Professor Michael Dowling
Co-founder and Chief Executive
Professor of Finance, named in Stanford’s list of the world’s top 2% of researchers. Previously led an AI centre for five years.
Bringing relationship banking to more small businesses.
Narrative is a Dublin City University spin-out bringing together expertise in finance, behavioural science and AI. We build technology that helps financial institutions develop stronger relationships with their small business customers.
Where Narrative comes from
Narrative grew out of research at DCU into AI and behavioural finance, supported by Enterprise Ireland’s Commercialisation Fund.
Both founders, Michael Dowling and Yulia Plaksina, grew up in households that ran small businesses, and set out to close a gap they had seen first-hand. A bank can hold a small business’s accounts for years without knowing what the owner is planning, while the owner works through important decisions with little support. Narrative gives that owner a mentor and gives the bank a way to be there when it counts.
Leadership
Meet the people leading Narrative’s business, product, technology and AI work.
Dr Yulia Plaksina
Co-founder and Chief Product Officer
PhD in behavioural finance. Developed the first customer-facing generative AI financial coaching app at a Fortune 100 company.
Chonghuan Wang
Chief Technology Officer
Has deployed applications used by millions of people in highly regulated environments.
Dr Ting Chen
AI Lead
Led textual AI and deep learning teams at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the world’s largest scientific research organisation and a global leader in AI research.
Company milestones
- 2024Research origins at Dublin City UniversitySupported by Enterprise Ireland’s Commercialisation Fund. Before building the product, we spoke with around 300 business owners through chambers of commerce, and with the banks that serve them. Owners wanted guidance specific to their own business. Banks wanted a way to serve customers with the needs of a large business and the revenue of a retail one.
- 2025Techstars Future of Finance Accelerator, AmsterdamWe joined the Techstars Future of Finance Accelerator in Amsterdam in 2025, working with banking and fintech mentors on our product positioning and sales approach.
- 2026Central Bank of Ireland Innovation Sandbox ProgrammeSix months of one-to-one engagement with Central Bank staff on making AI guidance for small businesses transparent and traceable, and on where a person needs to take over. It also showed us how developments such as open finance could shape our work.
- 2026Pre-seed investmentBacked by Enterprise Ireland and AI deeptech venture investors, to grow the team and bring Narrative Coach to more institutions.
- 2026EY FinTech Accelerator, LondonWe joined EY’s FinTech Accelerator in London, with a focus on building relationships in UK small business banking.
How we work
We give people real ownership and a learning path they choose. We give direct, specific feedback and expect people to question ideas openly. We set ambitious goals and make realistic decisions about priorities and workload.
Give every customer someone in their corner.
We’ll give you a demo of Narrative Coach and introduce the team behind it.