The announcement this week of the creation of 53 jobs by two new companies in Shannon is a pre-Christmas boost for the town and for the region generally, Shannon Chamber’s CEO Helen Downes said when welcoming Jetpower Aircraft Materials Limited (“Jetpower”) to the Shannon Free Zone and Iceland to SkyCourt.

Jetpower’s arrival in Shannon demonstrates the benefits accruing to creating industry clusters in areas where there is a concentration of similar business activity. Aviation is one such cluster at Shannon and the activities of the 50 companies operating in the sector impressed IAG CEO Willie Walsh when he visited Shannon recently. International companies are seeing the benefit of establishing a European base in Shannon where the property solutions on offer enable seamless set up. Jetpower brings a new dimension to that cluster and we certainly look forward to working closely with them as they embed in the region.

“Iceland’s decision to choose SkyCourt as the location for its first store in Clare is indicative that Shannon can be an attractor for retailers seeking to expand their reach to a new customer segment. SkyCourt is an attractive retail offering and we would hope that more national brands might follow Iceland’s lead and see the potential Shannon offers as a retail destination. While retail is not prominent in Shannon Chamber membership, it is a sector we plan to focus on more in 2018 by rolling out some new initiatives in conjunction with the retail sector.”