ESB’s €10bn clean energy bet; profit not jobs is Big Tech threat; and Irish Ibans at Revolut

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ESB Networks will invest €10bn in a major clean energy strategy. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill

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ESB Networks is launching a €10 billion plan today to upgrade its clean energy credentials in a move that will see a dramatic increase in connections for renewable energy as well as flexible energy use options that will allow the network to flatten some of the currently dangerously high peaks in usage. Kevin O’Sullivan reports.

Much of the current focus may be on the wave of job losses across Big Tech but a new report from Goodbody Stockbrokers says that falling corporate tax revenue as retrenchment at these companies hits profit levels is a bigger risk to the Irish economy.

Irish law firm Mason Hayes & Curran breached the €100 million milestone in revenues for the first time last year after recording growth of 8 per cent. Ciarán Hancock reports that it expects revenue to grow at the same rate this year as its new managing director focuses on increasing activity at its network of international offices.

Revolut has moved to make life easier for Irish customers as it rolls out Irish Ibans over the next couple of months, writes Conor Pope. Some users of its service have run into trouble when trying to set up direct debits from their Revolut accounts for salary or public utility billing purposes despite rules designed to prevent such discrimination.

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Thérapie Medical Group, the family-run business operating a network of medical aesthetics clinics across Ireland and Britain, has raised €30 million to fund further expansion, notably the opening of its first clinic in the US, in New York’s Flatiron district. Laura Slattery reports.

Ireland’s craft and design sector has opened its annual Showcase at the RDS, with 380-plus exhibitors pitching to more than 4,000 domestic and international buyers at an event where organisers expect to see businesses strike more than €20 million worth of business deals in the sector’s most important marketing effort of the year.

In his weekly column. Eoin Burke-Kennedy delves into a Central Bank report examining the impact of inheritance on wealth inequality in Ireland which comes up with some surprising conclusions that might help explain why politicians are so reluctant to tap the sector for more tax revenue.

And Vodafone’s director of strategy, Liam O’Brien, argues in an opinion piece that Big Tech needs to pay its fair share for the rolling out of digital telecoms networks on which it profits.

Also online, we answer a question from a reader who thinks he has found a loophole in the small gift exemption that might allow him to significantly increase the amount he can get from his father tax free.

And in Me & My Money, Jennifer Shaw, the woman behind The Property Show and The Pregnancy and Baby Fair, Ireland’s largest parenting and baby event, talks about keeping a grip on her personal finances with three young children

Finally, Pilita Clark looks at calls to reinvent central business districts in a post-Covid world so that they become places where people meet to eat, talk and have fun, not just go to the office. And that will take more than simply hosting the odd festival, she says, as she lays down the challenge on how planners need to rethink their current approach.

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