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Business In Ireland 2017

Business Performance in Ireland

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The performance of business in Ireland in 2017 was examined using a number of performance indicators. The structural business surveys 1 were used to compile the data.

Labour productivity, personnel costs as a percentage of Gross Value Added (GVA) and enterprise profitability were analysed. The contribution of the 50 largest enterprises, both in terms of GVA and employment were also examined. 

GVA represents the value of the goods and services produced, in this case, in the Irish business economy. A simple measure of productivity is to analyse GVA by the number of persons engaged. The relatively large multinational sector in Ireland and the consequent assignment of value added to the Irish economy, can make the interpretation of indicators like GVA per person more difficult. 

Care should be taken when looking at the results for Micro sized enterprises. This size class covers enterprises with less than 10 persons engaged. This also includes enterprises that officially have no persons engaged assigned to them, but in some cases have significant economic value.  In Figure 4.3 we can see that personnel costs relative to GVA are lower for Micro enterprises than for other SMEs. 

(1) The surveys used were Census of Industrial Production (CIP), Building and Construction Inquiry (BCI) and Annual Services Inquiry (ASI). Financial and Insurance activities were excluded from this analysis.

Irish-ownedAll enterprises
Micro <107142685853
Small 10-494923456981
Medium 50-2495325577224
Large 250+95446295665
All size classes66054137382
  • Gross Value Added per person engaged averaged €137,382 for all enterprises in the Irish non-financial business economy in 2017, while Irish-owned enterprises averaged €66,054
  • Small enterprises reported GVA per person in 2017 of €56,981, while Medium enterprises reported GVA per person of €77,224 
  • GVA per person for Large Irish-owned enterprises was just over €95,400 but rose to €295,665 when foreign-owned Large enterprises were included
SMEs (<250)Large (250+)
All sectors74164295665
Industry113743746411
Construction6559490726
Distribution6482450979
Services71706169390
  • Gross Value Added per person engaged averaged €295,665 for Large enterprises and €74,164 for SMEs in the Irish non-financial business economy during 2017
  • In comparison to other sectors, Large Industrial enterprises reported the highest average GVA per person engaged, at €746,411  
  • Industrial SMEs also reported the highest GVA per person engaged in their size class, at €113,743
  • In Construction, average GVA per person engaged in Large firms was €90,726 and for SMEs €65,594
  • GVA per person engaged was greater in Large enterprises in all sectors other than the Distribution sector, where SMEs averaged €64,824 compared to €50,979 for Large enterprises in 2017
  • In the Services sector, average GVA per person engaged by large firms reached €169,390 compared to €71,706 for SMEs in 2017

* Please note that above figures may differ slightly to values calculated when using Table 4.2 data where GVA is rounded to the nearest €million.

Irish-ownedAll enterprises
Micro (<10)33.428.1
Small (10-49)73.165.3
Medium (50-249)72.855.9
Large (250+)46.516.3
All size classes50.827.5
  • In 2017, personnel costs represented 27.5% of GVA across all enterprises. For Irish-owned enterprises the figure was 50.8%
  • Personnel costs as a proportion of GVA for Large Irish-owned enterprises was 46.5%
  • When large foreign enterprises were included the value of personnel costs for all large enterprises fell to 16.3%
SMEs (<250)Large (250+)
All sectors45.316.3
Industry39.38.3
Construction 6562.6
Distribution4965.3
Services41.728
  • In all sectors except Distribution, it was shown that personnel costs as a percentage of GVA was lower in Large enterprises than in SMEs in 2017
  • Large Industrial enterprises paid 8.3% of GVA in personnel costs compared to 39.3% for Industrial SMEs
  • Services enterprises that employed more than 250 people incurred personnel costs equivalent to over a quarter of GVA compared to almost 42.0% of all GVA for SMEs in 2017
Irish -ownedAll enterprises
Micro (<10)20.621.8
Small (10-49)5.96.4
Medium (50-249)6.79.8
Large (250+)18.332.3
All size classes13.822.7
  • For all enterprises in the Irish non-financial business economy, 22.7% of Turnover was reported as Gross Operating Surplus
  • Irish-owned enterprises reported 13.8% of Turnover as Gross Operating Surplus
  • The highest rate of Gross Operating Surplus as a percentage of Turnover was reported by all Large enterprises combined (32.3%)
SMEs (<250)Large (250+)
All sectors13.232.3
Industry19.641.3
Construction13.112.8
Distribution5.56.5
Services21.723.2
  • Large enterprises generated a Gross Operating Surplus as a percentage of Turnover of 32.3% in 2017 compared to SMEs which generated 13.2%
  • The Distribution sector generated the least Gross Operating Surplus as a percentage of Turnover, with Large enterprises at 6.5% and SMEs at 5.5% in 2017
  • The Industry sector generated the most Gross Operating Surplus as a percentage of Turnover in 2017, with Large enterprises at 41.3% and SMEs at 19.6%
Top 50 by GVATop 50 by employment
Gross operating surplus70.540.3
GVA54.133
Turnover38.623.6
  • Industry stands out in terms of its reliance upon a small number of high value added enterprises. The 50 largest enterprises in Industry by GVA accounted for 73.0% of total Turnover, 85.6% of total GVA and 93.8% of Gross Operating Surplus for the sector. See Table 4.1
  • The 50 largest enterprises in the business economy by GVA accounted for 38.6% of total Turnover, 54.1% of total GVA and 70.5% of Gross Operating Surplus. These Top 50 enterprises only accounted for 6.3% of all persons engaged
  • The 50 largest enterprises in the business economy by employment accounted for 23.6% of total Turnover, 33.0% of total GVA and 40.3% of Gross Operating Surplus
4.1 Contribution of 50 largest enterprises by GVA and employment within sector, 2017

4.2 Gross value added and persons engaged by sector and size class, 2017

Go to next chapter >>>Business Costs in Ireland

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