DCU Voices

DCU VOICES 62 High octane marketing BA Languages and Marketing graduate, Annie Kennedy reflects on a sports marketing career which has taken in UEFA European finals and her current role with the Ferrari Formula One team. Annie Kennedy studied Languages and Marketing in DCU and graduated in 1997. She spoke recently on the Travel Tales with Fergal podcast, which is hosted by Fergal O’Keeffe, who also went to DCU and graduated from Business Studies in 1994. “I left Ireland the day after I finished my last exam in my DCU finals. I left Ireland and I never came back,” said Annie. “And it was never planned. Two days after graduation, I moved to France for three years, then lived in London for two years, and I’ve been in Switzerland now for 18 years. But always in jobs where I travel a lot.” “I’m fromWicklow and I have a huge family of 10 siblings. By the time I left home for DCU, we were already living on four continents. Betweenme and my siblings, we’ve got nine languages. We speak Chinese, Japanese, Greek, Portuguese, French, German, Spanish, English and Irish, of course. “I live now in a place called Zug, which is classic Switzerland. It’s about half an hour from Zurich. It’s really multinational, which I love. It’s in a beautiful location. It’s quite low lying, but it’s surrounded by lakes and mountains. From every point, you’re seeing these beautiful mountain ranges. For example, from our balcony, we can see the Eiger. “People often ask me ‘Did you have that planned?’, because I have had a 20-year career in sports marketing. But I got into Eurosport completely by accident. I was living in Paris. Fergal O’Keeffe (Bachelor of Business Studies) Marketing Communication Specialist at Lume.ie @FergalTravel Annie Kennedy (BSc Languages andMarketing); UEFA, FIFA, Eurosport and F1