Business in Ireland 2020

This chapter outlines some of the main CSO statistics available on SMEs. Chapter 4, which deals with Business Performance in Ireland, also contains data on these enterprises.

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are defined as enterprises with less than 250 persons engaged. In this chapter, SMEs are further split into micro enterprises with less than 10 persons engaged, other small enterprises with between 10 and 49 persons engaged and medium sized enterprises with between 50 and 249 persons engaged. See Appendix 3.

The Financial and Insurance sector is excluded from this chapter, while the Other Services Activities sector (NACE Rev.2 - R92, R93, S95 and S96) is included. Accordingly, all the measures below relate to the non-financial business economy only (which encompasses the broad sectors of Industry, Services, Distribution, and Construction).

Key Statistics on SMEs

• SMEs (<250 persons engaged) accounted for 99.8% of the total number of enterprises in 2020
• SMEs generated 41.9% of total turnover in the business economy in 2020 and 34.5% of gross value added (GVA) was attributed to these enterprises
• Large enterprises (250+ persons engaged) generated 58.1% of total turnover and 65.5% of total GVA in the business economy in 2020

Percentage Breakdown of Active Enterprises

• Micro (<10 persons engaged), small (10-49 persons engaged) and medium (50-249 persons engaged) enterprises in the business economy accounted for almost all of the enterprises in the business economy in 2020, representing 92.6%, 6.1% and 1.1% of enterprises respectively

Percentage Breakdown of Persons Engaged

• Large enterprises (250+ persons engaged) employed over one third (31.6%) of all persons engaged in the Irish business economy in 2020 (504,896)
• SMEs (<250 persons engaged) had 1,093,747 persons engaged in the Irish business economy in 2020, which was over two-thirds of the total persons engaged (68.4%)

Percentage Breakdown of GVA

• Large enterprises accounted for the majority of the business economy GVA in Ireland in 2020, at €180.5bn, or 65.5% of the total
• Micro, small and medium enterprises generated 16.1%, 8.2% and 10.3% respectively of total GVA

Percentage Breakdown of Turnover

• Large enterprises accounted for almost 60% (58.1%) of turnover generated in the business economy, while SMEs accounted for the remainder (41.9%)

Percentage Share of Persons Engaged

• The Construction sector had the largest share of its persons engaged in SMEs in 2020, at 91.6%
• Seven out of every ten persons engaged in the Services sector (69.6%) and the Distribution sector (69.5%) were employed in SMEs
• The Industry sector reported almost an equal number of persons engaged in large enterprises (50.7%) as in SMEs (49.3%)

Percentage Share of GVA

• In the Construction sector 84.0% of total GVA was produced by SMEs in 2020
• Just 12.2% of GVA in the Industrial sector was produced by SMEs in 2020
• SMEs accounted for 67.3% and 48.7% of all GVA in the Distribution and Services sectors respectively

Percentage Share of Turnover

• SMEs in Construction generated the largest percentage share of turnover (83.4%) followed by Distribution with 75.7% 
• Large enterprises generated 82.5% of Industrial turnover output, while in the Services sector large enterprises produced almost 60% (58.4%) of total turnover  

Sectoral Breakdown of SMEs by Number of Active Enterprises

• Over half (55.9%) of all SMEs in the Irish business economy in 2020 were in the Services sector
• The Construction sector made up the second largest contributor to the number of Irish SMEs, at 21.5% of the total
• The Industry sector accounted for just 6.5% of all SMEs

Sectoral Breakdown of SMEs by Persons Engaged

• The Services sector accounted for the largest proportion of persons engaged in SMEs in 2020 (51.4%). The lowest proportion was in the Industry sector with 11.8% of persons engaged
• Having accounted for 21.5% of all active SMEs, the Construction sector accounted for just 13.2% of persons engaged in SMEs
• SMEs in the Distribution sector accounted for 23.7% of all persons engaged in SMEs and 16.0% of all active SMEs in 2020

Sectoral Breakdown of SMEs by GVA

• Enterprises in the Services sector accounted for 57.4% of all SMEs' gross value added (GVA)
• The Distribution and Industry sectors accounted for 19.1% and 16.4% of all SMEs' GVA respectively
• SMEs in the Construction sector recorded the lowest proportion of all SMEs' gross value added at 7.1%