Welcome to Dublin, welcome to the island of Ireland! Céad Míle Fáilte (A hundred thousand welcomes!) to EBAN Congress 2014Dear Conference Delegate, on behalf of HBAN, the Halo Business Angel Network, I am delighted to extend a warm Irish welcome to our EBAN colleagues, their accompanying guests, sponsors, participants from Europe and beyond. We welcome you to the island of Ireland and to Dublin. HBAN, as a proud member of EBAN, is delighted to be your host for the EBAN 14th Annual Congress and 9th Annual Award Ceremony. We are grateful for the opportunity that hosting the EBAN congress provides to greatly enhance the development of the business angel marketplace in Ireland north & south by furthering knowledge and understanding. Ireland is a small open economy working in unison with European and international partners. Today Ireland is home to over 1000 multinational corporations including: IBM, Oracle, PayPal, Amazon, Yahoo, Salesforce, eBay, Facebook, Dropbox, Hubspot, Linked-In, Twitter & Zynga to mention just a few, as well as being home to 20 of the world’s top 30 medical technology companies. Creativity is in the DNA of the Irish people. Today on the island, notwithstanding recent severe macro-economic challenges, there is a vibrant entrepreneurial culture and the symbiotic mix of international & start-up companies positions Ireland as one of the technology start-up capitals of Europe.From a start-up perspective the business angel landscape is complimented by a range of seed venture capital funds, a growing number of accelerator programmes as well as significant public funding. Business angel investment is developing as an increasingly important asset class for the seed and early growth stage financing of innovative start-ups on the island. We have invited a panel of international speakers to provide both European & US perspectives that will help guide and inform international best practice in the evolving business angel arena. Our Congress delegates will benefit from the educational and collaborative knowledge sharing of the EBAN 14th Annual Congress, which will help to further inform best practice from shared member experiences across Europe and beyond.Michael CulliganNational Director Halo Business Angel Network