Ireland’s RD&I funding and strategic plans 2025-2029

Ireland is at a pivotal point in the global economic landscape, requiring innovative and unique solutions to maintain its competitive edge. The country’s commitment to Research, Development, and Innovation (RD&I) funding has yielded significant successes.

However, the rapidly evolving environment demands that Ireland continues to push the boundaries and explore new opportunities within various diverse sectors to secure its future growth.

IDA Ireland and Enterprise Ireland recently released their strategies for 2025-2029, outlining comprehensive plans to continue enhancing Ireland's foreign direct investment (FDI) and national landscape.

This article provides an overview of both strategies, highlighting Ireland's commitment to enhancing its economic landscape through targeted strategies from these organisations, focusing on sustainable growth, innovation, and addressing global economic challenges.

Dr. Clare Guy

Senior Consultant

KPMG in Ireland

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IDA strategy

Adapt intelligently: A strategy for sustainable growth and innovation 2025-29

IDA Ireland was established in 1949 as part of the Department of Industry & Commerce. Initially, its mission was to stimulate and support export-led business and enterprise in Ireland, covering both indigenous and foreign investment.

This dual focus contributed to several key milestones, including the 1958 Programme for Economic Expansion, the 1965 Anglo-Irish Free Trade Agreement, and Ireland’s 1973 membership in the European Economic Community.

However, the landscape of economic development in Ireland evolved significantly with the establishment of Enterprise Ireland in 1998. Following this, IDA Ireland refocused its efforts solely on attracting high-quality foreign direct investment (FDI), shifting away from supporting indigenous enterprises — a responsibility that Enterprise Ireland now primarily manages.

This strategic pivot marked a significant change in Ireland’s approach to economic development, emphasising the importance and complexity of pursuing international investments while nurturing local businesses through distinct yet complementary avenues.

IDA Ireland's latest Strategy 2025-2029, titled "Adapt Intelligently for Sustainable Growth and Innovation," outlines a comprehensive plan to further enhance Ireland's FDI landscape.

This strategy is designed to accelerate sustainable growth and innovation, focusing on key areas such as digitalisation, sustainability, and regional development.

Strategic objectives and targets:

Strengthen long-term investment: The 1,800 IDA Ireland client companies based in Ireland are a key national asset that the IDA will place an overarching focus on retaining and renewing. IDA Ireland recognises the commitment these global companies have made to Ireland and will partner with them to drive competitiveness and productivity in their Irish operations, including through transformative talent development initiatives.
Scale cutting-edge innovation: Ireland’s FDI base has helped position an island on the edge of Europe at the very centre of cutting-edge global technological innovation across all our sectors. Ireland has a real opportunity to build on the existing innovation ecosystem and to enhance pan-European and global innovation linkages.
Drive sustainable change: IDA Ireland client companies are playing a core part in shaping a new green and digital global economy, where Ireland has the potential to be a location of choice for green-powered and digitally enabled enterprises. IDA Ireland will partner with clients to improve the digital maturity and sustainability footprint of their Irish operations.
Maximise regional opportunities: IDA Ireland client companies directly employ more than 165,000 people in regional locations across the country, while these locations in turn provide companies with the ecosystem, infrastructure, and talent needed to successfully implement leading investments.

In pursuit of these objectives, IDA Ireland will win 1,000 investments to:

Secure €7 billion in new RD&I investment
Deliver 550 regional investments
Reduce IDA Ireland client carbon emissions by 35%
Create 75,000 jobs
Upskill 40,000 people

The strategy highlights IDA Ireland's ambitious plans to continue providing a supportive environment for businesses. The strategy aims to strengthen long-term investment, drive sustainable change, scale cutting-edge innovation, and maximise regional opportunities.

Enterprise Ireland strategy

Delivering for Ireland, Leading Globally, Strategy 2025-29

Established in 1998, Enterprise Ireland was designed to support the development and growth of Irish enterprises in world markets. This organisation took over the role of fostering indigenous businesses, allowing IDA Ireland to concentrate exclusively on foreign companies.

