A lack of access to venture capital and poor bank support for electronic transactions have been identified as major contributing factors to the Republic's failure to maximise its potential as an e-commerce hub.
Speakers at a business conference yesterday, which marked the opening of the two-day Internet World Ireland event at the RDS in Dublin, said inadequate financing was a major obstacle to the growth of e-commerce
The keynote speaker, Mr Declan Ganley, chairman of Adornis.com - the jewellery store which has raised $60 million in financing and is soon to go online - said he would prefer to have chosen Irish banks to handle Adornis's transaction clearance services.
But because Irish banks couldn't offer adequate levels of credit card clearance for electronic transactions, he said he was forced to choose a US bank instead. Adornis.com, which already employs 58 people, starts trading in early November. Mr Ganley forecasts that Adornis will take between 1 per cent and 5 per cent of the world jewellery market within the next five years. The conference was also addressed by Mr Gerry McGovern, managing director of Internet consultancy, Nua. Nua holds a 15 per cent equity stake in Adornis. "The biggest inhibitor to e-commerce growth is lack of access to genuine venture capital," Mr McGovern said.
The opening of Internet World coincided with a new report published by Amarach Consulting, which indicates there are now 440,000 regular Internet users in the Republic, and the Irish e-commerce market is expected to grow to £400 million by 2001.
Internet service provider Indigo has introduced a new off-the-shelf product for small-to-medium sized businesses wishing to enable their websites for electronic transactions. The Go Sell product offers secure payment facilities in conjunction with Bank of Ireland, DHL, UK company Shop Creator, and Euro Commerce. It will be available through the Indigo Go Sell site (http://home.indigo.ie/gosell).
