Sir, – I appreciate that Fintan O’Toole was only using the arrival of Intel in Ireland in the late 1980s as a device to compare the Ireland of the 1980s to the Ireland of today (“Ireland in the 1980s was a dire place – but then our new patron saint arrived”, Opinion & Analysis, March 28th).
However, for the sake of historical accuracy, I feel I must correct the impression that Intel was the first and most significant hi-tech employer in Ireland.
When I arrived to take up a position at the Digital Equipment Corporation in Galway in 1983, it had already been here since the 1970s. Apple was in Cork, as was IBM in Dublin, Ericsson in Athlone, and General Electric in Shannon, to name only a few. Microsoft arrived in 1985.
Between them, these companies already employed thousands of men and women in well-paid manufacturing and engineering jobs.
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‘I could have gone to California. At this rate, I probably would have raised about half a billion dollars’
In fact, Intel’s first manager in Ireland was a former manager of both the Irish General Electric and Digital Equipment Corporation subsidiaries.
So it wasn’t really an explosion nor was it a great leap forward, as Fintan suggests.
As with most things, it was the result of an evolution which had its seeds in the policies of Seán Lemass and the excellent work of the IDA over many years. – Yours, etc,
PHIL JAMES,
Barna,
Co Galway.