Why we decided to relocate the headquarters of our AI company from the US to Ireland
Earlier this month,
Central Bank of Ireland
governor
Gabriel Makhlouf
issued a warning that the
Trump-era tariffs
could pose fresh challenges for Ireland's economy and have consequences for foreign direct investment coming from the
United States
.
These concerns are valid and deserve serious attention.
But as the chief executive of Partsol, a US
AI
company that made the decision this year to relocate our global headquarters from the US to Ireland, I'd offer a different perspective rooted in our lived experience.
Partsol's move to Ireland didn't happen despite the global uncertainty or because of who sits in the White House. It happened because of Ireland's stability, its deep alignment with European regulatory clarity and its position as a bridge between the best of American innovation and the rigour of European accountability and regulation.
READ MORE
Ireland offered the right mix of ambition and assurance – a rare and valuable combination in a world where both are in short supply.
Partsol is not your average AI company. Our technology – what we call Cognitive AI – is the next stage in AI's evolving journey and is specifically engineered for high-stakes sectors where the cost of error is too high to tolerate. Specifically these are healthcare, law, accounting and financial services.
What makes our platform different is that it doesn't 'hallucinate'. It's engineered with what we describe as AI Stem Cells, drawing from the four pillars of foundational science to ensure every output is based on verifiable truth. That means there are no fabrications, no guesswork.
You can't build this kind of technology in a vacuum. It requires robust oversight, scientific transparency and, above all, a regulatory environment that doesn't just permit innovation but actively, and ethically, guides it. That's where Ireland, and by extension Europe, stands out.
Regulation is often cast as the enemy of innovation, a brake on progress or a drag on agility. I reject that view entirely. Frameworks such as the
EU's
AI Act and GDPR don't slow us down. On the contrary, they speed us up – not by removing friction, but by replacing uncertainty with clarity. These are not merely bureaucratic guardrails that are holding up the show, they are trust-building tools that enable long-term growth and adoption.
Partsol made its decision to move to Ireland during one of the more turbulent moments in recent transatlantic economic relations, not as an act of risk mitigation, but as a signal of our long-term strategy. We are a US company and are enormously proud of that fact, but where others might see volatility, we see vision. The EU's principled approach to AI and digital governance, embodied by Ireland's leadership on these issues, gave us the confidence to invest, grow and scale from here.
We're already putting that commitment into practice. Partsol is in the process of hiring 25 highly-skilled team members in Ireland this year alone. We've already raised $28.6 million (€25.2 million) in funding and are on track to raise roughly double that again this year.
Our ambition is to build the world's most reliable, most transparent, most scientifically-grounded artificial intelligence platform – and do it from Ireland.
Of course, Ireland's appeal goes beyond policy. Its talent pool is exceptional, particularly in data science and engineering. The universities here are producing world-class graduates, and the local tech ecosystem is both intellectually rigorous and entrepreneurially dynamic.
There's a unique cultural chemistry at work in Ireland, an openness to new ideas, matched by a healthy scepticism that insists on integrity and evidence. That suits us just fine and, no doubt, it will continue to suit other similarly minded US businesses irrespective of our own domestic politics.
None of this is to say that we should ignore the macroeconomic threats. The global economic terrain is shifting, and no country, Ireland included, is immune to its tremors. But what matters most in moments of change is not just resilience, but direction. Is a country simply weathering the storm, or is it steering toward something greater?
Ireland, in my view, is doing the latter. It has made deliberate, thoughtful choices about regulation, about talent and education, and about economic openness that make it positioned to continue to thrive even amid the present global uncertainty. The Trump tariff era, with all its disruption, has ironically highlighted just how valuable this kind of principled consistency can be.
For US companies looking abroad, the decision about where to grow isn't just about tax rates or access to markets. It's also about trust, stability and a shared purpose. It's about finding a place where the rules align and make sense, where the people are brilliant and where the future is being built with both ambition and care.
That's why Partsol is here and that's why, despite the warnings, we are optimistic that Ireland's role as a pro-innovation, pro-regulation gateway to Europe will not just endure, it will continue to thrive.
