Updated 1pm

TWO COMPANIES HAVE today announced the creation of 70 new jobs in total in Kildare and Louth.

Cathx Ocean, which is based in Kildare, expects to create 50 new jobs in the next two years, Minister for Jobs Richard Bruton has announced from Texas where he is on a trade mission.

A US-based subsea engineering manufacturer, Bluefin Robotics, has chosen the company, which already employs 30 people in Ireland, to equip its underwater robots with cameras and laser based technology.

Companies in the defence, commercial and scientific space depend on Bluefin’s underwater vehicles for the completion of subsea survey and engineering tasks, such as real pipeline visual surveying at depths of up to 4,500m.

The imagine system provides real-time information and uses it to provide decision-making data to the robot.

This afternoon a medical technology company, Becton, Dickson and Company, opened its plant in Drogheda, Co Louth, and announced it will expand its production of syringes and create an additional 20 jobs.

Over the last five years, the company has invested nearly €73 million in its plants in Drogheda and Dun Laoghaire in Dublin. It produces syringes, safety components for insulin pen needles and lancet blood sampling devices.

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