IBM $100m e-commerce investment for Dublin

IBM has announced a $100 million (€93 million) investment in the Republic which will place the company's Mulhuddart, Co Dublin, technology campus at the core of its global electronic business strategy.

In partnership with the Government, the company has decided to locate its new supplier platform, or portal, in Ireland.

The move will create around 150 new jobs and, according to the Tanaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Ms Harney, could increase employment at the site from 2,000 to 3,000 people over time.

The investment will be mainly internally focused for IBM, and will see it establish a Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region "supplier portal" in Ireland. This will link all IBM's internal and external supplier websites within the EMEA region. It is understood IBM chose to locate its Metropolitan Area Network here because of the Global Crossing high speed bandwidth initiative launched by the Government last year, and the favourable legislative environment for e-commerce in Ireland.

According to Ms Barb McLane, vice-president of the IBM Technology Campus: "The network facility implemented in Ireland is a key factor in IBM's decision to place network dependent missions in Dublin."

IBM will now transfer responsibility for managing and supporting its internal and external websites within EMEA to Ireland. It will result in the transfer of IBM's EMEA web-hosting support facility from Portsmouth to Dublin.

The portal will be expanded within three months and opened on a pilot basis to any supplier wishing to supply goods or services to IBM in accordance with established sourcing guidelines.

Irish businesses are expected to be the first beneficiaries of the expanded service because of the portal's location in Ireland. A significant tranche of the IBM investment will go into facilitating these relationships at a low technology cost to the supplier.

"There is a significant opportunity here for Irish suppliers to secure leadership roles in electronic procurement platforms. IBM is offering a strategic platform for Irish suppliers to increase their business-to-business sales and streamline the e-procurement process," Ms McLane said.

IBM expects up to $37 billion of its annual $40 billion procurement process will be conducted through its supplier portal by the end of this year.

IBM has also said it intends to establish a data centre to support electronic business activities for corporate customers. The exact location of the facility has not yet been decided, but it is likely to be one of the new Dublin-based digital technology parks or the Mulhuddart site. It will operate along the lines of similar data centres being established by leading IT and telecommunications companies.

According to Mr John O'Connor, director of business transformation and global procurement at IBM, the supplier portal is the culmination of a four year re-engineering process within IBM to pull all ordering and invoicing processes together under one umbrella.

"Consolidation of business-to-business portals and marketplaces will begin soon. We envisage the emergence of more e-commerce backbones, eventually resulting in just two or three major players managing companies' access and inter-operability in electronic marketplaces. IBM's e-commerce backbone is part of this portal initiative and we would look to extend it to the wider marketplace within the next three months," Mr O'Connor said.