Companies located in Ireland include:

    uIBM/Lotus
    uComputer Associates
    uNovell
    uMicrosoft
    uSun Microsystems
    uSymantec
    uOracle
    uSAP
    uInformix
    uBaltimore Technologies (e-signature technology)
 

The Irish Software Industry is a dynamic, high growth industry delivering high quality, leading edge products a services to the global marketplace.

The Irish Software Industry success is characterized by almost 600 Irish owned software companies and a large number of new start up companies - estimated at 40-50 per year.  The Irish software industry is also highly export oriented, with exports representing 60% of total software production, with the USA being the largest market for Irish Software companies.  The software industry in Ireland is recognized as global players in banking, finance, electronic commerce, telecommunications and software tools.³
 

^{Call Centers in Ireland}

^{With fewer phone lines per capita than any E.U. country except Portugal, Ireland has built a thriving business in pan-European call centers. There are 50 such operations clustered around Dublin and more opening in Cork to the south and in Belfast in Northern Ireland. When you call America Online from France to find out why e-mail's down today, or phone Lufthansa from the Netherlands to book a flight, the voice on the other end belongs to someone sitting in a cubicle here. The Irish Republic's Industrial Development Agency (I.D.A.) says these international call centers employ 7,000 people, a figure which is expected to rise 50% in five years. A bigger payoff will come if this business helps make Ireland the Internet hub of Europe. That would generate 40,000 more jobs over 10 years.}

^{Since the late '80s, the state telephone company Telecom Eireann has pumped about $6 billion into international phone links, springing Ireland from the lazy days of rotary dials and party lines to the lightning age of digital transmission almost overnight. The I.D.A. examined 72 different growth niches and decided that a variety of factors--Ireland's low labor costs and cheap office and residential rents, its new (and inexpensive) telecommunications links, along with high education standards and a growing software industry--made international phone centers a natural.}
 

^{Using the success of early pioneers like Dell, which opened a 200-person shop in Bray in 1992, the I.D.A. began pitching companies like Oracle and American Airlines, which at that time had operations scattered all over Europe. American Airlines says consolidating in Ireland will save $20 million in 10 years. Telecom Eireann also set up a Call Centre Sector to service existing centers in Ireland and to recruit new ones abroad. With all that activity, labor costs have begun to rise in Dublin as companies bid for seasoned workers. The I.D.A. staff have been trying to encourage centers in other parts of the country, where they say the potential is just as great as in Dublin. Sharkey says financial services are the next target, and his eyes light up when he discusses the 5,000-strong operation American discount broker Charles Schwab runs in Phoenix, Ariz.}

^{London-based Datamonitor Consulting says Ireland accounts for only 1% of Europe's population but 3% of its telephone agents. The Irish also boast the biggest call centers in Europe, more than twice the average size of those in the U.K., Germany and the Netherlands, three of its nearest competitors in the sector. Half of all Irish agents work in centers with 250 or more people.  The I.D.A.'s Sharkey says this helps create a hub effect that can be used to trap Internet business. Predicting how fast Net commerce will grow is impossible, but any place with low rents, good telecommunications links and a literate work force is bound to win more than its share of the increase. "We've got all those ingredients now," says Sharkey. And the global business community is just taking notice.}

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Last update: December 17, 1999 by ED/MM