Accuris, the mobile phone software development firm, is to jointly invest €1.5 million in research and development in a move that will create 27 jobs over the next three years.
The investment is being supported by Enterprise Ireland (EI) which today published its four-year strategy for the software sector, the ‘New Software Economy’.
Based on an analysis of the industry by consultants IDC the strategy calls for the development of small, flexible and innovative technology companies that will partner to allow them expand their export operations.
Aidan Dillion, Accuris chief executive, said the company was investing so that it would be competitive when its customers started spending again. He also said the company was changing its business model from being licenced-based to a pay-as-you-go version.
Jennifer Condon, EI’s software division manager, said it was vitally important firms understand that the business models in the industry have changed.
She said there was little “revolutionary “in the strategy which aimed to develop the Irish software sector in a “a more effective and targeted way”.
The changed business model could potentially open new markets she said, as companies that had previously shied away from paying for expensive licences decided to try out new products on a pay-as-you-go basis.
Ms Condon said it was important a number of indigenous software companies grow to a “significant scale” and that one way for this to happen was for firms in a similar sector to co-operate.
Central to this is integrating the three component parts of the industry; multinationals such as Intel and Microsoft, the approximately 700 indigenous Irish software firms with research-funded academics.
She said the strategy would also seek to expand the development of clusters of firms, such as those in e-learning, to allow the State develop a market leading position.
“We already have clusters of companies in certain sectors and it is important that we build on them.”
The strategy sets a target of revenues from the sector growing to €2.5 billion by 2013, up from €1.6 billion in 2007.
Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise Mary Coughlan said among the issues facing the sector was access to working capital and the quality of the communications infrastructure.
“I am still hearing a lot from enterprise that we do not have the high-speed connectivity that we should have on the basis of being a knowledge-based economy,” but said coverage had expanded significantly and pointed to the awarding of the licence for the management of the second MANs project as an example.
