SaaS North Reception at the Irish Residence
15 November 2023
Remarks by HE Eamonn McKee
Welcome everyone, bienvenue, céad míle fáilte, and jambo. Jambo is Swahili for hello which I learned today from the company here this evening, Jambo. A big shout of for Jambo, a ‘software as a service’ company that has just established a presence in Ireland.
In partnership with the IDA. We are delighted to host the second annual reception for the SaaS North Conference here in Ottawa. Apparently our party last year was legend so we’re hoping to repeat it this year!
Thanks to our co-hosts this evening, the IDA, Ireland has been transformed. We have some of the greatest companies in the world established in Ireland with strong sectors covering digital services, ICT, pharmaceuticals, Medtech, financial services, aircraft leasing, and of course quantum technology.
Thanks too to all our sponsors and to Air Canada for sponsoring the fabulous prize of two tickets to Ireland!
Last year I told you that there was no cloud, the thing you think you’re all working on day and day out. No, the internet is actually underwater, in the submarine optic fiber cables that run along the bottom of the oceans. And the last stretch of cable that finally united the world with the telegraph was laid between Newfoundland and Valencia Island in Ireland in 1866. That was the birth of globalization, the sundering of information from transportation. It changed everything.
This year let’s consider the mobile phone.
I was always mystified about how my mobile phone always knows how it is orientated: vertical, horizontal, angled. It has a better sense of balance than I have.
It is a really important feature of the phone. And of course orientating an object in three-dimensional space is absolutely vital for all kinds of things. Think about aviation, precision missiles, and space travel, for example.
3-D graphics and software recreations of any kind of virtual representation would not be possible without this.
You would think that plotting this is a simple matter of three-dimensional geometry. Move the point or object along its three axes.
It turns out that it is not so simple. Using only three axes gives rise to ambiguities, particularly when it two of the axes line up.
The problem was solved on 16 October 1843. Irish physicist and mathematician William Rowan Hamilton was walking along the towpath of the Royal Canal in Dublin with his wife. He was on his way to a meeting of the Royal Irish Academy. He was absorbed in this puzzle.
Then it hit him like a bolt of lightning! You needed a fourth dimension. He was so excited by this sudden inspiration that he scratched the equation in the stone bridge they were walking over, Broom Bridge in Cabra, Dublin.
As Hamilton described it: “And here there dawned on me the notion that we must admit, in some sense, a fourth dimension of space for the purpose of calculating with triples … An electric circuit seemed to close, and a spark flashed forth.”
This proves one thing: husbands don’t listen to their wives when out walking and solving problems!
Joking aside, it was a moment of supreme inspiration. He called the equation the quaternion. The quaternion equation not only got the Apollo missions to the moon. It is the foundation of quantum mathematics and quantum physics.
When AI meets quantum computing, we will have what experts like Tom Jenkins at OpenText call the singularity. It will represent a paradigm shift in our civilization. How we manage that will depend on how we will apply software to the enormous power of this convergence.
There’s an old joke that when scientist created the most powerful computer in the world, they asked it if there was a god. What is god, the computer asked? The scientists fed in a definition. After some calculations, the computer replied “there is now.”
I tell the story of Hamilton because Ireland’s scientific heritage and the strength of Irish science in Ireland today is not readily associated with us. That’s a big mistake. Consider the following.
Boyle’s Law on the pressure and volume of gases.
John Tyndall and the Tyndall scale proving the connection between carbon and climate change.
The Kelvin scale for temperature.
Robert Mallet, the founder of seismology.
Charles Parsons, inventor of the steam turbine.
John Phillip Holland, inventor of the submarine.
Who can ignore either whiskey, Guinness Stout, and the famous Spice bag, first created in The Sunflower Chinese takeaway in Templeogue in 2010?
Hamilton’s true successor was the physicist John Steward Bell from Belfast. Bell’s Theorem has overturned our understanding of the world. It establishes a fact that scientist simply accept when it comes to quantum mechanics. That is, that two particles are ‘entangled.’ Entanglement is independent of space. That action of one particle has an effect on another independent independent of space. There is no traceable causality. Einstein could never accept this and called it ‘spooky action at a distance.”
Today, entanglement is simply accepted as a phenomenon. It is a cornerstone of quantum physics and therefore quantum technology.
The quantum revolution in computing that is at hand is down to the work of Hamilton and Bell.
That tradition continues to this day. Ireland is leading research location for quantum technology.
According to John Goold, Associate Professor of Physics at Trinity College Dublin, “Microsoft and IBM are here in Dublin and we have research collaborations in my group with them,” said Goold. “In terms of support of the MSc, both Microsoft and IBM were involved in the design of some modules, and Microsoft has a scholarship program for the best female applicants who get a Microsoft Scholarship, which will basically pay their fees and also give them a living stipend. They’re very interested in the MSc degree because they have ambitions to grow a quantum tech ecosystem here in Ireland’s capital.”
I should add too that Dublin’s thriving financial services sector is due in no small part to Trinity’s Department of Physics. Dynamic currency exchange was first developed in Ireland, for example. TCD’s graduates find ready employment in financial services. It is another example of the talent pool in Ireland.
Ireland’s scientific and technological community is literally at the frontier of quantum revolution in computing.
Another example of Ireland’s strength in science is its Young Scientist of the Year competition. John Collison won the 41st competition in 2005. He and his brother John created Stripe four years later. The company is valued at over $20 billion.
I would like us all now to raise a glass to Ada Lovelace. Augusta Ada King, the Countess of Lovelace, was the only legitimate daughter of Lord Byron. Well education and raised by her mother, Anna Isabella Milbank, Ada Lovelace loved mathematics. She worked closely for many years with Charles Baggage, the founder of computer.
However, where he saw machines as solely capable of making calculations, Ada could see many applications by developing algorithms to direct machines. She is regarded as the founder of software.
I was encouraged to see that Firehood, the group of women angel investors, presented at the SaaS North Conference.
February 1st is Brigid’s Day in Ireland. She is the goddess and Saint of light, fire, creativity, and manufacturing.
Today, Brigid’s Day is an occasion to celebrate women in business, the arts and in leadership.
So please think about what you might be able to so on February 1st to mentor and encourage women to consider careers in technology and software.
Thanks and have a great evening!
eamonncmckee 