Booming Irish pharmaceutical sector sets sights on China (3)

Laurent Borla, general manager of Arkopharma Ireland, listed several key reasons for the French-based multinational decided to invest in Ireland.

"Ireland was chosen because it's an English speaking country, it's in the eurozone, there is a well educated workforce, the climate is quite proper to control environments, it's never too warm, never too cold so there is good savings to be made on energy costs and it's just a great place to be in. I mean, the quality of life in Ireland is quite spectacular and it's important when people work hard, after a long day," said Borla.

Dominic Carolan, managing director of Genzyme Ireland, also said reliability of supply is another area that Ireland has a good reputation on pharma sector.

"Ireland has an ability to be able to do and deliver the products that are very important for patients worldwide and also Ireland has been developing in more recent times an ability to drive productivity improvements through their facilities in Ireland, to be very cost competitive in relation to other countries who are also operating in the pharmaceutical manufacturing area," Carolan said.

The sector directly employs almost 25,000 people in Ireland alone, and Irish officials believes that with an outstanding regulatory track record, a strong transparent framework and support from the government, the pharmaceutical industry in Ireland should continue to grow for years to come.

"We have a very strong regulatory framework which companies really appreciate because it gives them a lot of guidance and security in terms of what they are achieving and the industry has really been able to access excellent talent here with the engineering and science graduate output from the universities. They've had, I think, a second to none track record in excellence in both development and manufacturing," said Heavey.