Alumni engagement and philanthropy



BRIAN CONLON – A SHINING EXAMPLE  

16 August 2019 – Further obituaries can also be found in The Irish Times and The Telegraph

Brian Gerard Conlon, BSc Accounting 1987, DSc (Econ) 2012, Founder and CEO of one of Northern Ireland's most successful technology companies - the Newry firm First Derivatives - died on 28 July 2019, aged 53 in Daisy Hill Hospital, Newry, following a short battle with cancer.

One of four children born to Newry couple Gerry and Josephine (née Carroll), Brian was educated at the Abbey CBS grammar school in the city before coming up to Queen’s to study accountancy.

An accomplished GAA footballer, he played for his native Down team in the 1980s until a serious knee injury sustained during a Sigerson Cup match for Queen’s in 1987, cut short his playing ambitions.

Brian Conlon's career included spells at KPMG, where he worked in the audit department, Morgan Stanley, where he was part of the risk management team and then the NASDAQ-quoted company Sun-Gard, a major global derivatives software house based in London. There he was a capital markets consultant, devising structured financial products and travelling regularly between the UK and Silicon Valley on the west coast of America and, closer to home to Germany, France and elsewhere in Europe.

Brian returned to Northern Ireland as part of a Local Enterprise Development Unit (LEDU was a forerunner agency to Invest NI) ‘come back home’ programme to set up First Derivatives in 1996 in his mother’s spare bedroom, with a £5,000 loan from the local Credit Union.

In 2002, with 26 employees and a turnover of £2 million, First Derivatives was floated on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) in London. The company provides rapid data analysis for a wide variety of industries now operates in Europe, North America, Asia and Australia on behalf of clients including Airbus Defence and Space, and Red Bull Formula 1.

Currently employing over 2,400 employees in 15 offices worldwide, First Derivatives has an estimated valuation of £1 billion. Most of the company’s workforce is embedded in major banks around the world from Hong Kong to San Francisco and from London to New York. 

In 2012, Brian helped establish Northern Ireland’s first ever financial trading facility at his alma mater – The First Derivatives Trading Room – supported by Invest NI. It has continued to provide a dynamic learning environment for Queen’s students wishing to embark on a career in financial services or technology.

Having won the EY Entrepreneur of the Year (EOY) Award in 2010, Brian was awarded an Honorary Degree from Queen’s ‘for services to business and commerce’ in 2012. Delivering the citation, Professor Ellen Douglas-Cowie, at the time a Pro-Vice-Chancellor at Queen’s, said: “Brian Conlon is an inspiration to the students of the Queen’s University Management School graduating here today. 

“The meteoric rise and success of his business, which started off in the spare bedroom of his family home with his mother acting as secretary and now employs 550 people in providing software services to capital markets in around the globe, is a shining example to follow.”

Among many other awards, he was the recipient of the INVENT Innovation Founder Award and the Belfast Telegraph's Business Person of the Year (2015) and received the inaugural Chairman’s Award for Excellence in Director and Board Practice, at the annual Institute of Directors Northern Ireland (IoD NI) Director of the Year Awards in 2018.

Brian is survived by his wife, Julie (née O’Hare), with whom he had two children – son Fionn and daughter Danu – his mother Josephine, and his siblings Kathy and Ciaran, both of whom work for First Derivatives. He was predeceased by his brother Ronan.

To submit graduate obituaries or news items, or for general enquiries about this story, please contact Gerry Power, Communications Officer, Development and Alumni Relations Office, Queen's University Belfast or telephone: +44 (0)28 9097 5321.

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