The US-based software company, UniComp, has made its first acquisition in the Republic, after it announced yesterday that it had taken over Industrial Computing Machines (ICM), a company in Portlaoise which develops computer systems for feed milling industries.

ICM was established in 1984 by Mr Raymond Lawlor, an electrical engineer from Co Kildare. The company, in which Mr Lawlor was a majority shareholder, employs 33 people and supplies 75 per cent of the systems for Irish compound feed milling market.

UniComp, whose Belfast-based subsidiaries are Aurora Unicomp, ICS UniComp, CICS, Unibol and Creative Online Media, had a turnover was $25.1 million (£18 million) in 1997, 83 per cent of which came from providing information technology services overseas. It is quoted on the Nasdaq stock exchange.