Dr. Hugh Cormican is one of our most highly-regarded business leaders. Now heading up health diagnostic company Cirdan, he was a co-founder of West Belfast-based digital camera company Andor which floated in 2004.

In this podcast, recorded ahead of his address to the West Belfast Small Business Roundtable on 25 March 2025 in An Chultúrlann, he tells how his decision to become a business founder was shaped by an Irish Development Authority official who told him — at the tender age of 16  — that he would be an entrepreneur.

Though one doubts that even that far-sighted civil servant could have predicted that one day Hugh would aim to make his company one of Ireland's few unicorns (a business with a value of £1bn or $1bn).

Born in West Belfast, physics grad Hugh spent his formative years in Newry, Co. Down returning to the city on the Lagan to go to Queen's. He's in business to save lives through improved and innovative healthcare solutions.

Where Andor was about helping researchers do better, Cirdan is about helping the sick get better. 

Hugh was speaking with Máirtín Ó Muilleoir, director of the Belfast Media Group.