BQ North East Issue 20

www.bq-magazine.co.uk

ISSUE TWENTY: WINTER 2013

FUN ON THE RUN Picking up the pace with Steve Cram LAUNCH PAD AT LAST Emerging industries gain vital traction BRAVE NEW WORLD The shifting sands of the legal landscape LOOKING ANGELIC PR guru prepares to offer helping hand

SPEED DEMON How the man at the Vertu Motors wheel steered the firm into the fast lane and continues to drive its rapid growth

BUSINESS NEWS: COMMERCE: FASHION: INTERVIEWS: MOTORS: EVENTS

NORTH EAST EDITION

Business Quarter Magazine

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WELCOME

BUSINESS QUARTER: WINTER 13: ISSUE TWENTY

CONTACTS

Whatever your line of business, we hope you’ll take a little time this month to read our Live Debate on apprenticeships.

Since that took place it has been admitted at Government level that apprenticeship programmes could be better.

We must hope therefore that the Government, when it gets round to making adjustments, will sing from much the same hymn sheet as did our debate participants who made very relevant criticisms. Let’s face it, they are closer to the issues than many.

Among numerous recommendations emerging, and one indeed best tackled outside government, is the one that parents, teachers and school governors should be better informed and able to get across more effectively to young people the fact that conditions and career prospects in manufacturing and engineering in recent years have improved beyond recognition.

So much so that opportunities exist even to an extent whereby entrants can study for a university degree, paid for while they earn a wage, instead of having to study conventionally and face a mountain of debt on graduating.

That’s perhaps the most striking example of how manufacturing and engineering has changed in a robotic era.

Make no mistake. Many of our schools are doing a great job. But everyone these days needs to keep abreast of changes going on in the workplace.

Other problems of the programmes sector, centring mainly on administrative aspects, must be looked at by those with appropriate authority, particularly the need to help small and medium size businesses benefit from having apprentices.

To take a point from our interview with Nigel Perry, chief executive of the Centre for Process Innovation, great opportunities exist once more for companies of any size to go big with their innovation, thanks to the entry of Catapults held jointly by the public and the private sector.

That will surely mean investing in the future of

ROOM501 LTD Christopher March Managing Director e: chris@room501.co.uk Bryan Hoare Director e: bryan@room501.co.uk

a workforce, however small, with an overall view of lifting UK Ltd even higher up the chart.

One last point before you dip into our first miscellany of the year: Do we really feel comfortable with the Government view that an HS2 ultra high speed train service – even if it goes ahead – will only reach the North East seven whole years after it has been linked to Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool?

What’s that going to do for our region’s future prospects of inward investment?

Rob its ability to remain the best performing region in manufacturing and engineering perhaps? But cheer up, there’s some really positive news in these pages as well!

Brian Nicholls Editor

EDITORIAL Peter Jackson e: p.jackson77@btinternet.com Andrew Mernin e: andrewm@room501.co.uk DESIGN & PRODUCTION room501 e: studio@room501.co.uk PHOTOGRAPHY Chris Auld e: chris@chrisauldphotography.com Kevin Gibson e: info@kgphotography.co.uk SALES Heather Spacey Senior Sales Executive e: heather@room501.co.uk Richard Binney Senior Sales Executive e: richard@room501.co.uk or call 0191 537 5720

room501 Publishing Ltd, 16 Pickersgill Court, Quay West Business Park, Sunderland SR5 2AQ www.room501.co.uk room501 was formed from a partnership of directors who, combined, have many years of experience in contract publishing, print, marketing, sales and advertising and distribution. We are a passionate, dedicated company that strives to help you to meet your overall business needs and requirements.

All contents copyright © 2013 room501 Ltd. All rights reserved.

While every effort is made to ensure accuracy, no responsibility can be accepted for inaccuracies, howsoever caused. No liability can be accepted for illustrations, photographs, artwork or advertising materials while in transmission or with the publisher or their agents. All information is correct at time of going to print, February 2013. room501 Publishing Ltd is part of BE Group, the UK’s market leading business improvement specialists. www.be-group.co.uk

THE LIFE AND SOUL OF BUSINESS

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NORTH EAST EDITION BQ Magazine is published quarterly by room501 Ltd.

BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

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CONTE BUSINESS QUARTER: WINTER 13

FUn On the RUn

46 FROM OLD TO NEW

Features

The fine art of breathing new life into forgotten buildings

50 ENTREPRENEURS’ FORUM MAGAZINE News, features and insight from the region’s most enterprising leaders

24 IN THE FAST LANE The remarkable acceleration of Gateshead’s Vertu Motors

34 FUN ON THE RUN Steve Cram’s plans for a festival of running in the region

40 READY TO LAUNCH Speeding up some of the world’s most lucrative technology industries

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

52 LIVE DEBATE Tackling skills shortages in the trades that first put the North East on the map

60 BUSINESS LUNCH With Martin Soloman, senior partner at Hay & Kilner law firm

84 ANGELS IN MIND The trailblazing success story now looking to help others

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34 at LaSt theRe’S a LaUnCh pad

40

TENTS NORTH EAST EDITION

30 COMMERCIAL PROPERTY

Behind the deals shaping the region’s business and financial hotspots

the aRt OF LandLORding

66 WINE Two unseasonably warm bottles to remind us of sunnier times

Regulars

68 MOTORING A Maserati non-believer takes a grand day out to challenge his beliefs

72 EQUIPMENT Behind the handlebars of the retro riding revolution

08 ON THE RECORD Shopping sprees, forward thinkers lined up and fraud figures inquest

12 NEWS Who’s done what, when, where and why here in the North East

22 AS I SEE IT Can we make it? Of course we can in this region

78 FASHION

46 kaRi’S LOOking angeLiC

The Italian menswear master who’s pushing the boundaries of fashion

96 A BIT OF CHAT With BQ’s backroom boy Frank Tock

98 EVENTS Gatherings, seminars and conferences that could boost your business

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84 BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

ON THE RECORD

WINTER 13

Shopping group’s spending spree, forward thinkers lined up, fraud figures inquest, tough times for retailers, Lloyds begins SME hunt, and airport looking to soar once more

Taking part: Philanthropist Jonathan Ruffer will have his say on the future of the North East economy

>> On go the thinking caps Research to assess the North East’s long term economic potential is building to a head.

Submissions from organisations and individuals in the region are mounting for consideration by the high profile team of private-sector led thinkers who are working on a review for the North East Local Enterprise Partnership.

A series of seminars is being held and a major conference is planned for the final stages of the review.

Meanwhile leading academics are visiting the North East, forming an expert panel assessing and reviewing options for growth.

They include Professor Susan Christopherson of Cornell University, Professor Henry Overman of the London School of Economics, Professor Philip McCann of the University of Groningen, Professor Iain Docherty of Glasgow University, Professor Linda McDowell of Oxford University, Chris Pywell of the Centre for Industrial Growth and Charles Seaford of the New Economic Foundation. Three of these specialise in economic geography, and others in public policy, governance, human geography and new approaches to policy and service delivery. Pywell, who helped found Narec, was formerly head of innovation, industry and science at One North East. The panel is supported by Ian Neild, “disruptive futurist” at BT, Mike Emmerich, chief executive of New

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

Economy, Manchester, and Richard Baker from RBLS Consulting, an associate fellow of IPPR. The panel’s findings will go before an evidence-base conference at Baltic, Gateshead, in February. Northumbria and Sunderland universities will also present findings about North East manufacturing and services. The region’s universities have done a lot towards gathering and collating responses from many private and public sector organisations.

Meanwhile wealthy financier and philanthropist Jonathan Ruffer, North Yorkshire born founder of investment firm Ruffer LLP, has been appointed to the overall review team studying the next 18 years of economic activity in the North East. It will also recommend key strategic interventions needed over the next five years.

Ruffer, who is County Durham based, fills the position vacated by the Bishop of Durham, who had to step down on being named the next Archbishop of Canterbury.

Ruffer’s Investment Management set up in 1994 manages more than £13bn from offices in London, Edinburgh and Hong Kong. Ruffer also now chairs the Auckland Castle Trust.

>> Padded cushions Chief executives of top UK companies are paid more total compensation than their peers in other leading European economies, a study by a Belgian business school shows. The study covered Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands – and FTSE 100 companies in the UK.

