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Research & Development (R&D) expenditure in Ireland in 2023 was €7.0bn, which was 81% higher when compared with 2021 (€3.9bn).
Current expenditure accounted for 66% (€4.6bn) of all R&D expenditure in 2023.
Capital expenditure accounted for the remaining 34% (€2.4bn) of total R&D expenditure in 2023.
Foreign-owned enterprises spent €5.9bn on R&D in 2023, accounting for 84% of all R&D expenditure.
Irish-owned enterprises accounted for 16% or €1.1bn of total R&D expenditure in 2023.
In 2023, the top 10 enterprises accounted for 58% or €4.0bn of total R&D expenditure, compared with 37% in 2021.
There were 40,956 people employed in R&D in Ireland in 2023, of which 50% or 20,334 people were employed as researchers.
| Business Expenditure on Research and Development, 2021-20241 | €'000 | |||
| 2021 | 20222 | 2023 | 2024 | |
| Current Expenditure | 3,438,954 | 4,586,202 | 4,591,952 | 4,704,210 |
| Capital Expenditure | 440,053 | 2,408,772 | 2,411,792 | 1,885,354 |
| Total Expenditure3 | 3,879,007 | 6,994,975 | 7,003,745 | 6,589,565 |
| of which; Irish Spend | 1,177,296 | 1,143,697 | 1,132,247 | 1,012,941 |
| Foreign Spend | 2,701,711 | 5,851,278 | 5,871,498 | 5,576,624 |
| Source: CSO Ireland | ||||
| 1Expenditure for 2021 and 2023 actual. Expenditure for 2022 and 2024 estimated. | ||||
| 2Figure revised from preliminary to final. | ||||
| 3Totals may differ due to rounding. | ||||
Results from the 2023-2024 Business Expenditure on Research and Development (BERD) survey show that €7bn was spent on R&D activities by enterprises in Ireland in 2023.
| Total R&D expenditure | |
| (Estimated expenditure) 2024 | 6.59 |
| (Actual expenditure) 2023 | 7 |
| (Estimated expenditure) 2022 | 6.99 |
| (Actual expenditure) 2021 | 3.88 |
| (Estimated expenditure) 2020 | 3.39 |
| (Actual expenditure) 2019 | 3.26 |
Large enterprises (250+ persons engaged) had the greatest share of R&D expenditure in 2023, accounting for 77.1% (€5.4bn) of all expenditure. This was an increase of 122% or €3.0bn compared with 2021.
Medium sized enterprises (50-249 persons engaged) spent €880.4m on R&D in 2023, representing 12.6% of total R&D expenditure.
Small enterprises (<50 persons engaged) had a spend of €723.3m in 2023, accounting for 10.3% of all R&D expenditure.
Enterprises reported a spend of €2.6bn on labour costs in 2023, accounting for 37.4% of all R&D expenditure. Other current costs accounted for 28.2% (€2.0bn) of total expenditure. Capital expenditure accounted for the remaining €2.4bn or 34.4% of total R&D spend.
Foreign-owned enterprises spent €5.9bn on R&D in 2023, accounting for 83.8% of all R&D expenditure. In comparison, Irish-owned enterprises spent more than €1.1bn on R&D, accounting for 16.2% of all R&D expenditure.
In 2023, the top 10 enterprises accounted for 57.8% or €4.0bn of total R&D expenditure. In 2021, the top 10 enterprises accounted for 37.4% or €1.5bn of total R&D expenditure, compared with 40.7% in 2019. Excluding the top 10 enterprises, R&D expenditure amounted to €3.0bn or 42.2% of total R&D expenditure in 2023.
In 2023, the Manufacturing sector, at €3.6bn, accounted for more than half (51.3%) of all R&D spending. Services (other sectors excluding Manufacturing) accounted for the remaining 48.7% (€3.4bn). For the purposes of this survey, it should be noted that spending in Services includes the spend from all other non-Manufacturing sectors.
Regional R&D data for Ireland has been produced using the location of each enterprise’s registered head office to determine the region. See Information Note for further details.
Total R&D spending in the Eastern & Midland region amounted to €5.8bn in 2023, accounting for 82.8% of all R&D expenditure. The Southern region (€745.3m or 10.6%) and the Northern & Western region (€459.1m or 6.6%) accounted for the remainder.
Enterprises reported that 95.3% of all R&D expenditure was funded by the enterprise itself or internal funds, while the remaining 4.7% of expenditure was funded by public funding at 2.4% and all other sources at 2.3%. The lowest proportion of internal funding (86.6%) occurred in small enterprises, compared with 91.1% in medium enterprises and 97.1% in large enterprises.
The BERD survey is carried out in all EU member states. The most recent data available from Eurostat is taken from the 2023-2024 survey and allows comparisons across the EU. Please note that these figures are provisional for most of the participating countries. R&D intensity for a country is defined as the R&D expenditure as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
In 2023, the R&D intensity rate for Ireland (1.37%) was below the EU27 average of 1.47%. Ireland ranked 10th in the EU27 in 2023, compared with a ranking of 15th in 2021 and 13th in 2019.
| Percentage | |
| Sweden | 2.65 |
| Belgium | 2.46 |
| Austria | 2.27 |
| Germany | 2.12 |
| Finland | 2.09 |
| Denmark | 1.83 |
| Slovenia | 1.47 |
| EU27 | 1.47 |
| Netherlands | 1.44 |
| France | 1.44 |
| Ireland | 1.37 |
| Czechia | 1.19 |
| Portugal | 1.06 |
| Estonia | 1.06 |
| Hungary | 1.01 |
| Poland | 1.01 |
| Spain | 0.84 |
| Italy | 0.76 |
| Croatia | 0.76 |
| Greece | 0.74 |
| Slovakia | 0.58 |
| Bulgaria | 0.51 |
| Luxembourg | 0.48 |
| Lithuania | 0.44 |
| Malta | 0.34 |
| Romania | 0.32 |
| Latvia | 0.3 |
| Cyprus | 0.28 |
R&D personnel consists of researchers (PhD qualified and others), technicians and other support staff.
