IDA Ireland Appoints Barry O’Leary as new CEO

10/10/2007
IDA

IDA Ireland today (Wednesday, 10 October 2007) announced the appointment of Barry O’Leary as Chief Executive Designate. Mr O’Leary, who is currently IDA Divisional Manager, Life Sciences and ICT, will become Chief Executive at the end of this year.

Mr John Dunne, Chairman of IDA, said: “Barry O’Leary has exceptional vision, leadership and business skills to take IDA forward to further success in an ever-changing global business environment. He is an innovator who has a deep understanding of international business, and outstanding relationship and communications skills. The Board of IDA is delighted that he will be leading the talented and dedicated IDA management team and staff in advancing strategy and meeting the challenges of global competition over coming years.”

“Ireland has long punched above its weight in winning mobile international investments and has sustained this record in the current decade, in new areas of business and with new value propositions. This has involved repeated innovations by IDA working with companies, government and other public agencies. Barry O’Leary has demonstrated his abilities abundantly in his central role in these advances and has won the respect of many leading companies for his contributions. He has emerged as the ideal person to lead IDA from a field of very strong internal and external candidates for the CEO position.”

Barry O’Leary said: “I am honoured to be appointed to this position. I look forward to working with existing and new overseas companies, and the Board and staff of IDA, to meet the challenge of continuing IDA’s outstanding record of achievement.”

Mr O’Leary (56) has worked in IDA for over 30 years in most of its business areas, including two periods totalling 15 years in Germany, latterly as Director Europe until 2002. He has been deeply involved in changing the profile and raising the value of Ireland’s inward investments in the past ten years. He has been primarily responsible, since his return to Ireland in 2002, for the successful establishment of Ireland as the leading global location outside the US for biopharmaceuticals. He has also undertaken strategic change and built new strengths in R&D, medical technologies, information and communications technologies (ICT) and other areas. He has led IDA teams that won world-class investments from companies such as Centocor, Cisco, IBM, Intel, Kellogg’s and SAP among many others.

In addition to his role in the senior management of IDA, Barry O’Leary is a board member of the Dublin Molecular Medicine Centre and of the Institute of Neuroscience in Trinity College Dublin. He will now work in a transitional role alongside current CEO Sean Dorgan for the next two months, before taking over full responsibility at the end of the year.