IDA, the government agency responsible for attracting inward investment, together with Minister Bruton and his Department announced that they have helped secure 70 individual projects to date in 2013, compared to 61 at this stage last year. Of the 70 projects, 35 have come from companies deciding to invest in Ireland for the first time. Technology, life sciences and international financial services sectors are the key growth area.

Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation Richard Bruton TD commented “A key part of the Government’s plans for jobs and growth is targeting increased employment creation from the FDI sector, and in 2012 we have seen record growth with more than 12,000 jobs created by multinational companies. Today’s results show that this strong trend is continuing in the first half of 2013, with an increased number of investments which will create 7,000 jobs"

Among the companies who announced job creation plans in the first half of 2013, or plans to place fresh investment into Ireland, were:

Ebay, EMC, McAfee, Pfizer, Sanofi, Symantec, Zurich, Huawei, Yahoo, Facebook, Vistakon, Guidewire, Squarespace, Groupon, Qualcomm, Novartis, Nypro, AOL and FireEye.