Colm Long, Director, Online Operations, Facebook
in their favour”, he says, “They’re incredible and
they don’t get the credit they merit”.
wLong declares that there is “great potential here,
given the team that we have built”.
He echoes Schmidt’s sentiments regarding Ireland
as a headquarters for the European market,
In terms of longevity in the global information
technology sector, Microsoft is always the stalwart.
The company has been running its EMEA hub
from Ireland for more than 25 years. Having made
the transition from manufacturing centre, to a hub
that adds value with a fully fledged R&D centre,
a sales and marketing centre and an operations
centre, Microsoft’s Dublin office in Sandyford is
responsible for virtually the entire supply chain
management across Europe, the Middle East
and Africa.
“There are 60-plus languages spoken here in
Google. Ireland is good at multi-lingual, multicultural, multi-currency business. As long as we
continue to do well, we’ll continue to expand. We
hire new people here every month”.
Herlihy is also bullish about Ireland’s potential to
develop the sector further,
“Ireland is the perfect place to be. How do you
protect companies and IP and manage the growth
of that industry? Ireland could become a centre
of digital media … digital and web are huge
opportunities to play for”.
Facebook is another example of a cutting-edge
company that is surfing the crest of the information
technology wave, having created a platform that is
now in use by over 600 million customers.
According to Colm Long, Director of Online
Operations, “Through our last year we have realised
growth and this has justified increased investment
from Facebook in the Dublin office. We have
doubled our targets”.
As a result, Facebook are set to add another 100
faces to the 200 people that already staff its EMEA
headquarters in Hanover Quay.
Paul Rellis, Managing Director of Microsoft Ireland
noted that,
“Dublin has become more diverse. It is very
connected to the EU. It is at the heart of what makes
the EU tick”.
The games industry has grown by 400% in the last
7 years and is an area that has attracted many of the
world’s leading games developers. One such example
is Riot Games. While the company was establishing
its EMEA headquarters in Ireland last year, the
CEO, Brandon Beck stated that,
“When making the decision on where to locate
our European headquarters, we were attracted to
Ireland by its reputation as an emerging hub for
online game servicing. We’re aware of the success
that other gaming companies have had in Ireland
and of the highly creative, talented workforce
available here”.
A variety of critical functions are handled from
Dublin, ad support, user support, finance, HR,
legal, product marketing and engineering.
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