Ms Orla Battersby:

We do not want only to continue to support the companies that are here. We have established a pilot clustering programme and we are trying to build up examples from the pilot programme to encourage more companies to work together. Many people may wish to come together but they do not have the wherewithal to pull it together. It needs some intervention by Enterprise Ireland to make it happen. When we have evidence, we can encourage more companies. The applications we are looking at this week involve CEB clients, non-agency clients, EI clients and IDA clients working together with up to 14 companies.

There are other peer to peer and clustering initiatives that are not within the formal clustering programme where we encourage companies to help each other, be they large or small. We have a mentoring programme. We are trying to get people to help themselves and help each other, in addition to what Enterprise Ireland can do with its reducing resources.