Waterford city woman, Maria Smith (nee Cunningham) who has been named as one of the 25 most power women in Ireland.

Waterford city woman, Maria Smith (nee Cunningham) who has been named as one of the 25 most power women in Ireland.

A Waterford-born businesswoman has been named as one of the 25 most powerful women in Ireland.

Only daughter of James and the late Mary Cunningham, The Willows, Keanes Road, Waterford, Maria Smith is Vice President and Assistant Global Controller of the Mergers and Acquisitions Division of the Oracle Corporation.

Ms Smith is also a recipient of a HSBC Corporate Executives Award given to the ten women who hold the most senior positions in Ireland’s largest companies by annual turnover and Ireland’s largest companies by number of employees.

She is based in Dublin where she lives with her husband, Howard, and children, Steven, Lauren and Alex.

The awards were made by the Irish Women’s Executive Network at a Leadership Summit and Gala in Dublin recently. Other women lauded in the exclusive list included European Ombudsman, Emily O’Reilly, and the managing director of Microsoft Ireland, Cathriona Hallahan.

Maria Cunningham-Smith was educated in Waterford city at the Mercy Convent before gaining a degree in Accounting and Finance at DCU. Her first position on graduation was with the accountancy firm, Ernst and Young.

Like many working mothers, Maria has to juggle her corporate responsibilities with that of running the family home. Needless to say, she works extremely hard but she offers the following two pieces of advice: Never underestimate the benefits of a good night’s sleep and never miss a family or friend’s important occasion for the type of business meeting that occurs regularly.

Her company, Oracle Corporation, is a provider of enterprise software and computer hardware products and services. It also provides cloud services as well as software and hardware products to other cloud service providers, both public and private.