contract ever awarded by the State to a private company) by the Rainbow Coalition government was the focus of the work of the tribunal from 2007. The tribunal investigated whether money changed hands prior to the awarding of the licence to Esat Digifone by former Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications Michael Lowry TD. Denis O'Brien claimed preliminary findings by the tribunal effectively state that the Esat consortium was "illegally" issued with the state's second mobile-phone licence because he had a "corrupt" relationship with Michael Lowry. A number of failed bidders are suing the state over the handling of the competition process. Esat Digifone In 1995, Esat Digifone was a consortium made up of Denis O'Brien's Communicorp (40%), Telenor AB (40%) and the remaining 20% held by institutional shareholders. Esat Digifone won the 1995 competition process and entered into exclusive negotiations with the Department of Transport, Energy and Communications. Exclusive negotiations and new shareholding by Dermot Desmond It transpired that during the contracting period a change in the shareholding in Esat Digifone had occurred with financier Dermot Desmond's IIU Nominees taking a share of 25% of the company and Communicorp and Telenor AB holding the remainder between them. The Department of Communications decided that the 25% holding by IIU Ltd. was unacceptable in May 1996 and demanded a return to the 40-40-20 structure, but this information was not communicated to the Attorney-General's office at the time. The department and Lowry demanded that the 40:40:20 breakdown of the shares in Esat should be restored prior to the issuing of the licence, which resulted in Desmond selling part of his shareholding to Communicorp and Telenor. The licence was awarded to Digifone in May 1996, with Lowry announcing Digifone the winner before civil servants involved in judging the competition made their final decision. Legal opinion of Richard Nesbitt SC In May 1996, the Attorney-General's office sought the advice of barrister Richard Nesbitt regarding the change in shareholding. Nesbitt advised the government that the licence could be awarded regardless of the fact that Dermot Desmond had joined the consortium at a later date. The advice of Nesbitt as recalled by Denis McFadden – a barrister in the A-G's office – was to the effect that IIU's entry was not a material change and merely amounted to "equity finance". Moriarty's findings In February 2008, Judge Moriarty gave a legal finding that the written advice given