Page 14 - Sligo X North West

14 Working
Long game
key to jobs
A unified coalition of job creators, educational decision makers, development agencies and government bodies is key to the future development of Sligo’s employment options.
By Martha Kearns
Staff pictured at a meeting in Sligo company LotusWorks last week. Photo by James Connolly
You can’t talk about employment in Sligo without talking about manufacturing - and life sciences in particular, which has domi- nated the scene for decades. This
means that the county is a fertile ground for high-tech scientific and engineering jobs.
However, over the past few years, there is another side to Sligo emerging with a growth in those employed in the crea- tive and tourism sectors. The county has always attracted creatives but now those people are making businesses out of their passions.
According to the latest Central Statistics Office figures, there are 14, 291 people in private-sector employment in Sligo, includ- ing both owners and employees in 2,294 private enterprises. The vast bulk of these are manufacturing followed by wholesale and retail. After that, the next biggest industries are accommodation and food services followed by construction.
These figures would not include many other big employers in the town including Tesco, Penneys and other larger chains, the banks and public sector workers, including those in the education sector.
Paul Keyes, CEO of Sligo Chamber of Commerce, says that after Galway, Sligo has the highest proportion of high-tech compa- nies in the western region - including those working in the medical devices, pharma and IT sectors.
Both multinationals and indigenous companies are feeding off each other in this space, especially in the area of precision engineering - which is very much seen as a Sligo expertise.
One of the biggest things that happened
to Sligo’s employment scene, according to John Nugent, IDA regional manager for the North West, was the location of Abbott in the town 40 years ago this year.
Abbott, he said, recognised that pre- cision engineering was critical for their products and in turn Abbott being in Sligo helped companies involved in precision engineering to up their game.
“In the middle of all this IT Sligo flour- ished around a tool-making and tool-design capability. So you had a beautiful three-way relationship between the three parties with all of them relying on each other,” says Nugent.
As well as Abbott, some of the other big- gest players include Abbvie, Elanco (part of the Eli Lily Group), Stiefel (a GSK compa- ny), Hospira and Amcor - many of whom have recently invested significantly in their facilities. JenaValve’s recent decision to locate its first Irish base in Sligo has also been a major boost for the town.
“The announcement was a great en- dorsement of the collaboration between local government bodies to attract world- class companies to invest in the region,” says Antoinette O’Flaherty, regional manag- er of recruitment and HR services group, Collins McNicholas.
Supporting these multinationals, however, is a strong indigenous industry including the likes of LotusWorks, ProTek, SF Engineering, Avenue Mould Solutions, Verus Precision and Ward Automations.
“Sligo has 100 per cent reliance upon life science/med tech manufacturing,” says the IDA’s Nugent. “That sounds negative but if you were to pick one sector, this is the one you would want because there is longevity and there is longevity because there is
capital investment.”
He says that most people in Sligo would
love to see another Abbott-type company coming into the town.
“While I would love to see another company like this, I think what we need is a financial services company, like an insur- ance company, a bank etc.”
Nugent says that within Sligo there
was many job opportunities for engineers, scientists and manufacturing people but that Sligo needed a company to take the hundreds of graduates coming out of IT Sligo every year with business, humanities and computer science qualifications.
“If someone gave me a choice, I would pick an eBay or a PayPal: that’s the kind
of employer that I would love to see come here. It would be win win as that employer would be tapping into a previously un- tapped employee base,” says Nugent.
Of course, there are other major compa- nies already operating outside the sector including Bruss and Aurivo, which are two of the county’s biggest employers. In the software space, there is the likes of Socrates and US online retailer Overstock, which set up in Sligo last year.
“Experienced software professionals have seen a significant growth in oppor- tunities over the last couple of years. We were delighted to recruit the first tranche of software developers and software testers for Overstock. They have plans to expand their operation in Sligo over the coming months so there will be more opportunities for junior and mid-level software profes- sionals in the near future,” says O’Flaherty from Collins McNicholas.
And, as already mentioned, there is the creative and tourism industries.
THE INDIGENOUS VIEW
Local Fergal Broder, founder and CEO of Lo- tusWorks, says Sligo is a great place to be based because of the infrastructure and the highly-skilled work force.
“I never have problems recruiting at our Sligo site. You can run a very successful international business from Sligo; you don’t have to be in Dublin,” says Broder.
LotusWorks is a supplier of high-end technical services to industry and its company employs 300 people in Ireland and the US.
“With modern technology, geography becomes irrelevant if you are not a regional company. When doing businesses with US companies, it doesn’t matter to them where we are: to them two or three hours in a car after you land in Dublin Airport is nothing;it’sdowntheroad.”
Sligo Chamber’s Paul Keyes
We are seeing more and more people coming in the creative industry space
“We are seeing more and more people coming in the creative industry space; including artists and writers but also the likes of architects and graphic designers,” says Keyes of Sligo Chamber.
“A lot of SMEs setting up in Sligo are in the creative space but also in the tourism sector. There is significant growth in tour- ism into Sligo and, on the back of that, we are seeing new businesses - including ad- venture holidays or walking tours - sprout- ing up around servicing tourists.”
So what about the infamous green shoots? Keyes is in no doubt that he is already seeing them. “During the recession, the FDI base held its own but the indige- nous base was hit. However, they are now beginning to recruit again. The mood is definitely more optimistic.”
WHY SLIGO?
THE MULTI-NATIONAL VIEW
Elanco, which employs just under 200 people in Sligo, started off in Sligo in 1991 as Fort Dodge and was subsequently acquired by Elanco in 2010. The company, an animal health division of Eli Lilly that produces animal health products, acquired Sligo as part of its veterinary vaccine growth strategy.
According to a spokesperson, the proximity to other life science companies and a skilled work- force were initial determinants in locating in Sligo and these still hold true as reasons to stay in Sligo. Elanco plans to develop its vaccine business and sees Sligo as a critical growth component of that strategy, according to the company.
Irish Independent
26 November 2014