A round-up of other business stories in brief...
EU funding to be sought for jobless
The Department of Enterprise Trade and Employment is planning to seek funds from the European Commission to retrain workers who have lost their jobs at Waterford Crystal and SR Technics.
Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Mary Coughlan discussed the issue yesterday with Vladimír Spidla, Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities.
He has responsibility for the European Globalisation Fund.
“Discussions are currently ongoing with Fás and other relevant bodies to prepare the necessary inputs to complete applications, though this may take some time, a spokesman for the department said.
“However, the experience gained and the co-operation built up with the commissioner and his expert staff in preparing and submitting the Dell application will greatly assist in making these and any other applications in due course.”
The Government is hoping for some €10 million in respect of the 1,900 losing their jobs at Dell. More than 1,000 jobs are expected to go at SR Technics and more than 400 have gone at Waterford.
Tessera Solar signs CSP deal
The NTR US subsidiary, Tessera Solar North America, is to begin supplying solar- generated power to CSP, a utility based in San Antonio, Texas, in 2011.
The company announced yesterday that it has signed a 27 megawatt a year deal with CSP.
It will use technology developed by its fellow NTR subsidiary, Stirling Energy Systems, to provide the electricity.
Trade-barriers on the increase
Governments around the world have continued to push up trade barriers in spite of high-profile pledges at the G20 summit and other forums to resist protectionism, according to a World Trade Organisation report to be published today.
Over the past three months, the WTO recorded 83 trade-restricting measures. – The Financial Times Limited 2009
Ark Retail
In our edition of Tuesday, June 30th, we published an article entitled “Ark Retail heading for Liquidation”, in which it was stated that the Ark Retail Group is heading for liquidation after posting notice of a creditors’ meeting. There is no one legal entity known as “Ark Retail Group” and the creditors’ meeting referred to in the article did not relate to Ark Retail Holdings Limited; Ark Fashions (Blanchardstown) Limited; Ark Fashions (Liffey) Limited; Ark Fashions (McDonagh) Limited; Ark Retail (UK) Limited; Ark Retail (ESP) Limited; Ark Fashions (Dundrum) Limited; Ark Fashions (Portlaoise) Limited and Ark Fashions (Letterkenny) Limited. We apologise for the error.