Business

IDA pitches €900,000 US PR contract

Investment agency seeking communications firm on US west coast

The IDA has put an indicative cost of €900,000, excluding VAT, on a two-year contract for public relations services on the US west coast. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill

Gordon Deegan
Mon Feb 5 2024 - 12:51

The IDA is set to spend an estimated €900,000 to increase its presence on the US west coast as part of a bid to secure inward investment here from the next tech giant.

The IDA has put an indicative cost of €900,000, excluding VAT, on a two-year contract for public relations services on the US west coast “to help position Ireland as the leading European location for global companies looking to establish or grow their business”, newly-published tender documents show.

Already, IDA Ireland employs Padilla PR to provide communications services on the east coast of the US. The IDA has three company offices on the west coast at Mountain View in northern California, Irvine in southern California and Seattle, Washington. The tender documentation states that the target audience for the PR agency’s communication work will be decision-makers at leading tech and life-sciences firms on the west coast “and those leading fast-growth emerging firms, many of them coming from the unique ‘Valley’ ecosystem and general Bay Area”.

The tender states in addition to specific west coast titles to be targeted, “specialist sites, blogs and tech trade press are expected to be at the centre of the communication activity”. The work of the PR agency will also include implementing a programme that targets “west coast tech influencers and looks to secure interviews with influencers, on their podcast, LinkedIn, YouTube and other social-media channels”.

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The agency will be expected to build upon a strong IDA track record in securing inward investment from the west coast. Bay Area companies “play a particularly strong role in Ireland with major operations in Ireland”.

The tender states that those firms include Airbnb, Alphabet/Google. Applied Materials, Autodesk, Cadence, Cisco, DocuSign, Dropbox, eBay, Fidelity, Fitbit, Gilead, GoFundMe, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Indeed, Intel, LinkedIn, Meta (Facebook), Oracle, PayPal, Salesforce, Slack, Stripe, Twilio, Uber, Udemy, Broadcom, Wells Fargo, Workday and Zendesk. “For many, Ireland serves as the company’s European headquarters,” the IDA said.

Giving an insight into the IDA sales pitch to US firms looking to expand overseas, the tender states: “Ireland’s attributes include ease of doing business, political stability, a common-law legal system, a dynamic R&D ecosystem and an attractive, transparent and stable tax regime. Ireland offers US companies, those involved in regulated industries such as pharmaceuticals, medical devices and financial services, access to the European regulatory system.”

The tender adds that US companies use Ireland as an entry point to the European Union, the world’s largest single market. It states: “From Ireland they gain access to a young, highly skilled, English-speaking, flexible workforce which shares many cultural and historic ties with the US.”

The closing date for submissions is March 4th.

Gordon Deegan

Gordon Deegan

Gordon Deegan is a contributor to The Irish Times

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