>> Digitally speaking...

Digital media innovator Herb Kim has named his initial tranche of speakers for the 2013 annual Thinking Digital conference at the Sage, Gateshead. Among the speakers will be Pam Warhurst who is helping to transform communities armed with little besides a “can-do attitude”.

Also attending will be Professor Sugata Mitra, who is gaining an international name for his development of “minimally invasive education”. Through technology, he suggests, we can often help children to learn more by doing less. Sebastian Seung, a professor of computational neuroscience at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will preview the recently launched Eyewire.org project, and tell of his groundbreaking research on brain functions.

>> Fraud finding questioned Accountancy group BDO is reacting with caution to its own finding that fraud in the country has fallen from £2.1bn in 2011 to £1.37bn.

The group based its assessment on reported cases of fraud involving more than £50,000.

But Simon Bevan, BDO’s head of fraud services, says the large drop in overall fraud “should be treated with some scepticism” because police lack resources to investigate large complex frauds in parallel.

>> Slow tracking >> Shops with a difference The owner of the Metrocentre and Eldon Square retail destinations is investing £25m in changing its name and redefining its online presence. Capital Shopping Centres (CSC), with 15 shopping centres nationwide, is now known as Intu, while Intu.co.uk will be its website. Eldon Square will be one of the first venues to have free wi-fi available in its malls.

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HS2 ultra high speed trains on a Y-shaped network would serve Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool from 2026 – but not Newcastle until 2033, Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin predicts. Journey times between Newcastle and London could ultimately be cut by 34 minutes if the project went ahead.

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ON THE RECORD >> Retail’s up against it this year The North East and Yorkshire were the only English regions showing a year-onyear rise in business failures last year.

Together they suffered 305 business collapses in 2012, up 9% on 2011 – whereas England as a whole saw a 9% drop. Business advisor Deloitte says 1,833 firms in England entered administration down from 2,009.

Neil Matthews, Deloitte’s restructuring services director in the North East, says: “The North East figures are a stark reminder of difficulties that still face businesses. Constrained budgets and the challenges facing all sectors mean further distress in 2013.”

Despite destinations like the Cornmill Shopping Centre in Darlington and John Lewis generally having reported a healthy end of year sales outcome – Cornmill saw record footfall - the retail sector could be especially tested.

On mergers and acquisitions Rod Wilkinson, KPMG’s Newcastle head of corporate finance, believes the market will remain tough in the North East. However, he adds: “Even with no dramatic step change in the market itself, there are sound reasons to expect a higher volume of transactions due to changing dynamics on buyers, increasing their appetite for deals.” Meanwhile, firms in the North East are growing in confidence, buoyed by a more positive outlook for Europe and are hopeful of a business boost during this Q1 and 2, according to the latest Business in Britain report from Lloyds TSB Commercial.

>> DWF grows again Business law firm DWF, which took over Newcastle law firm Crutes in 2011, was merging with professional indemnity practice Fishburns LLP from February 1. Besides supporting DWF’s aim of becoming a top 20 law firm, Fishburns’ strength in professional indemnity Insurance bolsters DWF’s 750 strong insurance team, and its goal of becoming a top three insurance law firm.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

WINTER 13

>> Harker declares David Harker is to step down as chief executive of Durham County Cricket Club in May, after more than two decades with the business to take up a private venture. He has led the business, for 13 years after joining as financial controller in 1991. He says the new venture will be too good to miss. He remains with the club as a non-executive director.

>> Port upgrade completed PD Ports has a new terminal operating system devised to encourage growth in container business at Teesport for many years to come. Installation of the system built by Navis, a software development specialist in the field, signifies the completion of PD Ports’ £16.7m upgrade of its container terminal facilities.

>> Lloyds courts the SMEs Lloyds Banking Group has circulated a charter setting out pledges to small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), including a commitment to keep growing its lending to the sector in 2013. The new charter builds on promises made to SMEs three years ago.

It focuses on encouraging enterprise, giving access to finance, providing clearer and fairer pricing, and supporting communities. The pledges are aimed towards all SMEs. A prime tenet is a pledge to deliver positive net lending to SMEs throughout this year, at a level ahead of the industry as a whole - a key part of the group’s wider commitment to help support the UK’s return to growth. Other pledges reaffirm backing for enterprise, for example through a commitment to get another 100,000 businesses off the ground over the next 12 months.

