Episode 2 Made in Northern Ireland

This wee country of ours has been at the forefront

of some of the world's most ground-breaking innovations.

The pneumatic tyre, the ejector seat,

the portable defibrillator, and even the modern tractor

were all made in Northern Ireland.

But that was then, and this is now.

We've a whole new breed of entrepreneurs

from all over Northern Ireland.

In fields in Fermanagh,

sheds in Newtownards,

and workshops in Lurgan.

In this series, we hope to showcase

some of the best business minds in Northern Ireland.

Now, do they have what it takes to change the world?

Over the next five weeks,

I'm going to travel the length and breadth of the country,

meeting them...

Good to see you. £10 for a selfie, love.

..and learning more about their creations.

I feel like I'm swaying back and forward, but I'm not.

I know exactly what's going to be happening at home.

There'll be one person sitting on the sofa loving an idea,

and someone else, "It's never going to work."

So we're going to actually bring in a people's panel every week

to do just that,

ordinary people looking at these new creations in Northern Ireland

and trying to work out whether they like them or not.

First up, Trevor Graham from Randalstown.

Barking. Definitely an eccentric. I'll tell you what,

I admire him, cos he's come up with a brand-new idea

for his business - dog grooming.

# It's not puppy love It's a real thing

# It's not puppy love It's a real thing... #

We're here to demonstrate

the world's first cross infection and happy pet mat

for grooming and veterinary tables.

A lavender-scented mat.

The dog smells the lavender and they're calmed down.

They're gripped on a special grip surface.

They peel off in layers, so each dog gets a brand-new peel.

They're testable, so if,

God forbid, myself as a groomer, somebody accuses me

of giving their dog fleas, parvo or lungworm,

we can run all our valet lights over the mat

and we can test the mat to prove we didn't.

Barking as I am, I've come to the Lisburn Dog Training Centre,

winner of numerous national and international awards.

Mobile dog groomer Trevor is due shortly,

but until he gets here,

it's a good chance to watch the pros in action.

Come on!

Fetch! Good girl!

The centre's come on leaps and bounds

since it was set up just four years ago...

He's following your every move!

..by owner Michael and his prized pooch, Bestie.

Walk back, walk back.

Down.

Stephen, and you walk back. Walk back!

-I'll walk back!

-The dog's your teacher.

-And this takes months and months for the dog, right?

-Yeah.

But they enjoy it, and every type of dog can do it.

I mean, he's a Border collie, so he is,

people say, "Oh, it's easy for a Border collie,"

but I always tell people the smarter the dog, the more the problem.

This dog here in the wrong hands,

would have been like you driving a Formula 1 car.

-You'd probably put it in the hedge, so you would.

-'We'll see about that!'

Bestie, follow.

-Follow.

-That would be, "Close."

-Close.

Close. Close.

Back.

MUSIC: BBC Formula 1 theme tune

Go through. Go through. Go through. Go through.

-It's amazing.

-I know. Clever.

Go.

Sit.

Down.

'I'm clearly a natural.' Bestie!

But back to business, as Trevor's just arrived

in his mobile dog grooming van.

This man is eccentric with a capital E.

I'm in the back of a van with a strange man.

-For the first time ever.

-Can I rephrase that?

He's got a very strange smile as well. Look.

I'm in the back of MY van with a very strange man!

Hoping that...!

-Who is this?

-This is Zeus, the God of Thunder.

-Zeus is beautiful.

-Zeus is a nine-month-old Shetland sheepdog.

Oh, you're lovely. What is that you smell on my hands?

Is that prawn cocktail crisps you smell?

Mm! Zeus!

-So imagine that you're finished with Zeus.

-Yes.

Show me what you would do.

The mats peel off in a couple of seconds.

Peel off.

And my company will actually keep these in a sealed bag

for up to two weeks.

If somebody says we gave their dog fleas, parvo, lungworm,

or bled their dog, we can test the mat to prove we didn't.

