Four years after Ennis became the Republic's Information Age Town its promoters boast of finally having "a truly digital environment".

Seen as the foundation for what the promoters of the project hope will result in the creation of thousands of high-tech jobs for Ennis, a multi-faceted marketing drive has been set up.

Focused and armed with voluminous research, the Industry Ennis campaign is a far cry from the wild expectations and promises that accompanied Ennis's winning of Eircom's £15 million (P19 million) prize four years ago, when an IT jobs bonanza was anticipated almost immediately by the winners.

With the prospect of a PC in every home and a higher penetration of PCs in Ennis schools than anywhere else in the State, on the night of their win, the Ennis team said it had lined up almost 200 jobs in overseas companies on condition that it won the prize.

However, the hype did not match the reality and, since then, the number of IT jobs created in Ennis is comparable to the number created in similar-sized towns elsewhere in the Republic.

The failure to match the job expectations has represented something of an albatross for the promoters of the project.

Addressing the apparent failure to reap a jobs dividend, Mr Joe Saunders, project manager of the Industry Ennis campaign, questions the early high expectations.

"Were those expectations realistic? First of all, you need to put an infrastructure and skills in place. That wasn't there in 1997 and these things don't happen overnight. But the skills and infrastructure dividend are there now."

No stranger to planning strategic campaigns, Mr Saunders was one of the driving forces behind the Burren Action Group, which fought a successful nine-year battle against successive governments over visitor facilities at Mullaghmore in the Burren National Park.

He adds: "The Industry Ennis project would be coming very strongly from the view that just because you put a piano in every home, it doesn't necessarily give you a town of piano players, so a lot of the focus of the promotion has been on the use and training."

Mr Saunders points out that next year will see the first group of students coming out of Ennis's secondary schools with the benefit of five years immersion in a technological environment.

In relation to infrastructure, Ennis is the only place in Ireland with an ADSL enabled exchange, which gives Internet speeds 10 to 15 times faster than normal. Currently, 150 organisations in the Ennis area use that technology. The town also benefits from the fibreoptic ring around it. Mr Saunders says Ennis has a world-class business environment, comprising telecommunications facilities, property development, upskilling of the present and future workforce, and support services.

He says: "This has taken time. It meant listening to the needs of target companies through an elaborate research project and them implementing the services."

Last October, Industry Ennis, made up of bodies from the private and public sector - including Shannon Development and IDA Ireland - organised a direct marketing campaign. Explaining the long-term thinking behind the campaign, Mr Saunders says: "Because the Ennis school-going population has a different learning environment, through IT, than any other students in the country, it is going to influence and shape the ambitions the students have for their working lives.

"Isn't it logical to make that outlet available locally?"

Mr Saunders says there is no longer any reason for companies to have all their operations in what he called "the most expensive and most cramped square miles of real estate in the island - between the two canals in Dublin".

He says: "Industry on the east coast is experiencing congestion. However, identifying these problems doesn't mean that their corollary necessarily exists at alternative locations. "The reasons people invest in Dublin is for a particular set of services and, if they want to escape Dublin because of a certain set of problems, they need to know that the services they require are available in the alternative locations.

"Industry Ennis is not just saying the traffic moves and property prices are lower here. We are also saying we have put in place the bandwidth, the support services and industrial property that you already benefit from in Dublin, but we deliver them in a more efficient way. Also important is the fact that, in Ennis and Clare, you also have a world-class lifestyle."

In anticipation of the IT jobs growth in Ennis, Shannon Development is to apply for planning permission before the end of the month for a £40 million digital park on the outskirts of the town. The promoters expect the first phase of development to be available at the end of 2002.

This will complement a £10 million business park at Ballymaley currently being developed, which will provide more than 50,000 sq ft of office accommodation within 12 months.

Four months into the Industry Ennis campaign, it has made contact with more than 400 companies and is in discussion with 38 companies at some level. Mr Saunders says: "We can offer companies the quickest lead-in time and less bureaucracy than you would find in any other Irish town because all the partners are already together. It takes at least one month for businesses to get an ISDN line in Dublin; if you go through Industry Ennis today, you will get it tomorrow."

An Industry Ennis partnership with the Marlborough recruitment group means "we can offer companies people, in a quicker, more effective way than any other town in the country".