Ireland is an attractive location for investment, both as an end location for establishing business operations, and as a platform for investment into Europe and China.  This is primarily due to 3 reasons:

• Tax
• Regulatory regime for fund companies
• Talent

Tax

Ireland has a business-friendly, common law, corporate tax system, which is in line with OECD norms.  Its low corporate tax rate of 12.5% on trading profits provides the basis for companies to structure trading and holding company operations in Ireland.

Ireland also has a very beneficial Intellectual Property (“IP”) regime, which facilitates the application of the 12.5% corporate tax rate to profits from the exploitation of IP in Ireland.  Furthermore, to help develop and sustain the Irish knowledge based economy, and to encourage companies which develop, own and exploit their IP from an Irish base, capital allowances are available for capital expenditure incurred on the creation and acquisition of “specified intangible assets”, including the acquisition of IP. 

Ireland is a favourable platform for investment into China due to a combination of the Ireland / China Double Tax Treaty and the Irish holding company regime. 

Recent tax measures have been introduced to facilitate Ireland becoming the European hub of the internationals funds industry.  Administrative burdens have been eased, the Islamic finance market can prosper, and fund promoters and asset managers can benefit from the implementation of the UCITS IV Directive in Ireland.

Regulatory Regime for Funds Companies

The Companies (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2009 enables non-Irish fund companies to redomicile into Ireland on the basis that the migrating fund company will continue its existence as a company registered under Irish law.  This is likely to be of particular interest to promoters of alternative investment funds such as hedge funds, real estate funds and private equity funds who wish to redomicile their offshore funds to a regulated, well-serviced OECD and EU jurisdiction.  In particular, the legislation will benefit the many hedge fund managers seeking to avail of the distribution opportunities afforded by the UCITS Directive and for these preparing for the introduction of the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive, which currently contemplates the granting of an EU marketing passport to EU domiciled funds only.

Talent

Ireland boasts a young, hi-tech, skilled and English-speaking workforce. Ireland also remains a vibrant and attractive place for younger workers within the EU, ensuring the pool of talent for investing companies is deep. Ireland is positioning itself as a “Smart economy” and given the problem-solving skills and creative and innovative thinking of its workforce, this will be achieved.  The Canadian companies already operating in Ireland have ensured that large clusters of innovation excellence in ICT, life sciences, pharmaceuticals, New Media, and other sectors, are already in existence. 

Our clients cover the spectrum of industries from pharmaceuticals, technology, financial services, healthcare, and includes advising:

Schwarz Pharma (UCB)

Medifiq Healthcare

IKEA International

Axa

Pioneer

Sanofi Aventis

Siemens

Inditex (Zara, Massimo Dutti)

Banco Santander

Credit Suisse

UniCredito Italiano

Standard Bank

Investec