The Irish Examiner reports that 300 jobs are due to be created in Cork and Galway by two multinational firms. Cork city will get 200 jobs in the new year when a NASDAQ-quoted cloud computing software company sets up a major European hub in the city. The IDA and the company have yet to make an official announcement but it is understood that official word will come in early 2011. Meanwhile, the IDA is expected to announce over 100 jobs in HP in Galway today. The new highly skilled jobs will be in software engineering, testing and application development.

Irish Examiner reports that bookmaker Paddy Power has announced the creation of 500 new Irish-based jobs, to come on stream over the next three years. The jobs will be spread across the company’s retail outlets and its online business centre at its Tallaght headquarters.

According to the Irish Examiner, Irish IT firm PFH Technology Group has acquired Redstone Technology for EUR2.5 million from its British parent company, Redstone. Redstone provides enterprise storage and server solutions to blue chip public and private sector clients in Ireland. The enlarged business will have annual revenues in excess of EUR55 million and will employ 235 people.

The Irish Examiner says that a Cork-based firm specialising in business process services has said that it cannot fill job vacancies because not enough people are applying to work there. SouthWestern chief executive Stephen Hegarty said the company had a range of positions to fill but that they were not receiving enough CVs from interested jobseekers. “We currently have 40 vacancies… and we are looking for people from entry level right up to network administrators. We are one of the biggest employers in West Cork but we are not getting enough CVs sent into us to fill the positions,” he said.

 The Irish Examiner reports that hundreds of jobs could be at risk at a series of firms linked to the Calyx Group after the firm was put into receivership. In a statement, a spokesperson for the Kavanagh/Fennell insolvency practice said the IT firm had been put into receivership as the debt on its balance sheet was in excess of annual turnover of approximately EUR90 million. The 500 staff working with the business group in Ireland and Britain may now see their jobs put at risk. The Calyx group, which supplies managed ICT services, will be traded as a going concern while a buyer of the business and assets is sought. No redundancies have been made yet.

The Irish Examiner says that 20 jobs have been created at a Kerry-based property management software firm. Aspen Grove is hiring 20 staff for its development and networking teams. The graduate-level positions include project managers, software developers and designers. The firm provides web-based management solutions for the real estate market.

The Irish Examiner reports that professional job opportunities rose 38 percent in June compared with last year. Demand for workers in the IT sector saw a particular increase, according to the Premier Group Irish Employment Monitor. Month-on-month, however, job vacancies fell by 7 percent. There was a 31 percent increase in newly available professional jobs across Ireland this year compared with the second half of 2009. Chief executive of Premier Group Ireland Brian Murphy said the growth levels indicate that some confidence has returned to the jobs market and that businesses are taking a more positive approach to hiring. Murphy said that demand in the IT sector for software developers is a trend he expects to continue into the third quarter this year.

The Irish Examiner reports that William Hill is to launch a dedicated Irish website in the next three months, to capitalise on an increase in revenues from its internet operations here. While the establishment of such a site will boost job levels at the company, it remains unclear if any of the new positions will be based in Ireland or entirely in Gibraltar, where the company’s online gaming division is headquartered for tax purposes. The British bookmaker is due to publish its first-half results next month and has said that group revenue had grown by about 3 percent on a year-on-year basis.

The Irish Examiner says that Irish SMEs feature strongly among businesses who have secured industry funding from an EU research fund. More than EUR55 million has been awarded to businesses here out of a EUR213 million dividend received by Ireland to date from the seventh framework programme (FP7) for research and technological development. Higher education colleges secured 61 percent of the funding, but 26 percent went to industry. “SMEs account for over 69 percent of the funding to private industry, funding that is enabling Irish SMEs to collaborate with world-class research teams across Europe,” said the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation.

The Irish Examiner reports that the Government has launched its own “news service” in a bid to sell its message better. Key policies and issues which the Government wants publicised will be presented “in the language of a news bulletin”, the coalition said. The service will post “news” reports, as well as press releases and videos, on MerrionStreet.ie.

The Irish Examiner reports that e-payments provider Payzone saw its pre-tax losses increase to EUR177.2 million in its last financial year, according to accounts filed with the Companies Registration Office. The company, established through the 2007 merger of Irish firm Alphyra and British cash machine operator Cardpoint, had generated a pre-tax loss of EUR148.7 million the previous year. The latest set of accounts for the Dublin-headquartered company also show an increase in operating loss from EUR119.2 million to EUR148.6 million and a rise in overall revenue from EUR555.7 million to EUR588.7 million.