This division of responsibilities has led to increasingly complex strategies and plans aimed at ensuring sustainable economic growth amidst global uncertainties.

Key milestones in Enterprise Ireland's strategy evolution include the launch of the "Transforming Irish Industry" strategy, focusing on innovation and competitiveness in 2008.

Following that, in 2014, came the "Driving Enterprise, Delivering Jobs" strategy, aiming to create 100,000 new jobs by 2016. The "Powering the Regions" strategy in 2020, emphasised regional development and supporting 3,000 new start-ups.

Enterprise Ireland's Strategy 2025-2029, titled "Delivering for Ireland, Leading Globally," outlines a comprehensive plan to enhance Ireland's economic performance and global competitiveness.

This strategy is designed to accelerate sustainable Irish business, focusing on key areas such as innovation, productivity, and international expansion.

Strategic objectives and targets:

Start: Enterprise Ireland aims to support 1,000 new start-ups over the five-year period, fostering long-term sustainable growth and high-quality job creation.
Compete: The strategy focuses on strengthening productivity, competitiveness, resilience, and sustainability. Targets include a 35% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2030, a 3% annual average increase in productivity, and supporting 1,700 new first-time Irish-owned exporters.
Scale: Enterprise Ireland aims to increase the number of world-leading Irish companies, with targets such as 275,000 employed in supported companies, €50 billion in export sales, and 150 large Irish exporting companies by 2029.
Connect: The strategy emphasises enhancing enterprise linkages and the innovation ecosystem. Enterprise Ireland will invest in infrastructure to foster collaboration, drive RD&I, and support enterprise interconnection across all regions of Ireland.

In pursuit of these objectives, Enterprise Ireland will:

Target a growth in employment by supported companies to a record level of 275,000
Commit to help the enterprise sector reduce emissions by 35% by 2030 as targeted in the Government’s Climate Action Plan
Realise a €2.2 billion spend on RD&I by Enterprise Ireland supported companies in 2029
Ensure spending within the domestic Irish economy by Enterprise Ireland supported companies rises to €55 billion in 2029

This strategy highlights the key role of Enterprise Ireland in supporting Irish businesses. The strategy focuses on goals of increasing employment, diversifying exports, and enhancing productivity, and emphasises Ireland’s commitment to providing this environment.

The KPMG view

IDA Ireland's and Enterprise Ireland's Strategies for 2025-2029 set out comprehensive plans to foster sustainable growth and innovation.

The strategies aim to create a balanced and resilient economy, featuring a diverse mix of global companies and Irish enterprises. By focusing on digitalisation, sustainability, innovation, productivity, and international expansion, these strategies are designed to deliver significant benefits for employees, businesses, the economy, and society.

Both organisations have played pivotal roles in shaping Ireland's economic landscape, attracting investment, and fostering innovation. Their evolving strategies reflect the increasing complexity brought about by changing global economic environment and further emphasise the need for adaptation and resilience in uncertain times.

Future strategies will need to continue to adapt to global changes and evolve to meet Ireland’s requirements. This adaptability will be crucial for addressing emerging challenges and seizing new opportunities.

KPMG Grants Office

We are Ireland’s largest, longest-established, most experienced R&D Incentives practice. We operate on an all-Ireland basis. Our team consists of over 40 multidisciplinary professionals in a range of areas, such as tax, finance, science, and engineering.

We have prepared RD&I Grant applications for leading multinational and indigenous companies on the island of Ireland, including some of the largest grant awards ever provided by the IDA which required Cabinet approval by the Irish Government.

Our team of engineering and scientific experts can draft the technical aspects of the grant application and drawdown documents, delivering a high degree of flexibility to accommodate potential changes in research priorities in the future.

Our holistic approach to R&D Tax Credits and RD&I Grant drawdowns streamlines the process for clients who are availing of both incentives by capturing the required data once. Our RD&I Grant experts sit in the same team as our R&D Tax Credit specialists.

Our grant application and drawdown processes will maximise your grant while minimising the time inputs from both your engineering and finance teams.

We can help, and we’d like to meet with you to discuss your options.