SQUEAKING Oh, right, so I see what you mean.

If you test your hand, this is the ingeniousness of it.

-There's nothing on your hand.

-Yes.

-OK.

Imagine I'd cleaned the table with detergent and you go like that.

You have detergent on your hands.

What do most dogs do?

Most dogs lick their feet.

That means they're getting detergent from my grooming table

onto their tongue.

Whereas because there's nothing comes off on your hand,

not only does it grip the dog,

it also stops the dog licking detergent.

Forget about animals.

Every time my mother sits on my cream sofa, right,

she loves her Raspberry Ruffles and her Fry's Cream

and all this kind of malarkey,

and the sofa's got a little kind of crunched, sweaty chocolate

encrusted into it.

I'm thinking of putting one of these on top of the sofa,

and then every time someone new comes in,

peel off a new one for them!

-A human one for them.

-Do you not have a hoover?

-What's this giggle? Where's it from?

-It's a happy giggle.

You are a happy man, aren't you?

And good luck with the happy pet mats.

A local guy making it happen.

Here comes the smile and laugh again. Here it comes.

HE GIGGLES

At £1 a peel, the question is,

would you buy a box of them for your sofa?

Roll over! Roll over!

'But before I go, I'd better say goodbye

'to my new best friend, Bestie!'

Bestie, I love you!

-It's very clever.

-I think it's a fabulous idea.

And it's not too expensive either.

-How much was it?

-£1 a peel, he was saying.

-£1 a peel.

-Yes.

I was thinking it was a pound a pee and they were going to pee on it!

Waterproof as well.

-£1 a peel?

-It would be interesting to hear a vet's feedback.

I mean, what are the incidents of dogs going in, or animals going in,

and passing fleas?

I'm pretty sure that their cleanliness standards

are pretty high.

I know when I bring my dog in to get its hair cut,

you don't have anything like that.

He's just thrown on a hard table, and he goes absolutely ballistic.

If there was any way on this planet

that my dog could remain as calm as that dog did...

-Well...

-I think he's doing very well.

-I mean, it is literally a bit of sticky plastic.

-Yeah!

-And he's selling it.

-He's making a business out of it.

So, fair play to him. Great idea.

What I love about this series is,

one minute you can be rolling along with a dog -

I don't do that that often -

and the next, of course, you're talking to an inventor

who's come up with something

that could really, really help some people in their lives.

Here's something I hadn't thought of.

What if you had a disability - for example, you were deaf -

and you needed to be able to talk and contact the emergency services,

just like many of us can do?

Well, this next father and daughter team

are attempting to solve just that.

This is Les, and my name is Becca.

Myself and a team of advisers

are working in parallel with government

to build a next-gen 999 service.

999 is known to be a lifeline for people in distress.

-'A girl here's just had...'

-'Now, listen to me, love...'

-However, there are limitations for deaf and hard of hearing.

-Yep.

Along with those with speech impediments.

SIREN WAILS

Les and Becca have designed an app

with the deaf and hard of hearing in mind.

It's an app that allows users to submit an emergency call

using just the touch-screen on their phone.

So, talk us through how it works, Les.

OK, so whenever you first download the app,

you'll be prompted to put in your name, address, age, blood group,

and what other medical history that you feel relevant

to go in at that stage.

Let's say you want to go into an ambulance,

and you've got a series of highly visual icons.

Let's say it was a breathing problem. You would hit it.

You're then prompted to submit the emergency, and that's it gone.

It can be generally done in between 9 to 15 seconds.

-If there's a mobile phone signal.

-If there's a mobile phone signal.

You can still do this if you're up in the Hebrides, for example,

you're on your bike, you're having a great cruising session,

it's working off GPS.

Go in there again...

The E+press app sends your precise location

via the phone's GPS,

and then the emergency services send an instant reply

to let you know that they've got it and they're on their way.

Les and Becca claim

that that means the emergency call can be made easily and reliably

in just a matter of seconds.