>> Change of name A financial advice firm which has been trading on Wearside for more than 70 years has rebranded amid sweeping changes to the industry. Key Wealth Management is the new trading name for TTR Barnes Financial Services Ltd.

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>> Airport reopens bid to develop Among the North East submissions when Round 4 of the Regional Growth Fund closes to applications at noon on March 20 will be a £5.9m bid to develop at Durham Tees Valley Airport. The airport executive is resubmitting its bid for government support to activate 150 acres of land south of the runway.

A similar bid was rejected earlier. But this time the airport executive hopes support from the Tees Valley Unlimited LEP and local MPs will strengthen its proposal. Airport chairman Robert Hough says: “We hope this round will give us the opportunity to progress our plans for the Southside project, and to re-emphasise its significance to support aviation and job creation in the area.”

He added: “While a wide range of possibilities exists for attracting businesses related to aviation support, we expect a likely key element would be logistics services, given the proximity to the A66, leading to the A1 and the national motorway network.”

>> Achievers North East Business and Innovation Centre (BIC) under chief executive Paul McEldon has been named Business Incubation Champion in the UK. It has fostered more than 2,500 start ups in the Tyne and Wear area, with more than 75% still trading into their third year - above the national average. Opened in 1994, it is helping to create more than 6,000 jobs regionwide. McEldon also now chairs the National Enterprise Network.

Parkdean won silver in the best holiday park operator category of the latest British Travel Awards. The Newcastle group has 24 parks across the UK. The competition, based on holidaymakers’ votes, included Butlins, which got bronze. It previously won the title for two years running.

Blackfriars Restaurant in Newcastle has won a top rating for sustainability – an accolade given also to Hugh FearnleyWhittingstall’s River Cottage in Dorset. It has gained its three star rating from the Sustainable Restaurant Association.

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NEWS

WINTER 13

Double car industry boost, growing prospects in region’s job market, Far East promise for art group, Hays rules the waves, motors giant’s new look, and retail entrepreneur cracks open latest venture >> Long-term jobs growing in the North

Where it goes: Mike O’Neill and Paul Willson of TRW Sunderland explain to Councillor Harry Trueman, deputy leader of Sunderland City Council, how a £15m investment will be deployed

>> Boom time for region’s car industry North East automotives are getting a £28m injection of investment through two major developments announced recently.

Car parts maker Nifco UK is expanding into a new £13m factory, creating 170 new jobs – only a year after moving into its existing £19m factory at Eaglescliffe. It has outgrown the 12,000sq m premises three years earlier than expected.

And TRW in Sunderland is investing £15m in its plant following a successful bid to the Regional Growth Fund for £1.75m. This will bring in two new lines and enable TRW to build the next generation of power steering motors for global customers from its Houghton-le-Spring factory employing 250.

The commitments have been made as Nissan’s Wearside plant becomes the first manufacturer in the UK to produce more than half a million cars a year – this as new figures show a four-year high in British car production.

The Sunderland factory, where 6,225 people work, made 510,572 cars last year. That’s 34% of the UK’s entire 1.46m car output in 2012. It is also nearly double the number produced by the next largest competitor, Landrover, in Solihull and Heywood.

Nissan has opened its £200m electric car battery plant in Sunderland, the first lithium-ion battery factory in Europe. The plant, which stands beside the main factory, has 200 workers making batteries for the all-electric Leaf hatchback car to be launched this spring. Eventually 60,000 battery packs a year will be made there.

When Nifco’s new 7,000sq m plant operates alongside the existing one on Teesside in 2015, Nifco UK will employ around 500 staff. Managing director Mike Matthews says rising sales of new cars is raising demand for its plastic parts. The firm, a Teesside fixture for more than 30 years, lost 80 workers through the credit crunch in 2009, taking numbers down to 160. But the figure has since revived to 330 and now 170 more will be taken on.

US-owned TRW recently won Renault’s custom and is growing its business with General Motors.

It produces for VW, GM and Ford, and has smaller contracts with Fiat and Volvo.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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Growing numbers of people are finding work across the North, says Mick Thompson, office senior partner at KPMG in Newcastle.

