How Niamh Donnelly’s Bold Move to the US Is Revolutionizing Robotics—and What It Means for Tomorrow’s Tech Titans
Imagine this: the very same Niamh Donnelly—who now co-pilots cutting-edge AI at Akara Robotics—is once elbow-deep scrubbing hospital rooms herself. Why? Because to truly innovate, you gotta live the grind. With dual degrees in Computer Science and Mechanical Engineering, Niamh didn’t just dream about tech; she immersed herself in the nitty-gritty of hospital sanitation. Fast forward to today, and her company’s AI-driven platform is revolutionizing surgical theaters by slashing downtime and boosting efficiency. Think robots cleaning with ultraviolet light, AI sensors that respect privacy with thermal imagery, and an uncanny knack for transforming archaic hospital tech into futuristic solutions. But here’s the real kicker—Akara’s journey from Dublin to the US wasn’t just high-tech wizardry; it was relentless hustle, early morning calls, and coffees that turned into contracts. So, what does it take to not only build breakthrough med tech but also convince old-school hospitals to embrace it? Dive in to discover how Niamh and Akara Robotics are redefining healthcare’s future—one sensor at a time. LEARN MORE
Niamh Donnelly, Akara Robotics’ co-founder and chief technology officer, tells Sarah Freeman how the company’s AI technology is making surgical theatres safer and more efficient
There was a time when Niamh Donnelly, holder of a master’s degree in Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence alongside a degree in Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, spent her days cleaning out hospital rooms.
The co-founder of engineering innovation company Akara Robotics wanted to get a real-life feel for what hospital sanitation actually entailed.
The deep tech company, founded in 2019 as a spinout from Trinity College Dublin, had created an autonomous ultraviolet disinfection robot named Violet, designed to scrub operating theatres and wards.
“When we first started selling the robots, we did cleaning shifts in a hospital so we could fully understand how it should work,” Donnelly tells Business Plus.
From that one product Akara expanded into AI tracking, which, combined with robotic cleaning, cuts down on the idle time between surgeries.
Their current offering is an AI-driven automation platform which is aimed at optimising operating room efficiency and anchored by their Akara AI Sensor.
The decision to focus on sensors was more of a reprioritisation than a pivot for the company.
“When we were floating this AI sensor idea in the US, people really wanted [it]. So we built a prototype and it really just kind of took off,” Donnelly says.
The technology is essentially computer vision, helping hospital staff understand what’s happening in a particular room.
“Other people do that by using regular camera technology, which is like someone videoing a surgery. We really didn’t want to do that; we don’t want to be like the Meta glasses of the hospital. It’s something that’s really important to me. We come from Europe and are privacy-safe,” Donnelly says.
“Akara uses a concept called ‘privacy by design’ [that involves] thermal imagery. The image is like a white blob and you can’t tell who the person is, but the AI can understand what’s happening. So it preserves the privacy of the person.”
The device is a wall-mounted, passive sensor which can be easily installed in under an hour. It was named one of Time Magazine’s Best Inventions of 2025. The idea came about from observing the systems and processes used by hospitals.
“[Hospitals] still sometimes use pagers and fax machines, but we’re sending people to space. There’s a lot of archaic technology.”
Currently, Donnelly says, approximately 40 per cent of a typical nurse’s time is spent on documentation.
“They’re expected to be like human data collectors. We just want to get rid of that.”
As well as taking copious notes, the AI platform can ascertain what medical personnel need to be in a certain room at a certain time. This obviates the need for nurses to take endless details, make calls or walk down corridors to pass on messages. Donnelly sees the extraordinary potential for growth of med tech in hospitals, but concedes that it’s a slow process.
“We learned the hard way [that] you can’t just build a cool technology and because it does a task, they’re going to buy it. You have to prove the return on investment. We do a baseline study of how many procedures are done each day. Then we bring in our technology and we show them after three weeks, ‘You’ve improved your processes because you have the data and you can do X more surgeries now.’ So we’ve shown up to a 17 per cent increase in the surgical volume.”
While Akara began in Ireland, they found that the US market was more receptive to new technology from a then relatively unknown company, seeing an opportunity to get it at a lower cost and improve their margins.
Today, Akara’s products are employed in 11 US surgical centres, with seven in Los Angeles and the rest dispersed across the country.
As for Akara’s cleaning robot, they have partnered with an environmental services provider in the US called Servicon, providing services to 35 hospitals on the west coast. Donnelly has previously spoken about how the funding landscape differs between the two countries.
Because Akara creates new technology, funders need to take more of a gamble and in years gone by that may have rendered it harder to get backing. That is changing, she says.
“Everyone talks about how riskaverse European and Irish investors are, but they’re realising that you [may] miss out on the big things like ChatGPT or Claude. Investors want to see traction with customers, but [when selling to] healthcare we were finding it hard to get into Irish hospitals even though we had this tech that was better than anything on the market.
“Hospitals would [opt] for a bigger, well-known company, even though their technology wasn’t as innovative or new and was way more expensive.”
Today, Akara’s funding stands at $11m from venture capitalists in both Ireland and the US. In addition to the differences between jurisdictions, the physical product itself posed challenges.
“Traditionally, it’s been easier to get funding for software products because it’s easier to scale. You don’t have to think about the supply chain. You don’t actually have to build something,” Donnelly says.
“Now that’s completely changed because we’ve seen that investing in deep tech and grand ideas like AI really pays off. Although it might take a longer time to get to market, when it does, the advances that it can make are kind of more impactful.”
Approaching a new market in the US necessitated a different approach.
“You’re starting over again. You don’t have a network or anyone you could call up to get a connection into a hospital. I was calling physically into hospitals — old school and very intimidating, but it works.”
Akara changed their strategy somewhat and targeted surgery centres which, while associated with the larger hospitals, were more manageable in size with access to those in charge somewhat more achievable. Donnelly says the Irish network was invaluable.
“The Irish diaspora is not superstrong in Los Angeles, but in general I don’t know what I would have done without the Irish connections. So many Irish who have moved to the US are more than willing to help you. I was so surprised by [successfully] reaching out to people high up in institutions who didn’t know me and asking to meet for a coffee. I’d advise any Irish vendor going to the US to really lean on that.”
Donnelly did more than just reach out to people, though. Determined to make inroads, she’d suggest a coffee, saying she was in the area, and then fly there.
She credits this low-tech, labour intensive approach with successfully securing business in 11 centres in just one year. Expanding a company’s footprint into another jurisdiction can require onerous red tape, with compliance certificates and a host of legal requirements to meet.
“You almost have two teams, two companies, two accountants, two lawyers, doubles of everything, and we didn’t really realise that. So that was a hurdle we didn’t account for; you have to operate two offices. We have all of [our] engineering here [in Ireland] and then commercial in the US.”
With hospital budgets traditionally pushed to the brink, Akara has used data to convince healthcare decisionmakers that their product is a necessity rather than a luxury. So what’s next for Akara?
“We’re very much a solution-focused company, so we’re not just building a product and trying to push it into hospitals. I think I’ve spent more time in hospitals understanding how they work than in the office.”
Donnelly says customers are constantly asking for add-ons. Her dream is that when a new hospital is being built, Akara would be brought in to build out the technology so it can be a high-tech smart hospital.
“That’s our goal.”
Akara is currently doing a pilot study with an Irish hospital about patient wards where older adults fall or get out of bed late at night.
“We’re making a move to start [working with] some Irish hospitals now that we have American hospitals on board. Now they might trust us.”
The future looks bright and highly efficient.
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