So, Becca, how did you come up with the idea?

I came up with the idea

when I was doing my Masters in the University of Ulster,

I was working in parallel with doing my studies,

thinking, "How can I improve a service

-"for the deaf and hard of hearing community?

-And this is Paul?

Paul, have you been in an emergency situation

where you would need this product?

Yes, I've twice been in a car accident.

So whenever it happened,

I had to ask a hearing person to be able to help me.

I'm 30 now, I live by myself,

and I should be able to do it myself.

I don't have anyone there who would phone for me. How would I do it?

Our Newtownabbey-based entrepreneurs say this is a no-brainer.

But what about those at the other end of the phone?

I went to speak to John Wright

from the Northern Ireland Ambulance Service.

It's something that certainly someone like me,

I've never thought about the difficulty

someone with a disability would have

in phoning the emergency services.

You must have come across that quite a few times.

If you ring 999, you have to be able to exchange information,

and if you're deaf or hard of hearing, that's hugely challenging.

What do those people do at the minute?

They either get somebody who can make the call for them,

or they use emergency SMS.

You have to register for it. Not everybody knows about it.

It's functional, but limited in what information they can pass.

So there's real potential in the area that she's looking at?

Huge potential, yeah.

Becca saw the sort of information we needed

and has incorporated it in her design.

Any product that helps people contact the emergency services

when they need to is great.

So, in that situation where you were in a car accident,

maybe you can explain what this product would have done.

If something happened and I was in the situation,

you know, maybe if my father took ill,

I could just get my phone and use it.

A car accident, anything, yeah, I'd definitely use it.

-Good luck with it.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

-Fabulous idea.

-Really good idea.

You could see that being a godsend.

I wonder about the emergency SMS thing that already exists.

One of the guys alluded to it.

-The current SMS thing's a bit clunky and cumbersome.

-Mm.

I think that's excellent. You just... You know.

It's visual, you push a button to say,

"There's a picture of what's happened to me."

It's the...

The deaf person himself there,

I mean, if it's good enough for him, then it must be...

And the potential for it to go global as well.

This could be a real worldwide thing.

So how is she going to make money out of it?

-Is she really looking to make money?

-Don't know.

-I think the girl's just trying to...

-Introducing a new concept.

It's something that doesn't have to make money,

-but it'll make a difference.

-Brilliant. Brilliant idea.

What's really interesting about this series

is we're not talking about already established,

really powerful businesspeople that all sit in their little cliques.

We're talking about ordinary people like, you know,

here's a semidetached house in an estate in Belfast,

and there's someone in here that has the get up and go

to have an idea and actually make it happen.

Now, I know you've all wanted to see me in a see-through bit of plastic,

but it ain't going to happen.

Our next local inventor has come up with something

not too far away, though, called the Welly Wet Suit.

Bangor on a good day!

The Welly Wet Suit essentially aims to prevent wardrobe ruination

at events such as this,

and it's the brainchild of Elaine Sykes.

Elaine, where did you come up with the idea for the Welly Wet Suit?

I came up with it about five years ago, just sitting in the house

when my daughter came home from the festival.

She was soaked to the skin,

and her phone was water-damaged,

and I just thought, "Is there nothing else out there

"that would keep you covered from head to toe?"

How did you get involved, Nadine?

I'm Elaine's daughter's best friend, so I love the idea,

and I've been to many festivals, have severe horror stories.

What have you been up to that you have severe horror stories?!

I couldn't possibly say on TV!

It's like a 28 Days Later zombie film at them festivals.

I can't think of anything worse than those festivals.

Banging music and people running round drunk.

I was always looking for something out there

that was going to protect me, but there was nothing,

and then Elaine told me the idea and I loved it.

-Are you all not trying to be trendy at those events?

-Yeah.

So if you're running around in a plastic raincoat,

are the young kind of trendy, hip and hop...

whatever they call themselves...?

-That's the idea of the suit.