“In the context of permanent jobs being filled at the fastest rate for 23 months, we seem to be stepping in the right direction – something barely thought possible a few months ago,” he says.

His observation follows publication of The Report on Jobs, a survey compiled through recruitment and employment consultants in the North of England. Thompson says the rise may not be in leaps and bounds.“But in terms of progress these are the largest strides for some time, and come against a backdrop of improving economic conditions in the UK. The North has outperformed the national rate of expansion in both contract billing and permanent placement growth.”

But he cautioned: “No-one should be under the illusion that a strong Northern jobs market indicates a strong recovery. It must be hoped that businesses are ready to recruit long term.”

Job retention may have been helped by the effect of low interest rates and greater support from lenders. PwC has reported that company administrations are at their lowest level since Q1 2005. Between last July and September, 548 companies entered administration, an 18.5% fall on the same quarter last year.

>> How it’s done The Owen Pugh Group is defying the dismal construction and civil engineering period with a near 7% growth in turnover to almost £25.8m. John Dickson, chairman of the firm with five regional sites and a headquarters at Dudley in Northumberland, puts progress down to a commitment to customer service, a strong asset base and a good spread of clients and business.

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NEWS

WINTER 13

>> Cable prospects rise AEI Cables, the world’s oldest cable company, has won London Underground’s approval for a range of cables it designs and makes, raising chances of contracts. It has developed new compounds enabling its cables to meet the Tube’s rising safety demands.

A spokesman for AEI, which employs 190 people on its 26.5 acre site at Birtley, says: “This could have very positive consequences for further orders.’’

Eighteen months ago the firm controversially laid off 126 of its workforce, following a doubling in price of key component copper and an influx of low-priced products from overseas. Its results for the year to the end of last March showed a £2.2m loss and during that time it went through a company voluntary arrangement, a legally binding process with creditors, sometimes employed by viable companies on facing cashflow problems.

However, last November it marked its 175th birthday by winning a £10m order to design, manufacture and deliver a range of wires and cables for the Queen Elizabeth class aircraft carrier programme.

AEI Cables - part of Paramount Communications, one of India’s largest cable manufacturers - has supplied London Underground for more than 100 years. In 1863 it laid the first subsea cable in the Gulf, which led to a telegraph link between Britain and India.

>> Stadium sellout Electronics company Stadium Group has sold its Hong Kong property for £3.3m, of which all but £0.12m will bring the Hartlepool firm a net cash inflow.

It employs 1,000 people worldwide.

>> Double digit growth IT services firm TSG has reported doubledigit growth and annual sales up £5m to £42m. The Newcastle-based business, which employs more than 500 staff on 14 UK sites, grew its net assets from £2.5m to £10.55m in the year to last March 31.

The company has strengthened its CRM and SharePoint teams with two acquisitions, a

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

focus on telecoms and improvements to project management and quality systems.

TSG also now has a deal to provide IT support for British Cycling, one of the UK’s leading sporting bodies. The deal was sealed as Yorkshire was confirmed host for the start of the 2014 Tour de France.

Andrew McCoull: Hammers home success

>> Hays rules the waves Hays Travel, the UK’s largest independent travel agent, now has a multi-million pound partnership with World Travel Holdings (WTH), the world’s largest cruise agent.

WTH will manage and develop all Sunderlandbased Hays’ current cruise business outside Hays Travel Independence Group – a consortium of independent travel agents acting under the Hays banner – but including the Hays cruise website, cruise call centre and cruise representation in the company’s 43 high street shops. An accompanying joint venture has brought the launch of a new long-haul tour operator, SixStarHolidays.co.uk, to provide high end, luxury holidays, using the existing customer base of Hays Travel and WTH (UK).

Mal Barritt and James Cole, co-founders of WTH (UK), and John and Irene Hays, of Hays Travel, are board members of SixStarHolidays.

WTH (UK) is now a member of Hays Travel Independence Group. Hays Travel and WTH (UK) have a combined turnover of £1bn-plus.

>> Bids from China

>> Doorstep delivery

Nineteen leading British fine art and antiques auctioneers, including Anderson & Garland in Newcastle, now have Asia’s only online live bidding portal www.epailive.com.

