Three young entrepreneurs from County Kilkenny are going head-to-head with entrepreneurs from County Carlow, Wexford and Wicklow at the Regional Final of Ireland’s Best Young Entrepreneur (IBYE) competition, which takes place on Wednesday 19th June in Carlow.

The Local Enterprise Office Kilkenny will be represented at this year’s Regional Final in the Best Idea Category by John Duggan, who hails from Tullahought, Piltown, Co Kilkenny. John is co-founding director & CEO of Loanitt Ltd, a recently formed Fintech company that has plans to designed a cutting-edge technology platform that streamlines the credit application process for all stakeholders.

In the Start Up category, Kilkenny will be represented by Jens Kopke and his business Motoklik. From his passion for motorsports, Jens left his full-time employment to follow his dream and set up Motoklik. Motoklik aims to improve the performance and safety of off-road motorcyclists through it's USP, automated suspension set-up.

Rory Gannon, from Cakeface, based in Irishtown, Kilkenny - a premium food business that creates unique high end desserts is the County’s representative in the Best Established Business category. The business currently consists of a cafe, food production kitchen and cookery school with plans in place to open a new venture in the second half of 2019.

At the Regional Final event which is being held in the Step House Hotel, Borris Co Carlow, three finalists will be selected by the judging panel to compete at the IBYE National Final in September, one from each competition category.

This initiative for young entrepreneurs is run by the 31 Local Enterprise Offices (LEOs) nationwide, and supported by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation and Enterprise Ireland. The investment awards will be used by the young entrepreneurs to help fund business start-ups, create new jobs locally or to help develop new products for international markets.

Fiona Deegan, Head of Enterprise with Local Enterprise Office Kilkenny, wished local category winners the best of luck at the Regional Final, saying: “This competition highlights that Ireland’s entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well. Our young entrepreneurs are the employers of the future, and are the backbone of the Irish economy. This initiative aims to assist young entrepreneurs to develop and grow their business proposals through the supports such as bootcamps, training, networking and mentoring associated with the IBYE competition.”

More details about the competition and the supports available to young entrepreneurs are available through www.localenterprise.ie and from the IBYE website at www.ibye.ie.