Most Irish tech companies plan to hire more staff this year

Three out of four homegrown technology companies plan to hire more staff this year as they anticipate significant growth, a report due to be published today shows.

The Republic’s growing indigenous technology sector, which currently employs around 30,000 people and generates an estimated €2 billion each year in sales, had a strong 2013.

The Technology Outlook Report, published by AIB and based on a survey carried out by Amárach Research, shows that 70 per cent of Irish companies in the sector grew sales by an average of 30 per cent last year.

Most are confident they will outpeform this in 2014 – 87 per cent say that their outlook this year is better than in 2013 and 74 per cent plan to incease employment.

According to the survey, there are 700 Irish, as opposed to multi-national, technology companies in the Republic and 27 organisations that provide start-up supports such as pre-seed capital and training.

Of the 106 companies that were surveyed, 78 per cent had fewer than 50 staff, while 8 per cent employed more than 250 people. Almost six out of 10 had been in business for more than five years while 13 per cent had been trading longer than two decades.

During both last year and in 2012, two-thirds invested in research and development.

AIB's head of business banking, Ken Burke, says the report's findings demonstrate the Irish technology sector's potential for growth, but warns that his own industry has to play its part in supporting this.

'Poised for expansion'
"This report demonstrates that start-ups and small- and medium-sized enterprises in the technology sector are poised for major expansion and job creation and the banking industry must respond positively to support our indigenous companies to capitalise on the opportunities ahead," he says.

Managing director of Trilogy Technologies, Edel Creely, who chairs the Irish Software Association, also involved in producing the report, argues that a number of tax measures could accelerate the growth.

These include roll-over relief for entrepreneurs to encourage reinvestment in start-ups, extending the employment investment and incentive scheme and changing both the capital gains tax regime and the treatment of employee share options.