Ireland: New dawn, new opportunities Irish companies are reacting to COVID-19 and Brexit with more innovation

摘要

One hundred years ago, Ireland was an impoverished agrarian nation on the brink of independence from the U.K. Today, it's a wealthy, dynamic powerhouse that was the only European Union member to achieve economic growth in 2020. What lies behind this dazzling transformation?"A major factor in its success has been our determination to become a hub for innovation," says Julie Sinnamon, CEO of Enterprise Ireland, the agency responsible for the development and growth of Irish companies in international markets. "As a small country, we know that research and innovation are key to competitiveness. They are cornerstones of Ireland's economic policy, which is now a world leader in generating and using new knowledge for progress."Ireland's extensive innovation ecosystem contains many multinational giants in sectors like technology, pharmaceuticals, life sciences and medtech. Google, Apple, Facebook, Intel, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson and numerous others like them have substantial operations in the outward-looking, English-speaking country, where they benefit from pro-business and research-oriented policies, a brilliantly educated workforce, plus easy access to European and global markets. But Ireland has also built a strong base of homegrown companies in the same sectors, which made a significant contribution to export levels in 2020, a year that saw both COVID and dawn breaking on a post-Brexit trading relationship with the U.K.