Tractioneers has been working with the charity Natural Enterprise on the Isle of Wight to explore opportunities to restore and bring back into use Appley Tower on Appley Beach. See the Feasibility Study Report here.
The proposals have now gone to public consultation before Natural Enterprise enters into further talks with the current owner of the tower, the Isle of Wight Council.
The UK’s Office for National Statistics recently promoted an online business productivity measurement tool that allows you to measure your business performance against other British businesses. Improving UK productivity has been a challenge for some time and this is even more the case in the Solent area. To measure your business performance, the interactive tool can be found here. (Scroll down to Section 2.)
Productivity improvements are usually associated with the application of technology, investment in training, improving supply chain management, innovation in products/services, more efficient operational management and improving the perceived value of products/services to enable increased margins. How is your business doing?
According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the number of High Growth (annual average sales and/or employee growth of over 20% for 3 years) businesses on the Isle of Wight increased from 45 in 2010 to 50 in 2013. This was against a background of a reducing number of businesses (down nearly 8% over the same period).
This is good news, especially since High Growth businesses have been identified as those generating the majority of new jobs in the UK (NESTA, The Vital 6%, October 2009). But is it enough progress? The proportion of High Growth businesses on the Isle of Wight in 2013 was 1.4% of the total number of Isle of Wight businesses in the ONS database. This was higher than nearby East Hampshire (1%) and Gosport (1.1%) but behind Fareham (2.1%) and Rushmoor (1.8%). The proportion for the whole of the UK was 1.5%.
Given the other economic indicators that show the island is in need of more and better-paid jobs, increasing the number of High Growth businesses even further is required. The NESTA research showed that High Growth businesses can occur in any sector and are not just start-ups or early stage businesses. What they all had was sufficient resources and management talent to drive the growth.
In a recent analysis undertaken by Tractioneers, we identified just under 120 technology businesses on the Isle of Wight. Around a third of these are single person or two-person businesses and many more would seem to have less than 10 employees. The largest business is GKN with around 1,000 employees, followed by Vestas and MHI/Vestas who employ around 500 people. BAe appears to have about 250 employees at its Isle of Wight facility.
60 of the businesses are engaged in manufacturing, while the remainder are mostly service providers ranging from software development to engineering design and materials testing.
Of the manufacturing businesses, 17 are in the Transport sector (Aerospace, Marine, Automotive) and 15 are in Electronics. Several manufacturers are active in the Renewable Energy (3) and Oil & Gas (3) sectors.
Manufacturing in composite materials is a local strength with 15 of the manufacturing businesses producing products with composite materials. Supporting the manufacturers is the CECAMM composites training centre and 3 firms offering composite engineering design and materials testing services.
The island’s long tradition of engagement in the marine sector is reflected in 36 of the technology businesses (manufacturing or services) having some connection with marine markets.
Software development also features strongly in the activities of local technology businesses. 37 businesses develop software as part or all of their offering. Some of these are individuals offering contract software development while others have created new digital products or services and yet others are integrating software and hardware to make new products.
Most of the technology businesses are based in Newport (30), Cowes (28) / East Cowes (8) and Ryde (19). The Sandown Bay area follows with 13.
We’ll look at some of these businesses in future posts.
CECAMM Centre, Whippingham Technology Park
The Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN) and Innovate UK are holding a rare Isle of Wight event on Wednesday, 7th March 2018, at the new Isle of Wight College composites teaching centre – CECAMM. Register now to attend (it’s free) and find out more about innovation funding and support available from the KTN, Innovate UK and “Catapults”. Tractioneers will be there and you can contact Ken Dueck on confidential@tractioneers.co.uk if you’d like to book a time to meet up. Hope to see you there!
Tractioneers has completed an evaluation of the SOREC project for the Isle of Wight Council. SOREC (Solent Offshore Renewable Energy Consortium) was a 3-year project part funded by the European Regional Development Fund. Under the terms of the funding ERDF requires an independent evaluation of the project upon its conclusion. With previous experience of managing and participating in a variety of EU funded projects, Tractioneers was well placed to win the contract for this evaluation.
Tractioneers has completed a visitor economy research project for Natural Enterprise, an Isle of Wight economic development organisation. Natural Enterprise was interested in finding out in detail how tourism plays a role in the economy of a specific geographical area of the Isle
of Wight. With a short turn-around time, the study used published information and business data analysis to establish an informed perspective on the extent, value and spatial impact of the visitor economy in the Medina Valley. The area includes the towns of Cowes, Newport and Carisbrooke, and East Cowes.
Tractioneers has been working with Isle of Wight Tramway to help make the case for the badly outdated local rail service to be replaced by a modern, more sustainable and potentially extendible light rail solution.
Innovative Physics is pioneering new radiation detection devices for the decontamination and decommissioning markets. Based in Shanklin on the Isle of Wight, the company responded to the needs of decontamination teams in Fukushima, Japan by developing a gamma ray camera that could help visualise the location of radiation pollution, speed up the decontamination work and help families move back into their homes. See www.inphys.com for more details.
Tractioneers has advised on the development of sales and marketing materials, customer acquisition strategy, sourced graphic designers and film-makers and successfully assisted in raising research funding.
Tractioneers is collaborating with The Graphic Project on a market research project for Trident Renewable Energy Systems. Graham Pilcher of The Graphic Project has a track record of producing great designs for clients and the Trident project should be another notable success. More details to come after the launch of the market research project.