Telecom to set up £20m technology centre at Citywest

TELECOM Eireann is to develop a £20 million business services and technology centre at Citywest Business Campus in west Dublin.

A high-tech building of about 30,000 square feet will initially be developed on six acres of land, which have been acquired for £1 million.

Telecom's choice of Citywest for its new generation technology centre is a strong endorsement for the business park, which has already attracted 12 major companies who will occupy 450,000 square feet of new buildings.

Two computer companies, Xilinx and Saturn, are the largest companies in the 300 acre park, which is being developed by Davy Hickey Properties.

Telecom is expected to have its business services operation functioning within 12 to 18 months and the technology centre within two years.

Although the company is only to seek planning permission at this stage for a single two storey building, its site will be able to accommodate up to 100,000 square feet in the longer term.

The business services centre is being designed as a one stop shop to cater for its 5,000 top corporate customers.

These clients will have a single point of contact to report faults, check on the progress of faults and for billing queries.

The new technology centre, which is being designed as the flagship of Telecom's technical services, will enable staff to have better control over the network of services it offers.

It will also allow them to identify problems in the network before they affect customers.

Meanwhile, US computer company Compaq has agreed terms to take a 130,000 square feet at East Point Business Park in the Dublin docklands. Formal contracts have yet to be completed.

The company is likely to be paying a rent of close to £12 per square foot for the building, which will be sold on as an investment.

Compaq recently announced its decision to open a call centre in Dublin where it is to create about 550 jobs. The company will be able to avail of attractive tax breaks because East Point is located in an enterprise area.

The East Point operation will enable Compaq to bring together its 15 call centres throughout Europe into one centralised technical support operation.

East Point already has a number of leading companies including Sun Micro, AOL Bertelsman, Kindle and America Online.