Republic and Northern Ireland business women agree on collaboration

27/07/2011 The leading network associations for business women in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland have agreed to work together and share experiences and best practice; and to explore European joint funding and tender opportunities.
Network Ireland, the forum for business women in the Republic of Ireland and Women in Business Northern Ireland signed a Charter of Agreement that will bring together business women from both sides of the Border creating opportunities for network members to tender jointly for major contracts in Ireland, the UK and Europe.

Speaking at this special event at Stormont Castle in Belfast recently, Network Ireland President, Ms. Mary Kershaw said that, by uniting to work on tender contracts, business women can bring together and share their production facilities, IT, administration and marketing skills to offer true value for money for potential customers.

"Working together, business women from across the country can be more cost effective. So when tenders are sought for the supply of suitable products and services we can bring together the companies that have the necessary skills and experience to work on and hopefully win the contract," she said.

Ms. Edel Doherty, Chair Women in Business Northern Ireland, said that the agreement signed at this event would hopefully be the start of a process that will strengthen their ability to market businesses owned by women throughout the island of Ireland.

"Women in Ireland are achieving the highest standards of quality in business. Our members can meet the high levels of service required by European customers.

"It makes sense for members in both associations to work together on suitable tenders to strengthen their competitiveness. We look forward to working with women from all corners of Ireland and hope this will lead to increased collaboration in the future," Ms Doherty said.

This agreement followed the findings of research carried out by Network Ireland earlier this year.  It found that four in every ten surveyed expressed an interest in joint ventures with European companies and 21% wished to get involved in joint tendering processes with European counterparts.

43% of Irish SMEs do business in other European countries and the majority of them are selling goods and services, while half of those surveyed purchasing from European companies.

Only 15% of the respondents said that they were doing research business in Europe and 21% were involved in information technology. 8% of the companies reported that their European business transactions accounted for more than 75% of their overall business.

The majority of small and medium-sized companies surveyed believed that European countries were relevant to their businesses and that they had an interest in Europe as a market.

While the United Kingdom is the most sought after market, the companies also indicated that Germany, France, Belgium, Spain and the Netherlands were also target markets for this group.

Members of both associations were welcomed to Stormont Castle by Ms. Anna Lo MLA. Following the signing of the agreement the group had a tour of this historic building and completed a number of workshops aimed at identifying both potential customers and partners for a collaborative approach business approach.

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