THE US Ambassador, Mrs Jean Kennedy Smith, said yesterday that siting in Ireland now "not only makes common sense, but dollars and cents"

for US companies.

She was cutting the ribbon for the European operations centre of

Data Exchange, a world leader in computer repair and outsourcing.

A subsidiary of Data Exchange Corporation of Camarillo,

California, Data Exchange Europe currently employs 50 people at its

32,000 square foot facility in Clonshaugh Industrial Estate.

Company president Mr Sheldon Malchicoff, who founded the company in his garage in Camarillo in 1980, and has seen it grow into an industry giant, said: "We have been delighted with the success of the

Irish operation to date. Following on from this continued success and the rapid growth of the European technology industry, we expect to double our activity and employment levels here by the year 2000."

The international operation has a worldwide customer base of 1,000

companies, including some of the largest in the world. Mr Alan

Squires, president and managing director of the European operation, said the company is well positioned to provide outsourcing services to the European high-tech sector.

The Clonshaugh facility is part of the Data Exchange Oracle database in California, so that corporate customers can check the status of their repair jobs in real time by logging on to the company website at www.dex.com.