Darryl Williams is the CEO and founder of Partsol
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Times
28 minutes ago
- Irish Times
Dramatic spike in ‘safe account' scams flagged by Bank of Ireland
Bank of Ireland has recorded a 10-fold increase in attempted 'safe account' scams this week. Criminals have been contacting potential victims and luring them into calling a fake bank phoneline where they can be duped into transferring funds to a secondary account – in most cases Revolut – and in turn to a safe account, controlled by the fraudster. Reports of the scam to Bank of Ireland's fraud line and Text Checker service have been on the increase since the start of the year. This week has seen daily reports over 10 times the number of those made weekly in April and May. [ ComReg plans overhaul of SMS text message system to help block scammers Opens in new window ] The bank has urged customers to be hyper-vigilant of text messages claiming to be from the bank. READ MORE 'We have been seeing a concerning pattern in the increase of this type of fraud,' said Bank of Ireland's head of fraud Nicola Sadlier. 'This week's escalation has resulted in the highest number of reports in a single day of this particular type of fraud, so we need our customers and the general public to be vigilant and recognise the warning signs.' She said the main advice is to 'look out for these texts and do not call back. And remember that Bank of Ireland will never ask you to move your money to another account to keep it safe.' Typically the scam starts with the customer getting a text message asking them to call a phone number about a suspicious transaction or activity. Such messages can drop into the thread of a genuine BOI text. Questions posed can be a variant of 'Did you login from a new device?'; 'Do you recognise this transaction?'; or 'A transaction for [value] to [merchant] was declined and your card has been placed on hold' – followed by 'if this was not you / if you don't recognise this / etc please call us back on a given number. The callback number will be answered by someone claiming to be from Bank of Ireland, highlighting suspicious transactions and claiming the customer's account is compromised. The victim is then asked if they have a Revolut / or other secondary account. If they say yes, they are told that they should move all the money from their BOI account into their own Revolut account, or secondary account. The fraudster does not ask for access to the customer's account, and does not ask for any security details like pin numbers or codes – avoiding common red flags associated with fraud. The victim is then told they need to move their money from their Revolut account to a new 'safe' account, after which it disappears for good.
Irish Times
40 minutes ago
- Irish Times
Co-founder of Swedish internet security company named EY World Entrepreneur of the Year
Stina Ehrensvärd, co-founder of Swedish internet security company Yubico, has been named EY World Entrepreneur of the Year 2025 at an award ceremony in Monaco's Salle des Etoiles. Ms Ehrensvärd was selected from almost 5,000 participants that included 52 winners across 43 countries and jurisdictions competing for the global title. She is the fourth woman to hold the title and first winner from Sweden in the award's 25-year history. EY Ireland Entrepreneurs of the Year 2024 Sharon Cunningham and Orlaith Ryan of Shorla Oncology represented Ireland at the event. READ MORE EY said Ms Ehrensvärd built an 'industry-leading and highly profitable company that has set new standards for internet security'. She further created 'exponential growth for her company and a lasting impact on Sweden and its people'. Yubico was cofounded by Ms Ehrensvärd in 2007. Within a year, the company had launched its first physical security key for multi-factor authentication. Over the following five years, it secured work with three of the biggest technology companies in Silicon Valley. Since then, Ms Ehrensvärd has scaled Yubico to where it now protects 19 of the world's 20 largest internet companies. Its compound annual growth rate has been 40 per cent since 2020. EY chief executive Janet Truncale said Ms Ehrensvärd's 'defining philosophy that a secure digital identity is a basic human right is exactly the type of purpose-driven leadership we look to celebrate'. Ms Ehrensvärd said she was 'committed to saving the internet for democracy, for free speech, for education, for all the beautiful things we can do with it'. 'This recognition isn't the finish line,' she said. 'It's fuel. We are building a safer digital world, and I won't stop until that mission is fulfilled.' The winner was chosen by an independent panel of judges against four criteria: entrepreneurial spirit, purpose, growth and impact.
Irish Times
2 hours ago
- Irish Times
Sales of non-alcoholic Guinness surged 35% last year
Sales of non-alcoholic Guinness 0.0 across can, draught and micro-draught cans in pubs, hotels and restaurants across Ireland increased by 35 per cent in the year to March, new data from Diageo Ireland shows. The increase comes on top of 47 per cent growth of draught Guinness 0.0 in Ireland the previous year. Having been introduced to Irish venues on draught in July 2021, the product is now available in 4,000 on-trade establishments across Ireland. The drinks giant also said it has seen a 161 per cent lift in sales of the brand on draught between June 2022 and March 2025. Diageo said this growth is 'set to continue' into 2026 when the additional €30 million investment announced late last year into Guinness 0.0 production capacity comes on stream. READ MORE This will allow the St James's Gate brewery to brew 176 million pints of Guinness 0.0 a year for international and domestic markets, Diageo said. Ross Bissett, on-trade commercial director at Diageo Ireland, said the growth of the product demonstrates the 'enormous appetite' consumers have for 'greater choice in what they are consuming'. 'Following our recent investment announcement of €30 million in Guinness 0.0 production, we expect it to take up about 12 per cent of all production at St James's Gate,' he added. Cathal Sheridan, who is the seventh generation of his family to run Sheridan's Bar and Restaurant in Milltown, Co Galway, said he has seen 'huge demand' for Guinness 0.0, with customers 'making the most of being able to have a few pints and be able to drive home'. 'That's something that's really important in Ireland as rural isolation becomes a bigger problem,' he said. 'It's also key for the future of rural pubs as we try to encourage folks through the door.' The demand for non-alcoholic products has been seen across the board, with Kantar's recent data showing that 6.2 per cent of all Irish households purchasing non-alcoholic drinks in January. That data was backed up by a recent Drinks Industry Group of Ireland report that found the average amount of alcohol consumed by adults in Ireland had fallen by 31 per cent since 2001.
