AMP - Advanced Manufacturing Park

The Advanced Manufacturing Park (AMP) in Rotherham is set to be the base for an initiative designed to drive economic growth, and create sustainable employment, wealth and prestige through the growth of a globally competitive advanced manufacturing and materials sector.

The proposed Advanced Manufacturing and Materials Growth Hub (AMM Growth Hub) is a project led by The National Metals Technology Centre (NAMTEC), Finance Yorkshire and the University of Sheffield and Sheffield Hallam University, working in partnership with the Sheffield City Region LEP.

The proposed programme will create growth opportunities and employment by providing targeted and effective support to high growth potential manufacturing companies across the Sheffield, Leeds, Humber and York and North Yorkshire City Regions.

The programme aims to create and safeguard in excess of 4,000 jobs over a 10 year period, and generate £70 Million of new sales by 2014. The cost of the programme will be £27.0m, of which £3.3m is sought from the Regional Growth Fund, with a further £3.3m match funded through the ERDF programme, and the balance provided by the private sector and the banks. 

NAMTEC would manage the programme and the Innovation Fund, whilst also delivering the Market Access and Workforce Development programmes. The SME loan scheme will be managed by Finance Yorkshire to address market failure for access to finance by providing loan finance to SMEs in the Yorkshire and Humber region, where the private sector is unwilling or unable to do so.

Discussions are ongoing with potential private sector partners including Barclays, RBS, Lloyds-TSB, Santander, Grant Thornton, DLA Piper, and Nabarro with regard to their involvement and support.

Assuming successful funding bids it is envisaged that the programme will start on the 1st November 2011 and complete in March 2014. However, the programme is structured to be fully sustainable and would continue to deliver benefits over the next ten years, based on a commercial business model.

**News of the proposed AMM Growth Hub comes just days afteran announcement by business minister Mark Prisk that BIS will contract the Homes & Communities Agency (HCA) to manage the AMP Technology Centre as one of its three nationally important technology parks.

The Technology Centre along with Ansty Park, Coventry and SPark in Bristol will be managed by HCA in order to continue the development of these former RDA assets to maximise their impact on economic growth.

These assets have been identified as being of national importance to be retained within central Government in order to be developed further to support investments in innovation and technology.