With over 250 start-ups, tech companies and service providers in attendance at this year’s Dublin Web Summit, exhibitors are doing a lot of creative things to catch the eye. There are free smoothies and cocktails, Wii competitions for iPads and cupcake displays to tempt around every corner.
However, two attendees stand out simply by being what they are: the youngest app developers in Europe.
“I’m just going round looking at all the start-ups, and I’m going to a few seminars on developing iOS apps,” said Jordan Casey (12), the youngest iOS app developer in Europe. “It’s really, really good. So good.”
Mr Casey has an independent game company called Casey Games and recently won his own Android app deal.
With him was Caolan Fleming (11), who also develops apps through his own company Flama Games. He is the youngest Android developer in Europe. Both coders have been teaching themselves since they were about nine.
“I always really liked video games, and I asked my dad, how do I make my own? And, he really didn’t know so he Googled it and got me a thing called Python first,” said Mr Fleming.
Python is a programming language used for app development.
Along with the young developers, there are also young companies who are eager to get their names out there.
“Letting people know about us, creating buzz, and being in contact with other start-ups,” said Giancarlo Vinci about the benefits of the conference. He is at the conference with his start-up AdEspresso, a Facebook marketing tool designed to make successful ads easier to obtain.
Mr Vinci also spoke about the opportunities for collaboration and growth provided just by being at the Web Summit.
“We can talk to each other, see solutions they came up with. You can exchange ideas with them,” he said. “See maybe if you can also collaborate with them to improve your product. Or you can give them ideas, maybe something they didn’t think about, so they can improve their product as well. It’s very useful, I think.”
The summit continues tomorrow.