President Connolly signed the Regulation of Artificial Intelligence Act 2026 into law on 21 July 2026. The Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment announced on 30 July 2026 that the Act establishes the AI Office of Ireland and that Paul Byrne had been appointed its first Chief Executive Officer. The Office was expected to be operational by 2 August 2026. The stage reached is enactment and establishment of the national coordinating body, not the creation of a new substantive regime.
The controlling instruments are the Regulation of Artificial Intelligence Act 2026 and Regulation (EU) 2024/1689. The Act creates the AI Office as an independent statutory body and names it Ireland's central coordinating authority for implementation of the EU Regulation. The Department states that the Act is a technical implementing measure and does not add to the obligations placed on regulated entities by the EU Regulation. Sectoral supervision remains with the authorities Ireland has already designated, which the Department numbers at fifteen and which include the Central Bank of Ireland, the Data Protection Commission, the Health and Safety Authority, and the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission.
Providers and deployers placing AI systems on the Irish market now have one body to address on cross-sector questions. The Office acts as the Single Point of Contact for the EU AI Act for the European Commission, national sectoral regulators and the public, and it coordinates the activities of the competent authorities to encourage consistent implementation and supervision. Banks and payment firms supervised by the Central Bank of Ireland, employers and manufacturers within the remit of the Health and Safety Authority, and controllers answering to the Data Protection Commission keep their existing supervisors, with the Office sitting above them on coordination, cooperation and information sharing.
The Office also supports joint investigation and enforcement activity between the competent authorities, so one AI deployment touching employment, financial services and personal data may draw a coordinated response rather than three separate ones. Because the Act does not extend the substantive duties in Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, entities that mapped their obligations against the EU text face no second Irish layer of duties. What firms should settle now is which designated authority supervises each of their AI use cases, since the Act changes coordination rather than allocation.
Licentium advises providers and deployers on artificial intelligence regulation in Ireland and across the European Union. Work we undertake includes classifying AI systems against Regulation (EU) 2024/1689, identifying the Irish competent authority for each use case, preparing regulator correspondence routed through the Single Point of Contact, and drafting provider and deployer governance documentation.