County Wicklow, ‘the Hollywood of Europe’, nurtures cinema technology platform firm


Showtime Analytics, a company nurtured by the Local Enterprise Office (LEO) in Wicklow have secured €1.2 million in funding from the Chinese internet giant, Alibaba.  The company provides products and services to cinema owners and film distributors that enable them to collate, analyse and visualise operational data in real time.

Richie Power & Jolyon Spurling from Showtime Analytics first approached LEO Wicklow in June 2014 with an idea. Together with their co-founder Paul Lynch they had put together a piece of analytics software and had been testing it out in a Waterford cinema. Preliminary results of the analytics tool were extremely positive, and with the support of Wicklow LEO in the early stages of their business development, they were able to explore the feasibility of their idea, develop their software offering, exhibit internationally and start building their team.  The new joint venture announced this week in Shenzhen, China will result in a collaboration between Showtime and Yueke/Finixx, a subsidiary of Alibaba Pictures’ to develop a range of products targeting the Chinese cinema industry, the second largest in the world with more than 7000 screens. Reacting to the news, Head of Enterprise at LEO Wicklow, Sheelagh Daly said “We are delighted to see that Showtime has continued to grow and develop their business and we wish them continued success in the future.”

SHOWTIME ANALYTICS