Entrepreneurs lead Northern Ireland revival

by Peter Curtis & Matthew Rock - Tuesday, 19th February 2008 -

A major new report highlights the entrepreneurs building a new, post-Troubles economic revival in Northern Ireland.

For decades, entrepreneurship has been stifled in Northern Ireland but, with the reinstatement of the Northern Ireland Executive, a new mood of business optimism is emerging. This is the headline conclusion of a major new report published in this month’s Business Voice, the CBI’s magazine, and supported by Invest Northern Ireland and Bank of Ireland.

Belfast-based recruitment firm Grafton is at the forefront of the new entrepreneurs. The £108m-turnover company has 79 offices worldwide. as well as 17 offices in the Czech Republic. It supplies around 4,400 temps each week from its 20 offices in Northern Ireland. Says founder Ken Belshaw: “Just because an economy’s 20 years behind doesn’t mean it’s going to take 20 years to catch up... We are short of entrepreneurs because people couldn’t put their heads above the parapet before. We could do with more iconic people that kids can identify with.”

Another example is software business, Lagan Technologies. Set up in 1994 by four entrepreneurs, the Belfast-based company boasts annual revenue growth of 65 per cent since 2000 and is turning over £14.3m. It is in a high value-added field – which is where most see the future of the region lying. Lagan is heavily export-focused; it has two offices in the US and earns 30 per cent of its revenues there.

Belfast-based Andor Technologies is another example of the new entrepreneurial generation. Andor produces the highest-performance digital cameras commercially available. Chairman Bryan Keating says: “I think our politicians have settled down to carry out the real task of government. The parties know that health, education and social services are what they have to do, but they know the economy drives that.”

Others in the entrepreneurial new wave include: Crumlin-based medical diagnostics firm Randox; Almac in Craigavon, which provides services to the pharmaceuticals industry; and Belfastbased software company Meridio, recently acquired by Autonomy for around £20m.

Nigel Dodds, Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Investment (pictured above), explains that economic growth is top of the Northern Ireland Executive agenda, with ambitious targets including:

• Halving private sector productivity gap with the UK average.
• Increasing employment rate from 70 to 75 per cent by 2020.
• Creating 6,500 new jobs by 2011.

“Our aim is to develop a high value-added, innovative and competitive economy,” says Dodds in the Business Voice report. “The devolved political settlement has given us a new opportunity to showcase the region as an attractive destination for inward investors.”

None of this should be a surprise. Northern Ireland is the region where Harry Ferguson developed the modern tractor and Professor Frank Pantridge pioneeered the portable defibrillator.

To read the full report, Northern Ireland: the Way Forward, click here.