-I'm sounding like Victor Meldrew!

The suit's completely see-through,

so it shows your individuality and your style

and the stuff that you've chosen to wear over the festivals,

you'll be able to see that through.

I don't go out any more, but apparently at festivals,

what they do is, they get a little bit too exuberant,

they get a little bit too excited,

and they start throwing stuff over each other

and all this kind of malarkey.

We thought we'd test this,

cos what would happen if you had your good suit on

and you happened to get splashed with a wee bit of beer?

LAUGHTER

Like, you wouldn't want it over your head or anything stupid like that.

Definitely not.

And then, of course,

someone with a bit of curry or chicken, chips, peas and gravy.

And then you get these punks, or whoever they are, chavs,

is that what you call them?

Or rockers, or all these types of people I try to stay away from.

What they need to do, is they need to be protected at all times.

And that's for the cause!

These Welly Wet Suits do keep the beer at bay,

but I wanted to know how two complete business novices

have managed to take an idea like this and make it a reality.

You were telling me you've got a prototype made in China,

and I'm immediately thinking,

"How do you start talking to people in China?"

Just contacted a few manufacturing companies

and just chose one that I thought suited me.

Why not get them made here?

We would love to make it here, but with cash and capital,

we just need to get the product out there,

and then we'll maybe look at something further down the line,

manufacturing it here when it's viable to do so.

So, what about price? What type of...?

It's going to retail at about £25, and people might go, "God!"

because you're paying a couple of pounds for the ponchos,

but me going to festivals,

I would have spent £40 for a good raincoat.

This is just all-in-one, so you can use it for anything.

You might use it for one festival, but it'll do you for the gardening

and going to the golf, going to football matches.

It's a wee investment buy, so that's what we're marketing it as,

rather than a throwaway product.

-There's an entrepreneurial spirit in Northern Ireland, isn't there?

-Yeah.

Air conditioning came out of Northern Ireland.

The Welly Wet Suit's coming out now.

THEY LAUGH

MUSIC: Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head

Don't want to get my hands dirty!

HE SHOUTS

LAUGHTER

Stephen, if you'd have worn a Welly Wet Suit,

you wouldn't have got your jeans covered with muck.

I hate this show! Stupid idea show. Shove your ideas!

-Dancing in that, you'd be really sweaty, wouldn't you?

-Absolutely.

Which, of course, will take away from the transparency.

-That could be a problem.

-Yeah, but it protects your clothes.

Having played and, you know, went to these festivals,

I've played at them,

and I've seen people completely and utterly drenched.

Remind me next time I'm at Glastonbury.

For the uber image-conscious,

girls, especially, going to these festivals, it's all about how you look.

-Is it?

-It's all about the image.

-I thought it was all about mud.

It's all about the image now, all about what you're wearing.

You've got to look good while looking bad.

-That's the thing.

-Oh, right.

-Oh, yeah. It's hobo chic.

I would wear... I mean, I ride my bike all the time.

One thing that really annoys me is, there's loads of waterproof coats,

but waterproof trousers are a nuisance.

They get caught in your chain...

-I thought they had capes for that.

-No, but then...

-Do they work?

Then you look like Batman on a bike.

I like mad. I like eccentricity.

In fact, to try something that no-one's done before,

you've probably got to be a little bit thinking outside the box.

Paddy Bloomer is our resident inventor

who you should never, ever, ever try to copy in your whole entire life,

because his ideas are absolutely, completely crazy.

Do not try this at home.

MUSIC: Mad Man Blues

HE BASHES OUT "WE WILL ROCK YOU" DRUMBEAT

So, like...

everybody likes to clap along with their favourite '80s tunes,

but sometimes with your bare hands,

you just can't get that authentic '80s sound.

So that's what I... I've come up with a digi mitt.

It's a simple kind of a metal mitten.

If I open it up, you can see inside.

It has a thumb control here, a sensor here,

small lithium-ion battery, it's rechargeable off the USB.

