Date: 25 February 2010

Guest Speaker: The Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2009: Taxback.com CEO Terry Clune

Venue: Waterford Institute of Technology

Terry Clune, the 2009 Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year, had a injection of encouragement and inspiration for an audience of Irish MBAs at the recent MBA Association Guest Speaker event in Waterford in conjunction with Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT) and sponsored by Ernst and Young.
 
The entrepreneur, whose company Taxback.com employs over 700 people in 22 countries, with a 2009 turnover of €90m, told the audience of MBAs that challenging times can be a great source of innovation and a spur to progress.

The main impetus for the growth of his own business, Mr Clune explained, was a serious challenge posed by the changing tax laws in Ireland in 2002, which would have had the effect of wiping out 80% of his small business, and its 20 staff.

He was forced to look further afield for opportunities and credited Enterprise Ireland and their 33 overseas office network, as being pivotal to the company's expansion.  Through their network, he secured introductions to significant companies, now clients, around the world and now 95% of his turnover is from overseas.

Mr Clune drew parallels between his business crises and the challenges facing many firms in Ireland today, and encouraged Irish businesses to take the same approach - to use the recession to rethink business models and to explore new opportunities.

He had some succinct suggestions for Irish business people:
• Capture new ideas - he emails himself every time he thinks of a new idea and has 250 ideas in his inbox.  He is particularly inspired by Jack Welch of GE who said ‘20% of your business should come from new business ideas developed in the last five years."
• Ask customers for feedback:  It inspires business improvement and can be a great source of new ideas.
• Hire positive people. 
• Have passion for what you do: Entrepreneurs need passion - you can learn the rest.
• Be open and willing to change your mind.
• Learn how to sell.
• Teach children good communication skills from the earliest age. Clune himself was an early developer in the entrepreneurial stakes – raised on a farm, he began his first business at the tender age of 7 selling recycled fertiliser bags to pack wood blocks

He concluded on a very positive note:  ‘Opportunities are everywhere all the time, even in a recession.  The key is never to look back, always forward to the future. And turn off the radio, with all the negative news. Listen to Beethoven instead!!"

Event Photography

Photo caption: Adversity creates business opportunity: Entrepreneur of the Year Terry Clune encourages MBAs  at WIT event. Pictured at the event, left to right: Denis Harrington, WIT, Tom Egan, Christine Lewis, the MBA Association, Terry Clune,, Guest Speaker, Mary McEvoy, MBA Association South East Chair, Joe Dreelan, Austin Hughes.

More reading on Terry Clune:
Clune, who is founder and CEO of Taxback.com, a 100m euro business operating in 19 countries,  recently won the 2009 Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, and will represent Ireland at the 2010 World Entrepreneur of the Year Awards in Monte Carlo in May against winners from 40 other countries.

Clune has always shown a strong entrepreneurial streak, as a recent interview in MoneyWeek UK revealed:

MoneyWeek: Terry Clune: How the taxman helped me make €90m
Terry Clune, 37, just can't stop making money. At the age of seven, he collected sacks from local farmers and sold them on to a local timber merchant. At 20, he ran discos at Trinity College Dublin, using the money to buy his first computer. Now he heads up one of Ireland's fastest-growing businesses, €90m-a-year tax services firm Taxback.com.

Clune got the idea of becoming a tax expert from one of the entrepreneurial ventures he experimented with at university..... Read the full interview: http://www.moneyweek.com/news-and-charts/entrepreneurs-terry-clune-of-taxback-46335.aspx

About TaxBack.com

Taxback.com is a multi-national corporation providing specialist tax return services to private and corporate clients across 100 countries.

Taxback.com was the overall winner of the 2009 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award in Ireland and is shortlisted for the Deloitte Best Managed Companies Awards.

Established in Dublin in 1996 and led by a team of entrepreneurial business executives, taxback.com has 26 offices worldwide, in Europe, Australasia, the United States and South America, and a staff of over 630.

It is  a preferred supplier of tax return services internationally with global partners including VISA Europe, Concur Technologies Inc., Barclaycard Bank, Saongroup.com, CIEE and Informa.

The Facts:

130,000 income tax returns processed annually
20,000 VAT claims processed annually, managing a document value of €130 million
630 staff dedicated to client support
26 offices in 19 countries
22 languages spoken in-house
16 countries for income tax refunds
38 countries for VAT reclaims

Taxback.com is a trading name for the services of Taxback Inc., Chicago, USA, and its parent company Taxback Ltd., Ireland and its subsidiaries and representative companies.