Mr Dunne continued:

“The Irish economy continued its transformation in 2007. At the heart of this transformation is a belief in our ability to successfully compete with the best and a shared conviction that we can adapt, evolve and innovate in response to the increased challenges which lie ahead. Since the beginning of the new millennium, the manner in which IDA Ireland does its business has been evolving in line with changes in the global economic environment. Our focus is aligning around significantly increasing investment across three key pillars, namely global services, high technology manufacturing and Research, Development and Innovation (RDI)."

The annual report 2007 outlined the Investment Highlights of 2007:

Of the 114 new investments in 2007,

• 26% were secured from clients new to IDA.
• 40% were R&D investments.
• 34% were expansions to existing facilities.
• A total of EUR2.3bn+ future capital investment secured.
• 33% of investments came from non US corporations, demonstrating the global appeal of Ireland as an investment location.
• 60% of these new roles in IDA supported projects have wage and salary levels in excess of EUR40,000 pa.
• Over 9,000 new full-time jobs with total employment in excess of 152,000 jobs in all IDA supported companies.

In keeping with the IDA strategy of enhanced regional development, 64% of investments were located outside of Dublin.

Dunne went on to state:

“FDI continues to play a significant role in our future economic growth and prosperity. Our national mandate in support of sustainable economic development has increased in complexity in keeping with enhanced globalisation and the sophistication of the goods and services originating in our economy. IDA Ireland’s ongoing success in attracting the highest quality FDI projects to Ireland has been and will remain paramount.”

The 2007 Annual Report stated that IDA supported companies in the year under review paid almost EUR3bn in Corporate Tax accounting for c.47% of the total corporate tax intake, and they are a crucial element of Ireland’s export base accounting for c.85% of manufacturing companies’ exports during the year.

In addition, approximately one thousand foreign owned companies supported by IDA spent approximately EUR16bn in direct expenditure within the economy of which payroll accounted for almost EUR7bn.

Barry O’ Leary, CEO of IDA Ireland explained:

“Ireland remains the most Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) intensive economy in Europe and IDA has continued to play its part in winning the highest quality investments. Together in partnership with a wide array of national stakeholders, we have continued to re-position Ireland and ensure we are viewed as one of the leading innovation led and knowledge-based economies of choice globally for mobile investment," adding:

“IDA client companies have been instrumental in driving our national productivity performance through their adoption of leading international practice in technology, operations, logistics and human resource management. Our national productivity levels as a result are high by global standards. Maintaining and improving our productivity advantage is critically important in an open economy trading into an increasingly competitive global environment.

“IDA Ireland asserts its position as a world leading economic development agency. Our organisation’s objectives and methodology have constantly evolved in line with the requirements of our client companies and emerging industries over the years. We have always been forward looking and in order to maintain our leadership, we are further developing our own skills and talent base in preparation for securing investments from an increasingly competitive environment. IDA is an organisation that at its very core has a competitive, client-focused culture.

"We will continue to invest in training and development to ensure that we, as an organisation, are always ‘Fit for the Future’. In this context, we have expanded our existing offices and opened new offices in France (Paris) and China (Shanghai). The expansion will be further developed in 2008 with new offices in India (Mumbai) and USA (Boston, Orange County) and extra personnel in Atlanta, New York, Mountain View and London as part of a significant redeployment of personnel to our overseas activities.”

The CEO concluded:

“IDA has continued to focus on seeking inward investment from top-tier corporations and companies within a number of high potential business sectors including Pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology, Medical Technology, Financial Services, International Services, Digital Media, Engineering and Information Communications Technologies (ICT). We are confident that there are further FDI opportunities for Ireland in these key sectors which will be augmented in the future by a number of emerging technologies, new business models and sectors such as clean-technology, convergence and services innovation.”

However, the critical challenge faced by IDA Ireland is to secure investments that are innovation intensive, technologically advanced, having the maximum economic impact and the highest calibre of potential employment.

Since the beginning of the new millennium, Ireland’s offering to potential investors has been re-invented in recognition of the progress in our economic circumstances and the changed needs of the global marketplace.

In the highly dynamic and interconnected world of global business, multiple factors that are increasingly associated with the Irish - agility, inventiveness, a desire to seek performance improvements and productivity gains are vital to corporate success and profitability.

Clients comment positively on the coherence of national policy, the positive interaction of the development agencies and the speed and dexterity with which change is agreed and effected in Ireland.

These are factors that have proved critical to the company's success and will continue to be as the economy continues its transition to being increasingly innovation led.

Considerable changes have taken place in the global economy in recent years and the pace of change is likely to accelerate. Emerging nations will pose new competitive challenges and opportunities as will the developing markets in Eastern Europe and Asia.

As a small open economy that continues to outperform in terms of our size, national competitiveness is a matter of critical importance. A keen focus is needed on all the elements which constitute it. Service and infrastructure costs need to be benchmarked and aligned with best global practice.

Barry O’ Leary finished by stating:

“Despite the economic turbulence currently being experienced, a reasonably strong investment pipeline coupled with our positive reputation in some of the world’s leading companies leads us to be optimistic that we will continue to secure for Ireland the best in innovation and investments from around the globe. So far this year, we have announced 22 investments and we expect a strong flow of announcements for the remainder of the year. Securing FDI investment is not a short term game, increasing our resources and footprint overseas, even in challenging economic times, indicates our long term commitment and determination to continue winning the best possible future investments for Ireland.”