With combined annual revenues topping £200m, they now represent a dominant UK force in the international market and attract high-spending distance buyers to their sales from China and beyond.

Their Association of Accredited Auctioneers (Triple-A) has formed links for their direct sales with more than 100,000 registered collectors of fine art and antiques in China. It is posting catalogues printed in Chinese online.

An escrow system, one run independently, guarantees payments by successful bidders, who must commit funds to cover their purchases, the money then being accessible to the auctioneer within 48 hours of the fall of the hammer. Anderson & Garland – md, Andrew McCoull – is the only North East firm included.

Lanchester Dairies has won a £10m a year contract to supply nearby Hanover Dairies of Blaydon.

The dairy on 350 acres of farmland beside the County Durham village buys and processes milk from farmers between Durham and Tyne Valley and has a £14m turnover from 20m litres of milk produced a year. It employs more than 70 staff and customers range from supermarkets to doorstep deliverers. It also makes Bill and Geoff branded ice cream.

The firm, incorporated in 1994, was founded by Billy Austin, his brother Geoff and their wives Julie and Sandra. Last year Geoff and Sandra retired and sold their shares to their co-founders.

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>> Room to grow Accountancy and business advisory group UNW has made 13 new staff appointments and has created 50% more space in its Citygate, Newcastle, premises by investing in more meeting rooms.

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NEWS

WINTER 13

>> New-look Benfield Benfield motor group has a new-look board following an internal promotion.

Nigel McMinn has been promoted from managing director to chief executive, succeeding Mark Squires who has the new position of executive chairman.

Also appointed recently are Gerard Murray, now serving as financial director, and Neville Gaukroger, now strategic development director.

Squires says: “After our recent acquisitions and growth we needed to strengthen our board to give the right blend of expertise, experience and dynamism at the helm.”

McMinn described the opportunity to lead day to day management as a huge honour.

“We are all very excited about developing Benfield’s vision and values well into the future,” he adds.

North East and Australia. Two French films, a Scandinavian documentary and a cookery TV pilot could also come out of it. All three founders are originally from Scarborough.

Hicks and Taylor were teenage friends there.

And Goodill met Taylor while a Tyne Tees series on mythical legends was being made some years ago. Taylor’s most popular book, Shadowmancer, has sold more than 7 million copies in over 50 countries and is to be made into a Hollywood film shortly. Meanwhile his novel, Mariah Mundi - The Midas Box, is currently being made into a US$25m film.

Hicks worked on the Russell Crowe movie Master and Commander. He was also behind the birth of Scarborough Jazz Festival and has promoted various theatre-based events.

Goodill’s career began at Yorkshire Television, where he became the industry’s youngest

network editor. His TV work has involved him in A Touch of Frost, Heartbeat, Radio One’s Big Weekend and a documentary on Newcastle’s superstar guitarist Mark Knopfler.

In 2008 Seaham was pinpointed for a filmmaking centre of excellence proposal. It would have included a four-star hotel with 150 beds and smaller business hotel, and a campus for up to 2,000 students of digital technology.

Private investors and Hartlepool building developer Coolmore Estates, working with Michael Drain architects of London, had hopes of creating 2,400 jobs on the site of the old Dawdon colliery.

The earlier box office success of the film Billy Elliot, partly based and shot in East Durham, was an incentive. But state investment had been expected, whereas public spending is now being slashed.

>> Change of location for film prospects Best selling children’s author GP Taylor, whose fantasy novels are already being turned into Hollywood hits in a £50m bonanza, is co-founding a new film company with studios planned for Tyneside.

He has teamed up with Gateshead director and film editor Tim Goodill and TV and film producer Julia Hicks to form Moviebox Productions, which promises media investment for the North East, building on 30,000sq ft of industrial space. While good news for the North East generally, the choice of Tyneside for studios will probably mark the end of a £52m ambition to make job-hungry East Durham a Hollywood of the UK with the development of a centre for creative film excellence there.

Headquarters of the new proposal are likely to be in Gateshead’s Northern Design Centre initially, already home to Goodill’s own creative agency, Alius Media.

The studio subsequently built will complement studio space already to hand in Yorkshire.

