Sinead O'Sullivan

Yeah, I'm good, David.

Thanks for having me on.

It's been an unusual week for me.

I mean, the big picture is, and anybody living in Ireland will know this,

there is a massive difference between what we are told about how wealthy we are and how we experience that wealth through our day-to-day lives.

And so, for example, you will constantly hear Ireland is the second wealthiest country in the EU.

But somebody living in Ireland only feels the lack of public transport.

We don't have good rail connections.

We still have not been able to build a metro system.

75% of GPs are closed.

When I moved back to Ireland for a year and I subsequently left, I could not access a GP.

just a basic lack of everyday things that you need to create some semblance of a good quality of life are not there.

And this stark difference between how wealthy Ireland is on paper and how wealthy we are in our everyday lives is creating this enormous pent-up energy, let's call it.

And this energy is starting to come out.

And we will discuss that later, but that's the big idea, that there is this gap between what we are on paper and what we are in reality.

Yeah, so most of my academic research actually focuses on premature markets.

So, for example, where you might have a technology, let's say solar power in space, because I come from the space sector, right?

So this technology could, in theory, exist.

So let's think about industrial strategy, right?

So we have solar power in space, but why is there no commercial market around this?