230 jobs boost at Limerick IT campus

Staying in Munster, Limerick Institute of Technology is set to expand its payroll with 100 full time positions being made available as the campus grows its Coonagh Cross location for engineering and pharmacutical students.

The company established a manufacturing facility there in 1992 and now employs 500 people at Carrigtwohill.

GE Healthcare in Cork is a subsidiary of United States multi-national General Electric.

“Today’s announcement that GE Healthcare is investing $40m and creating an extra 140 jobs in Carrigtwohill is a great boost for Cork and for manufacturing in Ireland”.

Contrast media is commonly used during MRI scans and may be ingested by or injected into a patient in order to improve the visibility of the body’s internal structure.

“It’s an excellent response from Government to my call only a few weeks ago that without such investment in third-level facilities, we would not have enough graduates to fill all the new jobs created by industry in the region at present”.

The investment which is supported by IDA Ireland, will double the Carrigtwohill facility’s production capacity from 22.5 million to 43 million units per year.

Minister Nash said: “I am delighted to be here to open the new European Operations Centre for Neopost and to announce a major expansion of the company with 100 new jobs”.

The Limerick Institute of Technology is also expanding its Limerick campus after securing €3.5m in funding from the Department of Education.

The new jobs are broken up into two sectors with 134 positions being created in the construction phase and a further 100 full-time jobs when the campus is fully operational.

The offices will help manage 300,000 customers in 13 European countries, including Ireland.

With the total development expected to take a total of three years, the campus is expected to bolster the university’s focus on precision engineering, which will gear students towards careers in mechanical and automobile engineering and aircraft maintenance, as well as automated production processes in the pharma and medtech sectors.

The first phase of the development will be completed by 2018 and it is expected to take in over 500 students.