Galway tech hub at centre of remarkable ICT renaissance

AcademyWest expansion at the Galway Technology Centre

The shock announcement in 1993 of the closure of Digital Equipment Corporation in Galway was a seismic event that rocked the region – and the country – to its core.

Over 750 well-paid jobs were gone and many hundreds more indirect jobs were affected. It was at the time a cataclysmic economic bombshell from which Galway was unsure it could ever recover.

But within a short period of time, not only did the city and its workforce recover but the closure seeded a renaissance in ICT that has spawned a raft of new companies in the region and led to the establishment of one of Ireland’s most innovative tech clusters.

At the beating heart of this ecosystem of thriving enterprises lies Galway Technology Centre (GTC) which this year is celebrating 25 years in operation. It recently marked this milestone with the announcement of a major expansion of the facility, promising a cumulative additional 12,500 jobs over the next 15 years for the West.

Galway’s remarkable reinvention as a city of enterprise truly began after the closure unleashed an army of skilled and experienced former employees, many of them engineers, who were faced with a choice of either emigrating or starting their own companies. For those that stayed, however, they needed a physical space to get up and running.

“The Digital closure was a massive blow to the city,” recalls Thomas Fisher, deputy general manager of the Galway Technology Centre. “A special task force was set up, one of the first task forces of its kind, led by the former Galway City & County Manager, Seamus Keating.

“He focused on creating a facility for the purpose of encouraging and supporting the development of a technology-based industry in the region, which ultimately culminated in the creation of the Galway Technology Centre. That was the embodiment and vision of that mission.”

When it first opened its doors in February 1994, seven of the eight companies based at the nascent centre were staffed by ex-Digital employees. “So, there was a direct correlation between staff coming out of Digital Equipment Corporation and starting up their own indigenous ICT companies here at GTC,” adds Fisher.

And it has been a story of continuous growth from the start. “Within a year of opening its doors in February 1994, they were already expanding the building. There was 6,000sq ft in the original building and they were doubling that by year two, allowing for additional new IT companies to establish at that time,” he says.

But the demand kept coming. In 2000/2001, a new 50,000sq ft building was commissioned and constructed at a cost of €4.5m, resulting in the modern, state-of-the-art enterprise centre which exists today.

A new co-working space providing high-quality, low-cost space for start-ups came shortly afterwards and GTC was one of the early adopters of fibre broadband in 2008, a further boon to tenants there.

“The closure of Digital could have been seen as a hammer blow that knocked the city aside for years, but out of it came something good,” says Thomas Fisher.

“Providing a facility locally at least delivered for a cohort of former Digital employees an opportunity to start up their own businesses, stay in Galway and keep that experience that they had acquired with Digital in the city.”

He cites tech firms like Storm Technology, Toucan Technology and Bluetree Systems as examples of successful companies which grew out of GTC. Leading business technology consultancy Storm is still based in Galway with additional offices in Dublin and Belfast, while Toucan and Bluetree both have been bought by North American multinationals.

Adds Fisher: “The ability to keep the talent here in Galway was definitely key to the Galway Technology Centre at the beginning, and that has allowed other industries like medtech and the evolution of the ICT sector here as well to flourish.”

Over the past quarter century, the centre has assisted 300 companies, supporting over 3,000 jobs. “And we soft-landed a lot of FDI companies like SAP and EA Games here when they were setting up, so the knock-on effect of those industries establishing here in Galway has multiplied since,” he says.

Covid has naturally proven to be a challenge for GTC but Thomas Fisher says the nature of the centre facilitated adaptation relatively quickly. Communication between all stakeholders has been key, as has close collaboration with bodies such as the National Association of Community Enterprise Centres (NACEC) to see best practices within the industry, and with Galway Chamber, which jointly owns the social enterprise alongside WestBIC.

The pandemic has halted on-site activities like networking events and workshops, but GTC has been active online, hosting coffee break webinars and other virtual events to keep members in touch with each other.

However, most attention is now focused on the big AcademyWest expansion plan, involving an additional 22,000sq ft, bringing the overall footprint of the building at Mervue Business Park to over 72,000sq ft over four floors.

The expanded structure will have dedicated conferencing facilities and meeting spaces, boasting the latest technology, and will have a particular focus on facilitating the rapid scaling of start-ups within the ICT sector.

“As a result of our extensive interaction with the ICT community to date, we have seen there is a definite need for space for scaling companies within the region, so that is going to be one area of focus,” according to Thomas Fisher.

He believes anyone involved in the early days of GTC cannot but be deeply impressed with how the centre has evolved and grown over the past 25 years.

“Our community today is 300+ employees, 40+ companies but it’s also backed up by alumni companies which keep in touch with us. At the recent Scaling Our Legacy event (to celebrate the 25th anniversary), we got a lot of lovely messages from companies based here in the early days to tell us about the impact GTC had on their companies and the individuals involved in their journeys,” remarks Thomas Fisher.

“That’s a testament to the impact GTC has had on the region,” he adds.

Reporting: Ken Davis for the EnterpRISE Interview Series