Den for those dreams
Frank Corr on another reality TV series, Eddie Hobbs in Taiwan and rollicking Raw

No, we don't mean the Welsh rugby team. Rather four “wealthy investors” who want to back budding entrepreneurs on television. The latest reality show from Larry Bass & Co at Screentime ShinAwil of The Apprentice/You're a Star fame will see a bunch of young hopefuls explaining their bright business ideas to a panel of experts from early next year.

The line-up includes Niall O'Farrell of Black Tie dresswear, Sarah Newman who is described as “a dotcom millionaire”, Sean Gallagher “a construction technology provider”, Bobby Kerr of Insomnia coffee and journalist and broadcaster Gavin Duffy.

RTE has contracted to show this franchised programme which made its debut on Nippon TV in Japan in 2001 and has since been sold in several markets. Expect banter, analysis, snide comments and a tear or two before the Irish dragons snap up the next Facebook or Google – and that will only be between the judges on Dragons' Den.

“I want to stress that in there when a good idea does come up, I'm not going to let the guys get in ahead of me, if I can take it on,” Gavin Duffy told Irish Times reporter Steven Carroll. Duffy knows all about entrepreneurship and bright ideas, having enjoyed innings on RTE, LM FM and the Radio Leinster pirate station in the buccaneering days of Nova and Sunshine. He is also a lover of fox hunting.

As to bright ideas, well how about a reality programme in which employees would set up idiotic tasks for their bosses and then tell them “You're Fired!”?

INVESTMENT IDEAS Richard Curran, deputy editor, Sunday Business Post will present Dragons' Den on RTE in the new year, pictured with jury members Sarah Newman and Bobby Kerr. The sponsor is Bank of Ireland.

TALKING NATION
‘We've got the nation talking' claims RTE in a series of print ads for Radio 1 and while the claim may be open to debate as far as the general populus is concerned, the national broadcaster has certainly got tongues wagging within the media.

Niamh Horan, entertainment news correspondent at the Sunday Independent, said Bill Cullen and The Apprentice (yes, that show again) “couldn't beat the lure of a sexy lesbian kiss” on an episode of the restaurant drama series, Raw. The Sindo said that “two striking female actresses (sic)…locked lips in a long sultry kiss”.

The eagle-eyed Horan went on to report that what she described as “the risqu