "meeting monsters", those characters in every workplace who disrupt and divert, making meetings largely a useless headache for colleagues.

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