New US investment projects which will create over 5,000 jobs will be announced before the end of the year, according to the Tanaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Ms Harney.
This is one thousand more jobs than were announced in the same period last year, according to IDA Ireland.
Ms Harney was speaking after announcing the commitment to create 300 jobs by Kingston Technology, the US-based company which manufactures computer memory products and is to open a manufacturing facility in Blanchardstown, Co Dublin.
The jobs are part of a £10 million investment programme by the company, supported by the IDA, to produce memory upgrade products for the information technology industry.
An agreement for the new plant was reached yesterday at a meeting between the Tanaiste, IDA Ireland and the president of Kingston Technology, at the company's headquarters in California.
Ms Harney said the other 5,000 jobs would be created as a result of "the current intensive marketing drive by the IDA". She said that approximately half of all US inward investment from the electronics sector was now going to the Republic.
The jobs will be divided between new companies setting up in the Republic and expansions of existing operations. During her visit to the US and Canada, Ms Harney said she had detailed discussions with senior executives in over 20 companies. A spokesman for the IDA said the 5,000 jobs were "in the can" and the companies involved had given commitments they would concentrate solely on locating in the Republic.
The jobs will be in several sectors, including software, electronics and healthcare.
"I have been reassured at all these meetings that Ireland continues to be regarded as the prime European location for US companies investing in Europe," Ms Harney said.
The jobs in Kingston will be created over a five-year period and those employed will work in a 4,650 square metre building in Blanchardstown Industrial Park.
According to the department, the £10 million investment by Kingston is part of the company's strategy to establish a manufacturing presence "in each of its key global markets and will enable it to provide improved support to its European, Middle Eastern and African customer basis".
"I am very impressed by the forward thinking human resources strategy operated by this company and I feel sure the Irish workforce can match these high standards," said Ms Harney.
Kingston, set up in 1987, is the world's largest independent memory upgrade module producer. It designs, manufacturers tests and markets memory upgrade modules for a broad range of personal computers, workstations, servers, notebooks and printers.
A memory upgrade module consists of memory chips (DRAMS), placed on a circuit board.
