The fifth annual tourism policy workshop is taking place in Dromoland Castle in Co Clare over the next three days with the aim of consolidating tourism's contribution to the national economic recovery. Among the speakers is Professor Jim Deegan, head of the Department of Economics and Director of the National Centre for Tourism Policy Studies at the University of Limerick.
Professor Deegan says the Government's new draft policy document suggests that by the year 2025 the contribution of tourism to the economy will be in the region of €5 billion. The Professor says that - in his opinion - this is far too conservative given the changes in the tourism industry that are taking place internationally. He says it is interesting to reflect back on previous targets and says that in 2002, the Government was aiming for tourism revenues of €6 billion by 2012. Despite the international crisis since then, Professor Deegan says it seems to him that by making a target in 2014 for 11 years time of less than our 2012 target, our ambitions for the tourism sector have arrested considerably. He says it is quite critical for the tourism industry to diversify away from our traditional high dependancy on the UK market and we need to look at international markets which are growing. This is especially the case for Europe, which always outperforms our expectations. How we prepare businesses for the new tourism environment is also key for growth in the industry, he adds.
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Online gaming and technology company Xanadu is expanding its operations in Cork and will hire 120 new staff over the next year. The company, which develops software used by a number of large betting exchanges including Matchbook.com, is seeing rapid growth in demand for its services. The company helps handle the massive amounts of data created by these businesses, enhancing their ability to identify patterns and analyse consumer trends
Mark Brosnan, Xanadu's chief executive, says the company can build very high quality software and has built a very good track record on the back of that. Mr Brosnan says the company's reputation internationally in the online gaming sphere is growing as the online gaming sector itself is growing quite dramatically, especially with the growth of mobile devices and much more internet access in the emerging economies.
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MORNING BRIEFS - Bewleys profit is up 43% over the past year according to accounts published by the company and reported in this morning's Irish Times. Bewleys revenue was up 6.6% to €104m and profit was up 43% to €2.2m. That was driven by strong performance in the UK where Bewleys acquired a business called Bolling Coffee in March of last year. In its home market, sales were up 3.3% but the company is still dealing with the fall-out from a Supreme Court judgement that overturned a ruling that would have seen rent fall substantially at its flagship Grafton Street cafe in Dublin.
Bewleys says the café is losing around €1m a year.
*** Three quarters of employers plan to hire new staff in the coming year but over half of employees plan to move job according to an annual recruitment trends survey by Hays. The poll of almost 3,000 employers and employees suggests 58% of workers will be looking for a new position in 2015. Expectations are rising of pay and bonuses too with over half the employees surveyed saying they expect a better pay packet next year and 48% saying they expect a bonus in 2015 too.
*** Siteserv, the company which instals meters for Irish water, reported a pre-tax profit of just under €7m for the eight months to the end of 2013 according to newly-filed accounts. Siteserv is owned by businessman Denis O'Brien. It provides a range of services to utility companies and event organisers including UPC, Irish Water, the Glastonbury music festival and the Giro D'Italia cycle race. The accounts say revenue is up about 23% year-on-year on an underlying basis according to Siteserv's unaudited results.
