Ireland is officially the most entrepreneurial country in Europe.

That's according to the Wall Street Journal, which has analyzed Dow Jones data on the total amount of venture capital raised by companies in Europe over the past 10 years.

The Dow Jones figures show that Ireland attracted four times as much funding per capita as the European average and raised 650 times as much per capita as Bulgaria, last on the list.

Dow Jones VentureSource said: ''Despite Ireland’s battering during the financial crisis, the country’s tech startups fared relatively well. Of Ireland’s 311 venture capital-backed deals since 2003, 131, or 42%, came in 2009 or later.

By contrast, the UK closed 1,441 such venture capital deals, or just 34 percent of its 10-year total of 4,208, in the postcrisis period. And across Europe as a whole, the past five years account for 39 per cent of the total for the decade.

According to the Journal, the success has been put down to Ireland's favorable corporate tax rate and the ambition of its young, highly educated workforce that has experienced success with tech titans Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, Dropbox and others.