If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!The Irish Times recently launched a business podcast series publishing every Thursday. This week’s was published from Shanghai & I was interviewed for it by John Collins along with several of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year CEO Retreat participants & Clifford Coonan of the same paper. You can listen here . The other installments in the series are well worth a listen also.

Every country at Expo has been allocated a national day, June 17th saw Ireland’s National Day at this mega-event. President Mary McAleese was the guest of honour at the event and her short trip to Shanghai has been packed full of business and cultural events that have gone down very well. President McAleese is well known in China and well liked having forged the first formal Ireland-China University co-operation programme between Queens University & Shenzhen University more than 10 years ago and has since visited China several

I’m not sure I like this Ireland Pavilion video walk through that’s available on the otherwise excellent Irish Pavilion website. It doesn’t really do the pavilion experience justice but if you’re not going to make it to Shanghai for World Expo then this might be the closest you’ll get (but believe me, its still quite far away…). Click on the image to go through to the video on the Irish Pavilion website.

Deirdre’s tips for attending Shanghai World Expo 2010: Set aside at least two days to visit Expo, ideally three Go later in the day to avoid the crowds, the worst of the heat and the most zealous of queue-hoppers. Buy tickets when you arrive in Shanghai – there is generally no need to buy in advance unless you have a large group.  Actually there is almost no option to buy in advance as there is no official ticket agent in Ireland and you cant buy

Area B doesnt quite compare to Area C, based on my recent experience. Area C, particularly around the Belgian, Spanish, German and Polish pavilions is really busy and buzzing with a great atmosphere, especially in the early evenings when the day crowds are still around, the night crowd (enjoying discounted ticket price of 90RMB) are coming in and street performances are beginning. But head into Area B and it’s a different story altogether – when I visited it was almost deserted in fact. Outside the UN pavilion

Shanghai World Expo 2010 is being held on the banks of the Huangpu river in Shanghai. The national pavilions are over on the Pudong side but the Puxi side also has many attractions that, although aren’t getting as much attention, are well worth a visit. This is advisable even as a ploy to avoid all the crowds heading to Pudong – instead a stroll around the Puxi pavilions is a very pleasant day’s journey through showcases of innovation and splendid architecture.  Actually it’s the architecture that

The Irish Defence Forces Pipe Band have been in Shanghai this week performing at the Irish Pavilion at the World Expo. Details of their performances are available on the Irish Pavilion website here: The pipe bands of the Irish Defence Force play an important part on ceremonial and sporting occasions and are well known to Irish audiences due to their performances in connection with the Royal Dublin Society’s Horse Show in August of each year. As in the past, personnel carry out their regular military

I’ve had a lot of people ask me about whether their company can exhibit at Shanghai World Expo, particularly at the Irish Pavilion. In case others are wondering the same, this post could serve as a primer before approaching any of the organisers The first thing to be aware of is that this is not a trade show, it couldn’t even be called an exhibition. Its an Exposition. That means that if a company wants to be part of this they need to think beyond

One of the most talked about Pavilions in the run up to the Expo has been the UK pavilion, not least because the construction site was be-walled until very recently so it was hard to get a look at what it looked like. I read this article recently from the London Times which is full of praise for their Pavilion: It is beautiful, eye-catching, stimulating and not at all vulgar, everything a good propagandist pavilion should be After visiting last week, you can’t but agree

One of my favourite sections of the Ireland Pavilion at the World Expo in Shanghai was dedicated to pictures of Irish homes as they looked over the years. The pictures of the 1980′s kitchen and sitting room were particularly poignant – flashbacks to my own home, and those kitchens of my friends that I’d spent time in when growing up. (Just click Play, or Replay, on the slideshow to get a flavour of what was on display). It’s a very simple display for the Ireland

I went to see the Irish Pavilion at the World Expo in Shanghai earlier this week. I was very impressed – it’s a great advert for Ireland. Here are my thoughts. The Irish Pavilion is striking in its simplicity against other pavilions that have an awful lot going on. Even if I wasn’t Irish I’d think the most instantly impressive pavilions are the Irish, the UK and the Danish (in Area C anyway! ). The Irish Pavilion is set upon a hillock of green green

I’m in Shanghai at the moment, and on each of the past few days, I had the pleasure of visiting the Shanghai World Expo site since it opened on Friday. With something of this magnitude, it would be easy to pick holes and to poke fun at the sheer audacity of the whole occasion, but having experienced the Expo so far, it’s still disappointing to see that some western commentators have gone down this route. However, walking around the site with so many countries (more

Last month I mentioned that I had published the details of a couple of ChinaGreen success stories – on www.ChinaGreen.ie. This is the second of those case studies. While it’s obviously great to be able to write about how we were able to help our clients do great business in China, I think the experiences of these particular clients will be of benefit for anyone who’s starting to think about doing business in China. It can sometimes be daunting for anyone even contemplating starting to

Recently I wrote about the governments “Asia Strategy” and my hopes for the new Asia Strategy which is currently being formulated. The strategy is a collaboration at government level primarily between the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. In my last post on this, I provided some details on the strategy according to Minister Michael Martin. In his statement to the Dail, he referred to the fact that his department, Foreign Affairs, while having a vital part to play

Thanks to the very useful www.KildareStreet.com, I found a response from Minister Michael Martin which provided some useful information as to what this countries “Asia Strategy” is. The Minister was responding to the following question from Joan Burton, TD, on February 16th last: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the position regarding the Asia strategy following the conclusion of the first phase thereof; the objectives which he seeks for the second phase, including the advancement of human rights. Minister Martins reply provided some interesting

While the World Expo in Shanghai will run for 6 months from May until October, and during that time the Ireland Pavilion will be welcoming visitors, there will also be a full day dedicated to Ireland on Monday, June 17th. It may be a little overstated, but I’m expecting “St. Patricks Day in June”. I wrote earlier this week that the President, Mary McAleese is expected to visit Shanghai in either June or July – I wonder is she planning on being present for Ireland

Sunday Business Post Sunday, January 24, 2010 Niamh Connolly Political Correspondent President Mary McAleese is expected to attend the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai this summer as part of a government effort to boost international confidence in the Irish economy. The Department of the Taoiseach is responsible for Ireland’s participation in the event, which runs from May to October and is expected to attract 70 million visitors. McAleese will attend the event in June or July, subject to a formal invitation from the Chinese government.

Check out this presentation below for our top 10 favourite pavilions at the upcoming World Expo in Shanghai..

I wish all the readers of this blog a very Happy St. Patricks Day. While you’re all probably celebrating today, it’s a normal working day for me in Shanghai. However, I did get to celebrate in style over the weekend – I wrote last week about the St. Patricks Day Ball which was held on Saturday night in the Shangri La Hotel in Pudong. As expected, it was a fantastic night of fun and entertainment. The star of the show was Stavros Flatley – from

I visited the World Expo site in Shanghai last week and got a sneak preview look at the Ireland Pavilion. The Pavilion has really leapt up in the past couple of months and its seriously impressive now. In the past, I’ve posted artists impressions of what the Pavilion will look like, but these are the first actual pictures of the building and they will make for an imposing presence for Ireland at the World Expo. The building is still in construction phase (as are most