A landing at the NDRC in Dublin
The Dublin-based NDRC (National Digital Research Centre) is the only Irish incubator ranked in the top 25 of the UBI Index. The index has also ranked the NDRC among the top 2.5pc of incubators worldwide.
In what has been the highest placement for an Irish incubator, the NDRC has been ranked 19th worldwide and seventh in Europe because of its “exceptional economic impact”.
The UBI Index’s University Business Incubator Global Top 25 assessed 800 incubators in 67 countries worldwide, with 300 of these shortlisted for rigorous benchmarking. More than 60 key performance indicators were then used to assess each incubator.
“NDRC is one of the top business incubators in the world that provides good value to its portfolio companies and generates exceptional economic impact on the region,” said Dhruv Bhatli, co-founder of UBI Index.
“As the first and most elaborate benchmark of university business incubators, UBI Index includes incubators affiliated with most of the top universities in the world. Notable participants originate from Columbia, Oxford, University of Pennsylvania and Imperial College. In this context, NDRC performs much better than their peers at the above mentioned top universities.”
Survival rate
To date, NDRC’s portfolio of start-up ventures has cumulatively secured €40m in follow-on investment from commercial investors, and these ventures have a combined market capitalisation of about €120m.
NDRC portfolio ventures have created more than 300 direct jobs, with a consequent jobs impact of about 1,250 jobs.
“This is an important endorsement of NDRC and further confirmation of the central place we maintain in the global innovation ecosystem,” said NDRC chief executive Ben Hurley.
“NDRC is focused on building high-impact ventures which are worthy of investment and have the ability to scale and grow. The economic impact of these ventures is central to our approach and we are delighted that the report has drawn attention to this by pointing out that NDRC scores particularly well on economic enhancement indicators.
“The high growth rate of our portfolio ventures along with the impressive survival rate of these companies also shows that NDRC’s supportive environment, access to investment and external network are huge advantages for all existing and potential start-ups,” Hurley said.
