Enterprise Ireland to help create 800 jobs in start-ups over the next 3 years
By Geoff Percival
Thursday, June 09, 2011
NEARLY 800 jobs will be created by Enterprise Ireland-supported start-up companies over the next three years, according to Enterprise and Jobs Minister Richard Bruton.
He was speaking yesterday at the annual High Potential Start-Up Showcase, run by Enterprise Ireland.
The event — held at Enterprise Ireland’s Dublin headquarters — acted as a network event for the 80 new high-potential start-up companies the agency helped establish last year.
According to both Enterprise Ireland and Mr Bruton, those companies will create more than 770 jobs over the course of the coming three years, boosting their combined employment to nearly 1,300 in the process.
The companies will generate total sales of nearly €530 million over the same period, with exports accounting for more than 80%.
Mr Bruton said: "Government doesn’t create jobs, businesses do. But government has a crucial role in the process — through creating the environment and providing the supports which allow businesses to thrive."
He added that if employment levels are to begin growing again, business costs must be reduced, access to finance must be improved and key policy areas such as research and development&, innovation and commercialisation must be encouraged, "to ensure that good ideas can become good jobs".
Mr Bruton said: "We must also ensure that the public sector, as a significant economic actor in its own right, takes the lead in each of these areas."
Meanwhile, Enterprise Ireland chairman Hugh Cooney said the current environment for business start-ups in Ireland is strong, but having the right supports in place is crucial.
He said: "Access to funding, in particular, is a critical ingredient for driving a flow of new start-ups. Very early-stage companies can face difficulties in raising external finance."
Mr Cooney said Enterprise Ireland will be investing more than €120m in 40 new businesses next year via its various seed funds.
Of the 80 businesses credited yesterday, 38 came from the industrial and life-sciences area, 34 from software and services and eight from the food and consumer sector.
a d v e r t i s e m e n t
This appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Thursday, June 09, 2011
