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Overview

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Business in Ireland is an annual thematic e-publication released by the Central Statistics Office of Ireland. This publication outlines the key statistics for the Irish Business Economy in 2019.

Business Demography data (largely based on administrative data from the Revenue Commissioners) is used to analyse the number of enterprises and employment across the five sectors of Industry, Construction, Distribution, Services and Financial & Insurance. This data is combined with the Structural Business Surveys, which are run annually by the CSO.

This publication provides answers to many key policy questions, such as:

♦ the impact of SMEs on the Irish Business Economy

♦ the impact of foreign owned enterprises

♦ how concentrated is business economy value added creation in Ireland

♦ typical survival rates for new enterprises

Acknowledgement

The CSO would like to acknowledge and thank the many enterprises who completed their enterprise survey questionnaires. Without this extensive cooperation, this publication and a range of other important statistics would not be available. The CSO also wishes to acknowledge the contribution of the Revenue Commissioners, as the information provided by Revenue to the CSO is of critical importance in compiling these necessary outputs. All such administrative data provided is only used for statistical purposes. We think you will see the fruits of this data sharing in this very informative publication.

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X-axis labelLarge (250+ persons engaged)SMEs (<250 persons engaged)
Active enterprises0.399.7
Persons engaged33.666.4
Turnover56.443.6
GVA63.136.9
  • Large enterprises (250+ persons engaged) accounted for one third (33.6%) of all persons engaged in 2019 and just 0.3% of the total number of enterprises
  • SMEs (<250 persons engaged) accounted for 99.7% of the total number of enterprises in 2019 and 66.4% of all persons engaged
  • SMEs generated 43.6% of total turnover in the Business Economy and 36.9% of gross value added was attributed to these enterprises
DeathsBirths
20141533716256
20151594418100
20161462919249
20171658622241
20181780714458
201914113
  • The total number of enterprises that ceased trading during 2018 was 17,807, an increase of 7.4% compared to 2017 levels
  • Enterprise deaths increased by 16.1% in the period 2014 to 2018
  • In 2019, enterprise births showed an annual decrease of 2.4% to 14,113
  • The number of new births decreased by 13.2% in 2019 when compared to 2014
X-axis labelIrish-ownedAll enterprises
Micro (<10
persons engaged)
7243299827
Small (10-49
persons engaged)
4439355936
Medium (50-249
persons engaged)
4768476311
Large (250+
persons engaged)
79459303145
All size classes61122147621
  • Gross value added (GVA) per person engaged averaged €147,621 for all enterprises in the Irish non-financial Business Economy in 2019, while GVA in Irish-owned enterprises averaged €61,122
  • Small enterprises (10-49 persons engaged) reported GVA per person engaged in 2019 of €55,936, while medium enterprises (50-249 persons engaged) reported GVA per person engaged of €76,311
  • GVA per person engaged for large Irish-owned enterprises was €79,459 but increased to €303,145 when foreign-owned large enterprises were included
X-axis labelTop 50 by GVATop 50 by employment
Gross operating surplus74.737.9
GVA57.831.5
Turnover44.130.1
  • Industry stands out in terms of its reliance upon a small number of high value added enterprises. The 50 largest enterprises in Industry by gross value added (GVA) accounted for 77.3% of total turnover, 87.6% of total GVA and 96.2% of gross operating surplus (GOS) for the sector
  • The 50 largest enterprises in the Business Economy by GVA accounted for 44.1% of total turnover, 57.8% of total GVA and 74.7% of GOS. These Top 50 enterprises accounted for 5.4% of all persons engaged
  • The 50 largest enterprises in the Business Economy by employment accounted for 30.1% of total turnover, 31.5% of total GVA and 37.9% of gross operating surplus

 Figure 1.5 Irish MNEs abroad and foreign MNEs in Ireland, 2019

Figure 1.5 Irish MNEs abroad and Foreign MNEs in Ireland, 2019

  • In 2019, Irish multinationals had 1,168,733 persons engaged in foreign affiliates and generated turnover of €255.7 billion
  • By contrast, foreign multinationals had 437,202 persons engaged in affiliates in Ireland and generated turnover of €547.4 billion
Gross Value Added
IRELAND66.7
Hungary47.4
Slovakia47
Romania44.8
Luxembourg43.9
Czechia42.8
Bulgaria34.1
Latvia32.5
Malta32.5
Poland30.9
Netherlands30.1
Croatia29.8
Lithuania28.7
Austria28
Slovenia28
Sweden26.9
Belgium26.5
Estonia26.2
Portugal24.5
EU2723.8
Finland23.7
Spain22.3
Denmark20.9
Germany18.5
Greece18.2
France16.9
Italy16.1
Cyprus13.2
  • Ireland had the highest gross value added (GVA) contribution from foreign-owned enterprises to the overall non-financial economy in the EU27 for 2018 with 66.7% of total GVA
  • This compares to the EU27 average of 23.8% for 2018
  • Other high-ranking countries included Hungary (47.4%), Slovakia (47.0%) and Romania (44.8%) respectively
1.1 Main indicators for all business sectors, 2019

The individual surveys used to compile this report can be accessed here;

Go to next chapter >>>Enterprise Births, Survivals and Deaths