IBM Ireland's technology campus in West Dublin.

Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Innovation, Batt O’Keeffe T.D. and IBM today announced the establishment of IBM's first Smarter Cities Technology Centre. The Centre will be located in Dublin where IBM will build a highly skilled and cross-disciplinary team to help cities around the world better understand, interconnect and manage their core operational systems such as transport, communication, water and energy.

The new Smarter Cities Technology Centre will create as many as 200 new roles in an IDA-supported investment of up to € 66 million over the next three years. The team of subject matter experts will work with city authorities, universities, small and large businesses as well as experts from IBM Research and the company's Software Development Lab in Ireland to research, develop and commercialize new ways of making city systems more connected, sustainable and intelligent.

Speaking at today’s announcement, the new Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Innovation, Batt O’Keeffe T.D., said:"I am delighted to welcome the new IBM Smarter Cities Technology Centre to Dublin. The decision by IBM underscores the Irish Government’s commitment to providing an environment where industry and academia can collaborate to create economic growth through innovation and research. This project illustrates how IDA Ireland working with globally integrated businesses such as IBM can help create the Irish Smart Economy while also assisting highly innovative companies such as IBM to achieve their business goals”. 

The Department said due in large part to the enormous modelling complexity and intensive computing resources required to build truly integrated systems, urban planners and local governments have traditionally evolved separate solutions for areas such as water, traffic and emergency response. By being able to integrate their core systems and use advanced analytic capabilities offered by IBM's new centre, cities can now enhance decision-making, improve urban planning, and provide better and more cost-effective services to citizens.

“Researchers at the new Centre will investigate how advanced analytics individualization techniques coupled with solutions such as cloud, stream, and high performance computing, can help city authorities make optimal use of resources and so meet the challenges of our increasingly urbanized world," said Dr. Katherine Frase, Vice President, Industry Solutions and Emerging Business at IBM Research.

“In today’s rapidly changing world, no company can afford to stand still. IBM has been in Ireland since 1956 and, continues to evolve its presence in Ireland towards higher value, knowledge intensive activity. Today's announcement is yet another step in the evolution and follows on from number of announcements over the past three years which have ensured that Ireland continues to play a critical role in IBM’s success,”said Michael Daly, Country General Manager IBM Ireland.

IDA Ireland CEO, Barry O’Leary said, “Today’s announcement by IBM fits neatly with IDA Ireland’s recently published strategy, Horizon 2020. Global mega trends, such as demographic changes present business opportunities for companies prepared to research, plan, prepare and innovate. Ireland's ability to act as a test-bed for research and new technology to enable companies develop and internationalize innovative products and services is decisive factor in winning new investment of this kind”

IBM also welcomed the recent announcement by Dublin City of its intent to collaborate with IBM as a ‘Test bed’, positioning Dublin as a smarter city, embracing technology to stimulate economic activity and meeting the challenges of a globally competitive city for the future.

In a statement, the American Chamber of Commerce in Ireland said it "congratulates" IBM Ireland on the establishment of its Smarter Cities Technology Centre and congratulates IDA Ireland on securing this investment for Ireland.

The decision by IBM to establish its Smarter Cities Technology Centre is a significant endorsement of the potential of a collaborative culture between the multinational community and academia to deliver jobs and investment for Ireland. It also puts Ireland at the forefront of research into next generation technologies to deliver more sustainable cities and environments.

The chamber said IBM is one of the longest established US Multinational companies in Ireland and has repeatedly extended its mandate, securing new investment and jobs for Ireland. It is a prime example of how manufacturing companies can build on their manufacturing base to deepen the importance of their Irish operations within the global corporation.