Revenues at AOL's Irish unit climb to $32m

The Irish subsidiary of TimeWarner's AOL internet unit booked revenues of just over $32 million in 2006, up from $27.4 million in 2005.

AOL Global Operations, which during the year changed its name from AOL Technologies Ireland, generated a pretax profit of $1.29 million last year although it has accumulated losses of $10.5 million. The Irish operation, based in CityWest, Dublin, develops, tests and localises applications for a number of AOL websites and services.

Aengus McClean, the AOL vice-president who heads up the Dublin operations, says the revenues are derived from charging other business units for development work carried out in Dublin.

The company incurred a one-off restructuring cost of $1.82 million. Mr McClean said this related to AOL's disposal of its internet access business in Europe. Many back-office functions for business were carried out from Dublin and the cost relates to providing severance packages for some staff and incentives for others until the transition to the new owners is completed next year.

The accounts show that AOL's Irish staff numbers increased from 200 in 2005 to 221 last year. Despite this increase, wages, social welfare and pension contribution costs were broadly flat at $16.1 million - a reduction of just under $50,000 from 2005.

AOL Global Operations had just 10 voluntary redundancies last month when the parent announced a global reduction of staff from 10,000 to 8,000. Mr McClean said the primary cost of operating in Ireland was staff costs and the Dublin centre had a "very senior staffing profile".

He said that although Ireland is not as cheap as some of AOL's other development centres, it is highly regarded within the group. "The dollar exchange rate doesn't help us at the moment," said Mr McClean. "But we have built up a reputation within the company for getting things done quickly, producing good quality and being easy to deal with."