Invest NI support secures £764m of investment – highest in over a decade

Invest Northern Ireland performance results for 2025-26 show that its support has helped secure £764m of business investment in the economy, highest since 2014-15. 

The agency offered £126m of assistance across 2,221 investment projects. This means every £1 of Invest NI support contributes to £6 of investment in the economy.  

Speaking about the results, Kieran Donoghue, CEO, Invest NI said: “Securing three quarters of a billion pounds of investment in our economy is an increase of 19 per cent on what we secured in 2024-25. This brings us to a cumulative £1.4 billion investment over the first two years of our Business Strategy. This is a very strong performance at a time when businesses face increasing costs and competition, trade uncertainty, and rapid technological change.”  

“The support we provided in 2025-26 will also help companies to create 4,301 new jobs, up 45 per cent on the previous year. Of these, 85 per cent offer salaries above the Northern Ireland Private Sector Median (PSM) as our client companies create increasingly skilled roles.

Overall, Invest NI delivered against 48 of its 56 activity targets in 2025-26. In those areas where there was an undershoot, the organisation still recorded an average target achievement rate of 85 per cent.  

“We are pleased with the quality and mix of investments supported last year, which included a broad range of sectors including advanced manufacturing and engineering, agri-food, life and health sciences, technology and business services. We also observed increased investment activity in automation, AI, R&D and product and process innovation. These are very important investment trends across the client portfolio.

“The majority of our investments came from locally owned companies, predominantly SMEs, and we allocated the bulk of our financial support to these firms as well. In addition, we also won 20 new, first-time foreign investments, which are now ramping up their businesses in NI. It is vital that Northern Ireland continues to see development in both FDI and indigenous industry.

“The geographic distribution of the investments secured in 2025-26 was similar to 2024-25. We are actively measuring our contribution to delivering improved regional balance across multiple metrics including the percentage of investments located outside the Belfast Metropolitan Area (BMA), and the value and jobs associated with this investment.

“Almost 1,300 of the investments we supported last year were located outside the BMA, or in projects that have the potential to impact all of Northern Ireland. These projects will generate nearly £359m of investment in local economies and have the potential to create over 1,500 new jobs.

“This represents 59 per cent of all the investments we supported and 48 per cent of the total value of investments. This means that we exceeded this year’s target for the value of investments outside the BMA but did not meet the target (62.5 per cent) for the percentage of investments outside the area."

Kieran continued: “The main ambition behind every project we support is to help businesses be more productive, innovative and competitive, whether that’s through investment in capital equipment and automation, new product development, finding new clients in new markets or creating new and more skilled jobs. Projects such as the first-time investment by Bank of America with the potential to create up to 1,000 jobs, the £24.5m investment by Lakeland Dairies, £5m by Kestrel Foods and the 340 new jobs in Kainos are examples of how we are working with companies to enable the investment, that can generate positive economic and social outcomes.

“Both our two-year Business Strategy progress and our Client Performance Indicators (CPI) show that our support is helping our client base of over 2,300 to grow. These client companies employ just under 150,000 people, and from 2024 to 2025, they experienced a 7 per cent increase in sales, a 6 per cent increase in external sales, and a 7 per cent increase in exports. This gives me confidence that we are making a difference. I am optimistic, therefore, that we will see positive growth in our economy in future years because of what we have achieved this year.” 

The CPI results also show an increase in sales and exports alongside steady employment levels.  

“As with every public body, we are facing budgetary challenges. As it stands right now, we have received a contingency allocation to enable us to continue to support both local businesses and international investors. I am confident that we can still deliver good outcomes with the funds we have available as we move into the final year of our current Business Strategy. As always, even in the context of a constrained financial position, our targets are the minimum of what we hope to achieve, and we will make every effort to deliver the best return possible for the public funds we are allocated.

“We are very grateful to our clients, partners and stakeholders for their support of our work last year and look forward to making further progress in the year ahead.”  

Commenting on the results, Economy Minister Dr Caoimhe Archibald said: “Despite a very challenging global environment, we are outperforming Britain in terms of output and export growth. Productivity is increasing and regional imbalances are narrowing. These strong results show that Invest NI is a key driver of this positive economic change.

“Invest NI’s transformation agenda is working, and significant momentum has been built up over the last two years. As we move into the last year of the Business Strategy there is a strong basis to meet the target of 65 per cent of total investments outside the Belfast Metropolitan Area.”

Read more about 2025-26 performance results: £764m to be invested in Northern Ireland’s economy following Invest NI support.