Details: Tuesday February 3rd, 6pm, The Ramada Hotel.

Attendance: Joe Lowe (LCEB), Johnny Beirne (Facilitor), Leon Quinn (Reverb Studios), Brian Timoney (Webforge) and Enda Madden (SaasTek).

Topics Discussed:

Joe updated the network on the National Broadband Scheme and a meeting between Leitrim County Development and The Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources.

Last year The County Development Board conducted a broadband survey and presented the findings to the department ensuring that as much as the county would be serviced by the national scheme.

Joe also discussed plans for a new IT Incubation Centre which will be based close to Leitrim County Enterprise Board offices in Carrick on Shannon. He encouraged members to look out for potential tenants for what will be a state-of-the-art centre suitable for technology based start-ups. The centre will also cater for companies who wish to avail of tele-work facilities allowing their locally based employees to work closer to home thus removing the need to commute to Dublin for example. More updates on this soon.

The Centre will also have a classroom type facility for people on Third Level Courses ran by Leitrim County Council.

All Leitirm ICT companies are invited to provide input into the design of this centre and its facilities.

Enda Madden brought our attention to the NCPP Fund.

A very positive discussion also took place about saving money through IT. Examples included using OpenOffice and Linux as opposed to paying for Microsoft products such as Microsoft Office. These are just some examples. All Leitrim businesses are encouraged to contact local IT experts and save money.

A “Meet the IT Experts” is being organised and details will follow.