Local Enterprise Offices — LEOs — are now supporting more than 7,500 small businesses that employ 35,000 people, according to annual results from the network.

The LEOs helped thousands of businesses to pivot online during the pandemic, or adapt their products and services through new supports introduced as part of the July Stimulus Package. They approved 13,091 Trading Online Vouchers to assist businesses get online or improve their existing offering, up more than 950% from 1,218 in 2019.

As a result, they now support 7,529 companies and a total of 35,236 jobs, including 5,585 new jobs created in 2020. 

They also provided training and mentoring to small businesses in 2020 to help them navigate the particularly difficult trading environment created by Covid-19 and Brexit. Last year, LEOs trained over 77,000 entrepreneurs and business representatives, up from 37,000 in 2019, while 16,230 completed business mentoring assignments.

In 2020, over €22m was approved for projects to help improve clients’ businesses, up from €20m in 2019, the largest amount of approved funding by the Local Enterprise Offices to small businesses to date.

In Association with

Chair Padraic McElwee said: “2020 was a challenging year for everyone, and small businesses were no different. The Local Enterprise Offices were to the fore in trying to help these companies pivot or adapt their businesses to sustain through the issues caused by Covid and Brexit. 

“The figures show the level of support that was given, both financially and through training, mentoring and, significantly, the work done in getting small companies online to ensure they could continue to reach their customers." 

Employment Estimates

According to the latest government estimates. across the economy last year, 269,200 people were employed in foreign-owned and 216,700 in state agency-assisted Irish-owned companies in 2020. Employment in foreign-owned firms increased by 3.5% on 2019, with 9,000 additional jobs. In Irish-owned firms, employment decreased by 0.7%, a decrease of 1,560.

Among foreign-owned companies, the fastest growing sectors were in services. ICT services increased its share of full-time employment from 32% to 38.2% between 2011-2020, so that it is now well over a third of total foreign-owned employment in the country.

Among Irish-owned firms, business, financial and other services increased from 18.9% to 20.3% of full-time employment and ICT services increased from 12.4% to 14.1%.

At 34.3%, the services sectors have increased their share to just over one third. Among Irish-owned firms total industry has declined from 68.7% to 65.7% and food, drink and tobacco has declined the from 25.2% to 22.9%.