The financial software comapny currently employs 120 people at its offices on the Dublin Road but this figure will rise to almost 200 by 2010 following a £3 million expansion by parent company NYSE Euronext. Invest Northern Ireland has offered £945,000 towards the cost of the project.

Wombat, which was acquired by NYSE Euronext in March this year for £100 million, develops software to speed up the delivery of electronic market data to hedge funds and investment banks.

It has direct links to stock markets and has designed software so that the data can reach the financial institutions in milliseconds.

NYSE Euronext CEO Duncan Niederauer made the announcement in Belfast while flanked by First Minister Ian Paisley and Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, whom he first met last December when the pair visited the US on a trade mission.

"With the addition of Wombat to the NYSE Euronext family in March 2008, we immediately recognised the value that the Belfast centre would contribute to our business and customers both in Europe and globally,'' said Mr Niederauer.

"I continue to be impressed with the level of skills possessed by local software developers and engineers.

"Combined with the ongoing support of Invest NI, I am confident that Northern Ireland will continue to deliver the competitive edge we require to meet increasing global demand for our innovative technology products and services.''

Mr Paisley said that this week the Province had been able to showcase itself as an investment location to some of the world's most prestigious companies.

"It is extremely appropriate, therefore, that an agreement has been signed which will lead to Wombat expanding its European software development centre in Belfast," he said.

"We were pleased to visit the New York Stock Exchange and meet Duncan on his first day as CEO last year, and I am delighted that he has joined us today as a friend and once again as an investor in Northern Ireland and our people."

Details of the investment came on the second day of the US-NI investment conference in Belfast which is being attended by 80 companies and more than 100 top American executives.

The event, which aims to showcase Northern Ireland as a strategic investment location, ends today.

Mr McGuinness said Wombat was sending out a clear vote of confidence in Northern Ireland's talented people and the potential they offered firms in growth sectors such as ICT.

"I hope that as delegates return home to the US they will be taking with them a more positive image of this region," he said.

Bomb hoax fails to disrupt conference, see page 10