> brought big companies to the country

Unfortunately, these companies were brought over by accountants, not engineers..

In so far as, Ireland gave them an opportunity to target EU market (& tax deals) which meant their staff is mostly non engineering (customer service/finance/legal).

The big mistake Ireland made (back then) was not ensuring some of their core business functionalities _had_ to be present in Ireland (i.e. engineering)

A lot less new tech companies built by accountants and customer support staff compared to engineers.