The first feature length movie envisaged is Vardo, about a gypsy with a criminal history trying to go straight. It will be shot wholly in the North East. Also planned is a biopic of Captain Cook shot both in the explorer’s native

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

John Broad launching a new coffee chapter in the Ringtons story

>> Coffee time Ringtons, famed for its door-to-door tea and coffee deliveries and mass catering provision, has invested £500,000 in new technology and new barista training facilities at its Longbenton, Newcastle, headquarters. Though still known better for its tea blending and supply, Ringtons has also roasted coffee for more than 80 years.

ONLINE: Get the latest North East business news delivered to your desk every morning by subscribing to our new daily alert, BQ Breakfast. www.bq-magazine.co.uk

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NEWS

WINTER 13

>> Warming Gulf stream Marketing agency Cravens has secured £100,000 worth of new business in six months by launching an office in Dubai. The 64-year-old Newcastle firm opened an outlet there to offset the UK’s economic downturn.

>> English whisky Entrepreneur Nigel Mills, who sold his Whitley Bay-based Mills Group to Tesco for £20m-plus in 2011, is moving into whisky making in Cumbria.

The £2.5m Lakes Distillery on a farm near Bassenthwaite Lake has planning permission and building begins in April.

With Mills in the venture is Paul Currie, who set up the successful Isle of Arran distillery with his father 15 years ago.

About 25 jobs could result. No whisky will be available for the first three years to allow maturing. But there are plans to also make and sell gin from 2014.

Other board members include fellow entrepreneur Geoff Hodgson, Martin Stokoe, the former finance director at Mills Group, and Gary Thornton. Between £1m and £2m has been raised for the venture, and European grant funding has also been secured. Mills is chairman of the Entrepreneurs’ Forum.

>> Germany, twice over German companies have acquired two Tyneside firms in quick succession.

One, a Jarrow firm employing nearly 1,000 people throughout the UK, is now wholly part of a German multinational. The management team of Kaefer C&D, which has offices in 12 locations around the UK, have sold their 49% stake in the company to majority shareholder Bremen-based Kaefer GMBH for an eight figure sum. The management team of Alan Green, John Brecken and Bill Blakey is continuing to run the business for the immediate future. In Newcastle, the timber agent and family business Gill and Robinson, founded in 1889, has been sold to Kullik and Rullmann for an undisclosed sum. Chairman and managing director Ian Robinson is staying on as managing director of the firm.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

>> Newsmakers Andrew Harvey (pictured), a chartered marketer and the business development and communications director at Dickinson Dees law firm, has been elected chairman of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) for a two-year term. Professor Barry Clarke, a Newcastle born engineer, is now the 148th president of the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).

Clarke, who grew up in Newcastle and attended Newcastle University, returned there in 1984 as a lecturer and later became professor of geotechnical engineering, head of civil engineering and dean of business development for science and engineering.

Roger Whiteside, current chief executive of leisure giant Punch Taverns is the new chief executive of Greggs, following Ken McMeikan’s move to lead Kent based catering group Brakes. Whiteside, 54, has been head of Marks & Spencer food business, co-founder and joint md of Ocado, and chief executive of the Thresher Group off-licence chain.

Alison Fellows, head of major projects at Newcastle City Council, has been appointed director of Newcastle Science City on a secondment, replacing Dr Andrew Young whose interim role has come to an end.

James Davies is now with the North East Local Enterprise Partnership as policy and strategy coordinator of European Regional Development Funding (ERDF). He was previously with Sunderland City Council’s social policy team, and with Tyne and Wear City Region as an economic and transport analyst.

Natalie Davison is now principal of Bishop Auckland College. Previously vice-principal and director of curriculum and quality, she succeeds Anne Isherwood, now principal at Sunderland College.

Paul Harriman is the new managing director of Barrier Ltd, the Wallsend coatings specialist. The former commercial manager who joined Barrier straight from school in 1979 succeeds Robert Bowles, now Barrier Group chairman.

Andrew Allner, a senior independent director, succeeds Sir Patrick Brown who is stepping down as chairman of Go-Ahead transport group in April.

