West Midlands attracting more foreign investment
Work is under way on a £10 million new home on the i54 for a Black Country engineering firm as new figures show the West Midlands is the most attractive area for foreign investors outside of London and the South East.
The region attracted more foreign direct investment (FDI) projects and saw more jobs created as a result than anywhere apart from the capital, according to the Department for International Trade’s latest report.
A total of 151 new FDI projects were recorded over the last year, with 6,570 new jobs created in the West Midlands over this period.
Major investors included Swedish engineering group Atlas Copco, which is moving its West Bromwich hydraulic bolt manufacturing firm Tentec from West Bromwich to a £10 million, 46,000 sq ft, new home of the i54 site in Wolverhampton.
Work is now under way on the property, which is being developed by the Halesowen-based Mucklow Group. It will provide production and office space for Tentec's 80 employees and the company expects this number to grow as the operation expands.
The site has also seen £1.5m of investment on expanding the food and water testing laboratories run on the i54 by Luxembourg-based Eurofins Scientific.
Other major investors into the region in 2016/17 included US automotive firm Tenneco, based in Tyseley, Birmingham, which gained 75,000 sq ft of warehouse space for the distribution of suspension parts and emission control components to the automotive sector. French-owned, customer care provider Sitel generated 400 new jobs last summer when it expanded in Coventry.
Andy Street, Mayor for the West Midlands, said: “The West Midlands has once again demonstrated the appeal the region has to overseas investors.
“Inward investment is incredibly important to our economy and as key schemes like UK Central and our Enterprise Zones come to fruition ahead of the arrival of HS2, the role of overseas investment will grow.
“It is vital that we continue to press the case for the region and ensure the West Midlands is seen as the number one destination for foreign investment.”
Neil Rami, chief executive of the West Midlands Growth Company, added: The pace and scale of foreign investment pouring into the West Midlands has rapidly gained momentum in recent years, creating a more diversified, robust economy.
"This consistently strong performance in FDI attraction is translated into employment opportunities, with the latest figures showing the region created more new jobs off the back of foreign investment, than any other UK region.
“The West Midlands has a very targeted strategy to accelerate economic growth. From the development of clusters across high-growth sectors such as technology, life sciences and advanced manufacturing, to large scale initiatives capitalising on major schemes such as HS2 – the region is attracting the world’s heavyweights as they look for a long-term future and world-class talent."
Overall, the UK is the number one destination for inward investment in Europe, with the technology, renewable energy, life sciences and creative industries all seeing an increase in the number of projects.
