Job hopes as Eli Lilly spends €10m on offices

Cork could be in line for a significant jobs boost with the announcement that pharmaceutical multinational Eli Lilly is to spend €10m on new Cork offices, in a building capable of hosting hundreds of new shared financial services jobs.

The major pharma employer, currently investing €330m at its manufacturing facility in Dunderrow, Kinsale, already employs 120 at its global services centre in Little Island, Cork. It handles financial transactions for up to 40 Lilly affiliates/countries.

The Fortune 500 firm, currently employs 700 in Ireland: in Cork, Sligo and Dublin. It is buying a 65,000 sq ft office building in EastGate Business Park, Little Island via Niall Guerin of Savills from developers O’Flynn Construction.

Work started this week preparing the largely-completed building, called Island House, for occupation by Lilly in mid-2014.

The move will allow Lilly’s shared services swell from its current employment of 120, although the company declined to confirm the investment sum or the number of new jobs.

One of the biggest office deals in recent years outside Dublin, it can accommodate as many as 500-600 people. The similar sized adjoining building was bought by Quinn Insurance (now Laya Healthcare) in 2008 for €25m, to provide for up to 650 jobs.

Eli Lilly senior director Kay Flynn said: “We have run out of office capacity in our current building in EastGate. We want to ensure capacity does not become a barrier or challenge to future scope expansion opportunities. We have expanded considerably since we commenced business here in 2010 and feel confident about our future in Cork.”