Mark O’Rourke is the Managing Director of Bibby Financial Services. He leads with a passion for empowering SMEs to thrive in dynamic financial landscapes. With nearly three decades of experience in invoice and commercial finance, he has built a reputation for delivering tailored funding solutions that unlock growth, resilience, and innovation.
By Héloïse Chaudot
What are your main priorities and goals in your role?
As we mark twenty years in Ireland, my priority remains unchanged: helping SMEs access the funding they need to manage their cash flow and grow their business with confidence. As one of Ireland’s leading specialist business funders, our focus is on ensuring SMEs continue to have choice, speed and flexibility when it comes to sourcing working capital solutions.
Operating across the island of Ireland, we’re delighted to now be in a position to, on average, facilitate over €1m a week in new funding limits, in addition to the millions in weekly payments to existing clients.
We’re focused on offering support to businesses with a turnover of €750,000 or more, across a range of sectors, including Manufacturing, Wholesale, Food and Beverage, Transport, Construction, Recruitment, and various professional business services.
We have clients in every county, and a team of experts located right across the country to ensure that our clients receive a personalised and face-to-face service.
What are your biggest challenges as CEO?
Our biggest challenge is ensuring that more SMEs understand that there is now a range of funding options available to them – and that this funding can move at speed. The days of relying on a bank loan or overdraft are long gone.
Traditional banks remain important, but many businesses have found that rigid lending criteria and slower approval times do not always match their operational needs. Specialist lenders have stepped in to bridge this gap, offering more tailored solutions that better reflect the realities of different business models.
These providers often bring flexibility in structuring facilities, faster access to capital, and a willingness to support areas such as M&A, management buyouts, and growth funding, where traditional finance can be harder to secure.
For example, invoice finance and invoice discounting are revolving credit facilities that enable businesses to release cash tied up in unpaid invoices, with providers like Bibby Financial Services advancing up to 90% of invoice value within 24 hours. This ensures quick access to earned income, with the facility scaling in line with sales growth. Importantly, it also means that the business doesn’t have to take on new debt or monthly repayments.
As a result, Irish SMEs today have a broader choice of funding partners, enabling them to align working capital solutions with their growth ambitions and operational pressures.
How do you keep your team/staff motivated?
We are a people-led organisation, and we motivate our team by building a values-led culture where purpose, ownership, and impact are clear. Our leadership approach is to empower people with trust, autonomy, and the right technology to make better decisions. Our teams can see the direct impact of their work on SMEs, which creates pride, momentum, and sustained engagement.
It was also fantastic to be recently awarded Financial Services Company of the Year at the Chambers Ireland In Business Recognition Awards 2025. This was a really wonderful achievement for the entire team.
What are the challenges facing the industry going forward?
The financial services industry is balancing tighter credit supply, rapid digitalisation, and heightened cyber risk. At the same time, SMEs need predictable access to working capital. Specialist providers and public-private partnerships will play an increasingly important role in bridging that gap.
What new trends are emerging in your industry?
AI-enhanced insight is transforming how receivables, cashflow and risk are analysed, shifting finance from reactive to genuinely proactive. We are already embedding AI, data and automation across our operations to strengthen decision-making and customer experience.
Investment in digital infrastructure and integration enables real-time data use and alignment with Open Banking, a financial services model that allows third-party service providers to access consumer data from traditional banking systems. At the same time, SMEs are increasingly adopting blended finance models, and our product strategy continues to evolve to support that flexibility.
Are there any major changes you would like to see in your sector?
Ireland would benefit from a more open, competitive funding landscape where banks and specialist providers work side by side. According to our recent SME Confidence Tracker, 52% of SMEs say accessing external finance has become more difficult in recent months, while 38% report an increased need for it.
Secondly, businesses are looking beyond traditional banks, with 55% considering alternative or government-backed options in the next 12 months. As a specialist provider and the SBCI’s only invoice finance partner, Bibby Financial Services is already helping fill this gap – delivering faster, flexible working capital, and supporting SME growth.
As an employer, are you finding any skill gaps in the market?
Like most Irish employers, we see skill gaps, particularly in data-driven financial analysis and digitally fluent credit roles. Our approach is to hire for potential, train for capability and empower people with technology, while keeping strong relationship skills at the core.
How did your strategy develop in the context of the banking crisis and economic crisis?
Our strategy didn’t fundamentally change. We’ve always focused on real trading performance and receivables rather than balance-sheet lending. That relationship-led, cycle-resilient approach allowed us to support businesses through downturns and remains central to how we operate today.
We did, however, engage in several strong relationships that are still ongoing today.
For example, we are the only invoice finance partner with the Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland, funding businesses with a €100 million revolving fund. We also partner with PTSB, offering their customers an enhanced range of funding solutions designed to improve cash flow and fund their growth ambitions.
How do you define success, and what drives you to succeed?
Success is seeing SMEs grow, hire and trade with confidence. Profit matters, but this only follows when the right things are done in the right order. Industry recognition helps too – it validates the team’s work and reinforces the impact we make every day.
What’s the best advice you’ve been given in business?
Assume nothing. Stay close to the detail, test assumptions and listen carefully – to customers, colleagues and partners – especially during periods of uncertainty.
What advice would you give to others starting in business?
Know your numbers, particularly cash flow. Diversify your funding options, surround yourself with strong advisors and keep governance simple but disciplined. Most importantly, stay close to your customers and the problem you’re solving.
What have been your highlights in business over the past year?
Reaching twenty years in business in Ireland is a significant milestone. Securing an additional SBCI facility, bringing cumulative support to €100m, and delivering a record level of funding to SMEs were also big achievements for the team.
What’s next for your company?
Guided by our internal BFS 5.0 strategy, we want the Bibby Financial Services brand to be recognised globally as a human‑centred, technology‑enabled financial partner. One that accelerates growth, empowers colleagues and delivers smarter customer experiences, while staying locally relevant in every market we serve and living our values through sustainable, responsible action.
Where do you want your business/brand to be this time next year?
This time next year, we want the Bibby Financial Services brand to reflect the full shift into our BFS 5.0 strategy. Empowering People, Enabled by Technology – a brand that shows we are growing faster, scaling smarter and delivering more sustainable value across our international footprint, while demonstrating a distinctly local impact in Ireland by supporting SMEs with the personalised relationships, sector understanding and responsiveness that the Irish market expects and values.
What is the best book you’ve ever read (non-business) and why?
The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It’s about resilience, belief, and the impact ordinary people can have when they commit to a bigger purpose, themes that resonate strongly with leadership.
What is your favourite hobby and why?
Reading. It allows me to switch off and reset. I read a mix of business, sport, and fiction – it keeps curiosity sharp and perspective balanced.
What is your mantra for life?
Stay curious and never think you know it all.
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