In 2023, there were 40,956 persons engaged in R&D in Ireland. Of this total, 49.6% or 20,334 persons were employed as researchers, of which 2,582 were PhD qualified researchers. In addition, there were 12,740 (31.1%) technicians and 7,882 (19.2%) support staff.
The number of R&D personnel engaged in small enterprises in 2023 was 11,084, accounting for 27.1% of all R&D personnel. Medium enterprises had 8,335 persons engaged, accounting for 20.4% of all R&D personnel, compared with 21,537 persons or 52.6% of R&D personnel engaged in large enterprises.
Large enterprises employed 1,088 persons or 42.1% of all PhD qualified researchers employed in R&D. This compares with 1,078 persons or 41.8% in small enterprises and 416 persons or 16.1% in medium enterprises.
Almost four in ten (37.2%) R&D staff were engaged in Irish-owned enterprises compared with 62.8% in foreign-owned enterprises. More R&D staff were engaged in Services (65.6%) than in Manufacturing (34.4%).
The Eastern & Midland region accounted for seven in ten (69.6%) of R&D staff in 2023 with 28,486 persons engaged. This compares with 7,640 (18.7%) persons engaged in the Southern region and 4,830 (11.8%) persons engaged in the Northern & Western region.
In 2023, female R&D personnel accounted for 28.2% (11,565) of all R&D staff. More than half (50.6%) of female R&D personnel were employed as researchers, followed by 25.7% (2,976) employed as technicians and 23.7% (2,741) employed as support staff.
There were 29,392 males employed in R&D in 2023, with 49.3% (14,486) of these employed as researchers, 33.2% (9,764) employed as technicians, and the remaining 17.5% (5,142) employed as support staff.
R&D enterprises are those enterprises which reported that they either performed in-house R&D, had R&D performed on their behalf, or controlled branches engaged in R&D activity.
There were 2,351 enterprises engaged in R&D activities in Ireland in 2023, of which almost two-thirds (66.1%) spent less than €500,000 on R&D activities. Almost one in five (19.3%) enterprises had a spend in the €500,000 - €1,999,999 category, while 14.6% spent €2,000,000 or more.
In 2023, of the 2,351 enterprises engaged in R&D activities in Ireland, 1,622 (69.0%) were small enterprises, 508 (21.6%) were medium enterprises, and 221 (9.4%) were large enterprises.
In 2023, more than eight in ten (85.5%) of R&D active firms spent less than €2m on R&D. Small firms had by far the largest share (81.6%) of total R&D spend in the €0 - €99,999 category and also had the largest share in the €100,000 - €499,999 (77.1%) and €500,000 - €1,999,999 (61.3%) categories.
Large firms had the largest share (69.0%) of R&D spend in the €5m and over category in 2023.
In 2023, there were 1,706 (72.6%) Irish-owned enterprises engaged in R&D activities, compared with 645 (27.4%) foreign-owned enterprises. The majority of Irish-owned enterprises (76.7% or 1,309) spent less than €500,000 on R&D, compared with 38.1% or 246 foreign-owned enterprises.
In 2023, 817 or 34.8% of all enterprises engaged in R&D activities had a spend of €0 - €99,999 on R&D. This was closely followed by 31.4% (738 enterprises) which had a spend of €100,000 - €499,999 on R&D activities.
In Services, the largest number of enterprises was in the R&D spend category €100,000 - €499,999 with 529 firms or 32.9%. In Manufacturing, the largest number of enterprises was in the R&D spend category €0 - €99,999 (320 enterprises or 43.0%).
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Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (28 April 2025) published Business Expenditure on Research and Development 2023 (Final) - 2024 (Preliminary).
Commenting on the release, Devin Zibulsky, Statistician in the Sustainability and Circular Economy Division, said: “This release measures the Research & Development (R&D) activities of enterprises in Ireland including expenditure, personnel, and sources of funding. Measuring R&D activity allows for viewing changes over time, international comparisons, and evaluating the social and economic impact of R&D.
In 2023, enterprises in Ireland reported R&D expenditure of €7.0bn, which was an increase of 81% from €3.9bn in 2021. The BERD survey is conducted every second year, which means the 2023 data in this release is compared with the previous survey results from 2021. Please note that data for the intervening years of 2022 and 2024 is estimated. Current expenditure accounted for 66% (€4.6bn) of all R&D expenditure in 2023, while capital expenditure made up the remaining 34% (€2.4bn). Labour costs were the largest component of R&D expenditure, rising to €2.6bn in 2023 from €2.0bn in 2021.
Large enterprises, those with 250 or more people employed, accounted for 77% or €5.4bn of R&D expenditure in 2023, with Irish-owned enterprises accounting for 16% or €1.1bn of total R&D expenditure. Foreign-owned enterprises spent €5.9bn on R&D in 2023, accounting for 84% of all R&D expenditure. In 2023, the top 10 enterprises accounted for 58% or €4.0bn of total R&D expenditure, compared with 37% in 2021. In 2023, there were 40,956 R&D staff employed in Ireland, and nearly half were employed as researchers."