Place the hand in.

Close it over.

And you're ready to go.

"WE WILL ROCK YOU" DRUMBEAT

# Buddy, you're a boy Make a big noise

# Playin' in the street Gonna be a big man some day

# You've got mud on your face You big disgrace

# Kicking your can all over the place, singing

# We will, we will rock you... #

You probably already know how big the craft beer business is,

but actually, in Northern Ireland,

there's also growth in the gin market,

and we have a company who has won major international awards.

It's a little-known fact that,

during US Prohibition of the 1920s and '30s,

spirit exports from these shores were hit hard,

and almost all of Northern Ireland's distilleries were forced to close.

But one young husband-and-wife team have taken it upon themselves

to bring the art of craft distilling back to Northern Ireland.

MUSIC: Pure Imagination

Based at the Rademon Estate on the outskirts of Crossgar,

Shortcross Gin claims to be

Northern Ireland's first premium craft gin.

-Hello there.

-Hi, Stephen.

-Good to see you.

-Hi, Stephen.

-How are you?

-This is where all the magic happens down here?

This is our 450-litre copper pot still.

It's very special in that it has two seven-plate enrichment columns.

It was created specifically for us in Germany by a family called Carl,

who are the oldest family of still-makers in Bavaria.

We forage botanicals from the estate.

The wild clover, you know, the little flowers that you see,

the elderberries, elderflowers,

and apples from our walled garden

giving Shortcross the unique flavour profile.

As with whisky, the origins of gin are open to debate.

But it made its way over here in the 17th century,

when English soldiers fighting the Thirty Years' War

watched their Dutch counterparts sipping this morale-boosting spirit.

Hence the term "Dutch courage".

-So, I don't drink.

-OK.

-Nor do I have a clue about gin.

Do different gins taste significantly different from each other?

It must taste predominantly of juniper berries.

So, these are the juniper berries here.

If you crush them in your finger, you'll start to get

the smell of the terpenes that make up juniper and gin.

And you two have given up your jobs to do this, right?

Yes, we both gave up our jobs two and a half years ago

to follow our dreams.

It's been a rollercoaster so far, but we've definitely no regrets.

Where are you exporting to so far?

We just shipped our first order to Dubai last week.

We're also available in France, Spain, Germany.

Is it easy working together, husband and wife, in a business?

THEY CHUCKLE

It's all fun and games, but it's worth it at the end.

Do you know what? I don't even drink,

but the gin must have got to my head somehow,

because I'm going to Fermanagh next to meet Gerald Coyle,

an entrepreneur who reckons his waterwheel device

could actually change the lives of millions.

It's just about worth a trip to Fermanagh.

The wettest county in Northern Ireland.

A place so wet, they keep their baths outside...

..and their boats in the field.

See lots of these great ideas

with me travelling the breadth of Northern Ireland.

So now I'm down in Fermanagh. I really want to be here, don't I?

Look, there's the cliched tractor.

No doubt I'm going to meet some type of countryman

that's going to go, "Hello, Stephen, come on in for a bun,"

and show me some type of wacko idea.

My name's Gerald Coyle, from Belleek, County Fermanagh.

I'm here to launch my new company,

which is H2otricity Renewable Energy.

24/7 renewable energy.

MUSIC: Down By The Riverside

-You must be Gerald.

-Yes.

I was just saying there how much I love country people.

-So you have an idea to show us.

-Just down here.

Gerald's family have been running this small farm in Belleek

for over 100 years.

I find it almost impossible to believe

that hidden behind these hedges

is a potentially world-changing technology.

But that is precisely what Gerald claims to have invented.

For what he's about to show us is a secret new breed of waterwheel

that he calls the hydro wheel.

There must be other waterwheels in the world.

There is, but not to the same output as this one.

Make that real for someone like me.

900 homes we could actually run per unit.

-All year round?

-All year round.

We've designed it, even if the water runs really low,

it will work 24/7,

so you'll have the same output 24/7, day and night.

