FACEBOOK HAS CONFIRMED plans to create hundreds of new jobs in Ireland next year as it expands its teams in its Dublin headquarters.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar met with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg today at the company’s headquarters in Silicon Valley during his trade mission to the west coast of the US.

The new jobs will be created across a number of different teams, according to Facebook.

Dublin is home to the company’s largest headquarters outside of California. Facebook Ireland has grown from just 30 people in 2009 to over 2,000 in 2017.

“As the home of our international headquarters, Ireland is an important part of Facebook’s story. We are delighted that our Irish operations will be growing in 2018 with hundreds more jobs across our teams,” Gareth Lambe, head of Facebook Ireland said.

Lambe also noted that the company had recently announced that it is expanding the Clonee Data Centre “which will keep construction crews busy well into 2020, further demonstrating our long-term commitment to investment in Ireland”.

The primary focus of Varadkar’s visit is on growing trade, investment and tourism opportunities between Ireland and the US.

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Yesterday, Varadkar visited Seattle, where he told business leaders and the Irish community in the city that companies like Microsoft and Amazon, which both originated in the city, are ones that make important economic contributions to Ireland.

Varadkar is currently on the second day of his three-day trip to the west coast, and he’s expected to meet Apple’s CEO Tim Cook later today.

Tomorrow, Varadkar will attend an Enterprise Ireland event before officially opening the company’s San Francisco office.

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