Microsoft Ireland officially launched Visual Studio.NETand the .NET framework - the application development tool and platform for .NET applications - in Dublin this afternoon.
According to Microsoft, the new toolkit will drive the development of XML Web services in Ireland which - the company estimates - could deliver cost savings of up to €120 million to the Irish software development sector alone.
Microsoft, in association with software developers Iona and SoftCo, held a pan-industry briefing in University College Dublin earlier today. The briefing was told that new Web services would enable high-tech businesses interoperate across disparate systems and platforms.
Recent industry figures indicate these businesses include more than 800 international and indigenous software companies, employing over 25,000 people and generating a combined turnover of over €7.6bn.
"Web services will benefit Irish industry in terms of increased business process productivity and a reduction of business development costs which they will gain from using the Internet as a development platform," said Joe Macri, General Manager of Microsoft Ireland.
Visual Studio.NETis a development tool for creating and deploying such Web services. Over 3.5 million copies of the software have been distributed world-wide for testing.