But how come if the water's low?

Because it's about the strength of the...

The gearbox is the whole secret.

-Not letting me see the gearbox, big boy, are you?

-No.

-The gearbox...

-Is that the secret?

-Yeah, the secret is the gearbox.

So, I'm standing here in the piddling rain in Fermanagh

and you're keeping this gearbox secret?

-Patent pending.

-Don't trust me?

-It's not that I don't trust you.

You're very welcome down in Fermanagh.

-Thanks very much for coming down...

-You don't trust me, do you?

-Well...

-You think the neighbours are looking out in their telescopes?

-You never know!

You could have people here standing at two o'clock in the morning

with a flash...

Anything's possible.

I'll not be standing here at two o'clock in the morning, let me tell you.

So our boy Gerald here wants to be coy about his gearbox.

Because if what he's saying is true,

he reckons this technology could be a game-changer

in the world of renewable energy.

And he reckons it could make him a very, very rich man.

MUSIC: Proud Mary

Most people who think about hydro dam the river further up,

which stops migrating fish, which is a no-no.

This here actually runs in the flow.

Our biggest thing is to save life.

That fish in there has as much right to this world as me and you.

But this is just not a thing for Northern Ireland.

This is for the developing world.

This can be used to create jobs,

save lives in different parts of the world.

Developing countries need electricity now.

Not today, not tomorrow. Now.

Gerald's got big dreams for his gearbox.

And he's putting his money where his mouth is, too,

having invested £30,000 of his own cash into this idea to date.

But there's other technology out there

that's had hundreds of millions spent on its development,

and it's already used across the world.

So, can this young farmer's waterwheel

really be an improvement on the likes of that?

What is the difference between this and a wind turbine?

A wind turbine only works at 40% efficiency when it's windy.

This here, have you ever seen a river run dry in Fermanagh yet?

This will work 24/7, day and night.

-You see, the last laugh, hopefully, will be with you, right?

-Yes.

But as I'm standing here,

I'm kind of thinking, "This guy's got to be a wee bit nuts."

So it's impossible, surely,

that there is a brilliant worldwide idea

sitting in this little field in Fermanagh.

Happy the ones who try to make a difference in the world

than ones who sit and judge you

for being someone who tried to something better.

I'm a person who believes in trying,

because there's more people who talk about something.

I'm a do-er. I'm a trier.

I'm not a quitter, I'm not a sitter.

Gosh.

I don't know if I believe him.

I would want to see absolute rock solid proof,

cos if what he says is true, that's revolutionary.

Well, he didn't put it in the water, did he?

No, he didn't, and the key's in the gearbox?

Why? Does it store electric?

If it takes away from those eyesores that are those wind turbines

that you see everywhere, I'm a big fan of that.

They are not attractive.

-True!

-We don't know to what extent

the water is actually influencing this contraption.

What I would say is,

that's for, let's say, our Executive to get involved,

through resource and development grants to people like that,

to develop something like that, which could be far-reaching.

So, we don't know. It looks good.

I don't like the way Stephen was talking to him there

about it being in this wee field in Fermanagh.

Like, working in...

As soon as someone comes here from somewhere else,

they're international, and that's a big stamp of credibility.

I completely agree with you. There is absolutely no reason.

We have produced more world-beaters in Northern Ireland...

You know, you think Dunlop, and, you know, the tractor boy...

Ferguson, wasn't that his name?

And, you know, there is absolutely no reason

why you can't have a world-beating invention

in the fields of Fermanagh.

Like Stephen said, he'll have the last laugh, this guy,

if it goes global.

Here's my message to you if you've got an idea.

There are so many entrepreneurs in Northern Ireland

who have told me the same thing.

The support in this country for your business idea

is absolutely incredible.

They've told me it's better than anywhere else in the world.

So if you want to make something in Northern Ireland,

then make it happen.

The support is here.

And the details are on our website.