Indigo Internet

Indigo Internet was established in late 1995 as an Internet service provider in Dublin, Ireland. It was founded by Macky Moyna. Indigo was claimed to have over 16,000 subscribers in Ireland, though others questioned the validity and accuracy of these user numbers.[1]

Their sudden appearance as a new company that would provide internet services caused a stir amongst the small number of communications companies and individuals who were active in Ireland at that time. This raised many questions when Bill O'Herlihy's public relations company announced when questioned by the media about their client that Indigo expected to invest approximately a 4 million punt (Irish pounds) into their internet service. When asked about the sources of their investment, it was stated that this was derived from repatriated profits from investments in Cuba and was in the region of approximately 4 million Irish Punts (Pounds).

Approximately 3 months after their launch in early 1996, Indigo were subject to an article in Computimes, a special section on computing run once a week by the Irish Times,[2] about a security breach in their system. This story, due to the interest in the development of the internet, made the front page of the Irish Times. Indigo had reportedly placed a file containing what was believed to be most if not all of their users usernames and passwords into a public file download area. The file was acquired by Computimes staff and opened to expose the security content. Some of their competitors referred this incident as the "Who do you want to be today" incident, reflecting on the then popular Microsoft advert "Where do you want to go today".

Indigo's admission that they benefited from a result of trading with Cuba is believed to be the real cause of their withdrawal from Indigo as the source of their internet connection was carried via a United States company which could not legally trade with Cuban connected interests at that time. This, after allegations of ties with the Irish Republican Army and questions regarding Indigo's investment sources, led to the company being initially sold off to one of the amusement companies in Bray. Some months later the company was resold to a consortium of investors headed by Shay Moran and supported by Davy Stockbrokers.

It was subsequently sold to Telecom Éireann,[3] the incumbent Irish telephone and state monopoly who had received additional monies from a decision of government allowing them to minimise their tax liability and so maximise cash flow giving them an ability to expand. The Department of Communication requested a second audit by Stokes Kennedy Crowley of Telecom Eireann's first annual statement prepared by independent audit on a private company basis by Price Waterhouse was being questioned. This stated that there was an under report between 80 and 90 million pounds in tax. (estimated to be about 140 - 160 million today)

This second report has never been made public or discussed in any public arena. Some believe this bounty from government should be considered to be an undisclosed payment for ensuring Ireland's Internet future had apparently no hidden issues and no attached rumour of criminality of corruption. This benefit also was that Telecom Eireann showed financial results well beyond expectations and these were used by promoters to hype Eircom shares sales which initially climbed to a high level after launch and their take up by many Irish citizens, being presented as the most successful public company launch in Ireland. Indigo was retained for some years as a separate internet company unit and had some key Eircom staff "dropped" into this. These key staff later returned to Eircom. After its absorption some years later into Eircom, it disappeared as a working entity except for some users who retained their email addresses.

Questions into the original startup by Donal Moyna were highlighted by incidents such as the news that a man who US Federal officials said was a member of the Irish Republican Army was being held on charges of carrying $13,500 in counterfeit $50 bills at LaGuardia Airport, when arrested. The suspect, Donal Patrick Moyna, then 29 years old, of Dublin, was about to board a plane for Providence, R.I., when he was stopped by agents of the U.S. Secret Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said Andrew J. Maloney, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. [4]

However, even though he was caught "red" handed, he was quickly released by the U.S. authorities and allowed to leave their country. It is believed that the investigators were not happy with this turn of events.

In 1998, it was announced that the national telephone company, Telecom Éireann, saw an opportunity to enter the ISP market and made an offer for Indigo which was accepted by the consortium of investors, including Shay Moran.[5][6]

Indigo was purchased by Eircom[7][8]

Indigo effectively no longer exists as all of its activities have been subsumed into Eir (formerly Eircom and, before that, Telecom Éireann). The Indigo website now simply points to Eircom services.