Withdrawal of investors' tax breaks could threaten software companies
The Irish Software Association (ISA) has called on Minister McCreevy to retain and expand the controversial BES schemes, because the association has identified them as the main funding vehicle for start-up software companies in a survey of ISA members.
ISA chairman Cathal Friel yesterday called on the Minister for Finance to extend BES until 2004. "The only current source of funding available to software companies is BES and Enterprise Ireland funding, as all other sources of early-stage funding have dried up. Thus, software companies are now virtually dependent on BES funding.
