Anna Downes. Image: Connor McKenna/Siliconrepublic.com
Video Sherpa CEO Anna Downes tells Siliconrepublic.com about the company’s plans to expand beyond its base at Galway’s PorterShed.
Last month, we went to Enterprise Ireland’s Start-up Showcase for 2020, which took place in Croke Park, and caught up with Anna Downes of Video Sherpa, a Galway business previously featured in our Start-up of the Week series.
The team has developed a step-by-step guided process that aims to handle the “heavy lifting” of video production operations for businesses in-house, so that high-quality content can be created with the company’s own software and a smartphone – something that may have become more topical in the weeks since we spoke to Downes, as more companies have started working remotely.
On its Vimeo page, the company also shares advice on how to conduct video interviews, how to film using a smartphone and how to choose a suitable location for filming, where demos of the platform are also available to view. The start-up recently offered tips for businesses as they adjust to communicating through video, rather than in person, due to the ongoing Covid-19 distancing measures.
‘Global ambitions’
Co-founded by Downes and her husband Andrew, Video Sherpa’s aim is to sort out the technical side of video production so that businesses can focus on storytelling.
“We work with mid-sized companies that want to bring video production and marketing in-house. We help them through our software platform to film, edit, publish and manage all of their video content in-house,” she told Siliconrepublic.com.
“It gives them the ability to create really high volume, good-quality content in an agile and cost-effective way.”
The company started off with Enterprise Ireland’s New Frontiers programme in the Galway Mayo Institute of Technology three years ago, Downes explained, before securing Competitive Start funding and being selected as a high potential start-up (HPSU) by Enterprise Ireland.
“This helped us to really scale and develop the product. We launched Video Sherpa last November,” she said. “Video Sherpa is already trading internationally, we have clients in Ireland, the UK and in the States.
“That’s definitely a route to market that we’re interested in exploring to scale quickly as we’re growing our team here in the west of Ireland. We’re based in the PorterShed in Galway, which is a great place to be based. We have huge global ambition but want to maintain a headquarters here in Ireland.”
