Ireland has no native-born firms in the tech categories. The only entry is in the Food & Beverage category: Bevcraft Group (181), a specialist process and packaging business. Last December it merged with a Norwegian firm — Cubicle 7 Entertainment (192); System.I0 (271); Zoosh Digital (423) — these 3 Irish firms were founded by foreign nationals.
The Irish Venture Capital Association (IVCA) last month reported an estimate that venture capital investment "in Irish tech firms and SMEs in 2022 totalled €1.33bn, no change on the previous year." The data are not reliable as it includes foreign firms, mainly American, that become Irish for tax purposes.
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) says "Ireland has a large population of very low-productive SMEs that co-exist with high-productive large firms (mainly foreign firms)." Employer firm births are low (even including foreign firms) and the number of firms that export is also low (separate article pending).
The Financial Times's FT 1000 published in March 2023 with Statista, a research company, data on the European companies with the highest compound annual growth rate in revenue between 2018 and 2021.
The minimum CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) required to be included on the rankings, was 36.2% — slightly below the 35.5% in last year’s ranking.
The Big 4 countries Italy (260); Germany (217); the UK (155) and France (140) accounted for 772 of the 1,000 firms or 77%.
However, London has retained its position as the city with the most significant number of fast-growing companies, for the seventh consecutive year, with 83 businesses listed, followed by Paris (34) and Milan (33).
The FT 1000: on.ft.com/3Z9fBzJ
In this year’s FT1000 ranking, 356 of the companies featured were also ranked last year, and 125 have been on the list for three consecutive years.
The tech categories: IT & Software (176); Ecommerce (96); Fintech (67); Technical Services (41); Media & Telecommunications (18) and Leisure & Entertainment (7) total 405 firms.
Poland has 48 entries; Spain 37; Sweden 17; Hungary 15; the Netherlands 14; Lithuania 11; Czechia and Norway 10 each; Denmark and Belgium 7; Switzerland, Finland and Portugal 6; Croatia 5; Greece and Romania 4; Cyprus, Estonia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Austria 3 each; Latvia and Iceland 1.
UK firms have the first, second and fourth positions.
The FT says [London-based Tripledot Studios, has turned this seemingly commoditised property into the foundation of a highly profitable business with more than 400 staff, about 50mn monthly active users and “several hundred million dollars” in revenue last year, according to its founders. As a result, Tripledot tops the FT-Statista ranking of the fastest-growing companies in Europe.]
In the Leisure & Entertainment category, Tripledot Studios had a compound annual growth rate of 794.7.
Criteria for inclusion:
1) At least €100,000 in revenue was generated in 2018 Revenue of at least €1.5 million in 2021;
2) It is an independent company, not a subsidiary or branch office;
3) Between 2018 and 2021, revenue growth was primarily organic, i.e., “internally” stimulated;
4) Since 2021, a company’s share price has not fallen by 75% or more on a stock exchange;
The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) was calculated as follows: (revenue2021 / revenue2018)^(1/3)) — 1 = CAGR The absolute growth between 2018 and 2021 was calculated as follows: (revenue2021 / revenue2018) — 1 = Growth rate.
Companies with headquarters in these countries were eligible to participate: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom.
