THREE SEASONED technology executives have formed a start-up, InishTech, by spinning out an existing Microsoft business unit. Entrepreneurs Aidan Gallagher, John O’Sullivan and David Smyth, has taken over Microsoft’s Software Licensing and Protection (SLP) services unit with assistance from Enterprise Ireland and Microsoft IP Ventures.
The company will provide services and software to prevent software developers having their work pirated and also to provide flexible licensing models to their end customers. “Software developers – both commercial and in-house – have always been challenged to protect their code and manage licences,” says Mr Gallagher, who is chief executive of the new firm. “The issue gets a thousand times worse with .net and cloud computing technologies.”
Mr Gallagher said cloud and web-based software also meant end-users wanted more flexibility in their licences, such as the ability to scale up and down the number of users. He said InishTech’s software is designed to be used by product managers and other non-technical executives rather than developers.
It is the first time that Microsoft has spun out an existing division of the company. Mr Gallagher said Microsoft initially wanted simply to license the technology, but the InishTech founders put a proposal together for a spin-out because they believed there was a huge market opportunity. The unit already has 120 customers which InishTech is taking on.
Microsoft IP Ventures, Enterprise Ireland and the founders have shareholdings in the new company. Mr Gallagher said that the company had been funded to date by the founders and Enterprise Ireland.
He expects employment to reach 15 to 20 staff by the end of the year but says the company will adopt a “low-touch, self-service” approach which will not require large numbers of staff. In key markets such as China it intends to work with local partners.
Founded in 2005, Microsoft IP Ventures licences technology and ideas generated by Microsoft’s multi-billion-dollar annual spend on research and development and which the software giant is not pursuing itself.
It has done a number of deals in Ireland prior to this, including with Zignals, an online share-trading service, mobile content player Vimio and document management firm SoftEdge Systems.
