The inaugural Women@SIMI event, hosted by the Society of the Irish Motor Industry and sponsored by Bank of Ireland Finance has been held at the Gibson Hotel in Dublin.

An impressive panel of speakers shared their inspirational stories with Master of Ceremonies Mary Kennedy. People interviewed included, Katie Taylor, current Irish, European, World and Olympic Boxing Champion, Lynne Cantwell, Ireland rugby team's most capped player and Rosemary Smith, a former world rally star and road safety campaigner.

Rowena Dooley, Director of Dooley Motors, Member of the SIMI Management Board and SIMI Treasurer opened the event remarking it was great to see so many women from the Industry in one room. Rowena pointed out that some 8000 women now work in the Irish motor industry representing 19% of the workforce. This is up from 13% in 1998, but she felt there was still room for improvement.  

Women@SIMI developed out of an idea conceived and organised by the women within SIMI, who wanted to create a forum where female business professionals from within the motor industry could meet together interact, network and share their experiences. Having surveyed SIMI members the feedback on the proposal was overwhelmingly positive, and there was a real sense that an event like this was long overdue.

The event proved to be a great success with over 150 professional women in attendance from a variety of counties and different sectors such as the Heavy Goods Vehicles, Vehicle Body Repairers, Franchise sales, Distributors and many more.