Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 3 March 2021
36. Deputy Sean Sherlock asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment the number of companies and-or persons that have participated in business innovation centre, BIC, programmes across all regional centres for each of the years 2016 to 2020 and to date in 2021; and the cost of the BIC programme to the Exchequer. [11697/21]
View answerThe Business Innovation Centres were established in 1988 as a European Union (EU) initiative and until the end of 1999 were funded by the EU. The BIC’s are independent companies, limited by guarantee, and led by boards whose members come mainly from the private sector. There are four Business Innovation Centres located throughout the country as follows – Dublin BIC, Cork BIC, South East BIC based in Waterford and West BIC based in Galway.
Since 2000, EU funding was replaced by Government exchequer funding, which is administered by Enterprise Ireland on behalf of my Department. The payments made to the BICs for each year is €2,199,988. The payments are made on a quarterly basis, and no payments have been paid to date in 2021.
The BICs aim to empower entrepreneurs to start and scale by providing a comprehensive range of programmes specifically designed to advance the ambitions of early-stage companies.
The number of companies and or persons that have participated in BIC programmes across all regional centres for each of the years 2016 to 2020 and to date in 2021 are detailed in the table below:
|
Year |
2016 |
2017 |
2018 |
2019 |
2020 |
2021(YTD) |
|
No. of Participants |
920 |
983 |
1041 |
1190 |
1498 |
362 |