Kimberley Workman, 28-year-old marketing manager at Pickerings Lifts, was named Young Marketer of the Year at the 12th annual Construction Marketing Awards. She joined the Teesside firm, the UK’s largest independently owned lift manufacturer, in 2011 and played a key role in a strategic rebrand. Wilf Peggs is a winner at 62. A former shipyard worker now employed by the not for profit housing company Coast & Country, he has been named North East Achiever of the Year at the Constructing Excellence North East Awards, going on to the national finals, where he was highly commended.

Steve Cook is now recognised as one of the nation’s best building site managers. Against some 13,000 rivals he was named supreme winner in medium builder class of the National House Building Council Pride in the Job Awards - for his overseeing of Yuill Homes’ College Gardens.

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NEWS

WINTER 13

>> Piemaker rises again

>> Banker steps down

Piemaker Tindale and Stanton has been rescued for the third time in two years.

Administrators from PCR have found a buyer for the Burnopfield, County Durham, business.

Although 50 jobs have been lost in less than a year, 59 remain.

RDT Foods now owns it. Former senior managers who took it over last June ran out of working capital.

Anthony Thomson, a former Newcastle advertising rep, has stepped down as chairman of Metro Bank, which he co-founded in 2010. The other co-founder, American billionaire Vernon Hill, plans to fill the chairman’s role ahead of the bank’s expected flotation in September 2014. Thomson, a former Newcastle Grammar School pupil, sold advertising for the Evening Chronicle during the early 1970s and later launched two other

businesses, City Financial Marketing Group (which he sold on) and the Financial Services Forum. He told The Daily Telegraph he never intended to stay with Metro until its stock market listing. Metro was opened with a view to restoring customer services which the major banks had been abandoning. It now has 15 branches across London and the South East, and claims to have more than half a billion pounds in deposits and more than 130,000 personal and business accounts.

In the money: (from left) Jane Siddle of NEL with SBV directors David Geary and Samantha Condren

>> Fillip for fabricator >> Nisha finds a niche Nisha Vedhara (above) who came to the UK with her husband seven years ago, is out to fill a gap in fashion retail. Vedhara, 31, who is from an entrepreneurial family and already has a business of 400 clients in Delhi, has launched Love Niche on Newcastle’s Clayton Street.

The boutique specialises in “decadent evening wear”.

>> Broker boosts builders Independent insurance broker Henderson says it has boosted the region’s struggling construction industry by arranging performance bonds to guarantee £500m worth of contracts in the North East and Yorkshire during 2012 - 10 % up on the previous year.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

SBV Fabrications is being backed with a new six-figure investment to expand its steel fabrication, mechanical engineering, machining and engineering activities that occupy more than 200 people at Middlesbrough and Hartlepool.

Having diversified into the nuclear sector and established a specialist stainless steel fabrication facility, SBV expects its highest ever turnover, more than £12m, for 2012. Directors David Geary and Samantha Condren, who acquired the business in 2008, are getting additional working capital now of £400,000 through NEL Fund Managers, via the Finance For Business North East Growth Fund.

>> QUOTE OF THE QUARTER

With over half the UK population visiting our shopping centres each year, we have the scale to seize the opportunities provided by the changes in the retail marketplace David Fischel, chief executive, on the decision to change Capital Shopping Centres’ name to Intu and invest £25m in digital infrastructure

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AS I SEE IT

WINTER 13

CAN WE MAKE IT? YES, WE CAN It shouldn’t surprise us that the UK in general and the North East in particular are raising the pace in manufacturing once more. Our achievements are not always as obvious – that’s all, says Dan Burrows We’re proud to be British during big national events such as the Olympics or Diamond Jubilee of 2012. The rest of the time it’s a different story. Like a tax inspector or coldcalling salesperson, we as a country are rarely happy to stand tall and talk about how good we are at what we do. As for UK manufacturing, it’s even less likely you’ll hear shouting from the rooftops.

Perhaps because there’s not much to shout about? Manufacturing output in the UK has recently fallen; that’s so.

Difficulty looms for high value engineering and specialist manufacturing businesses as they struggle to replace retiring staff from a small talent pool; that’s a fact also.

Look around you, too. I wager you’ll struggle to find Made in Britain displayed on products around you. Living in the North East, I’m surrounded by those who’ve seen manufacturing dying; whether it’s the shipyards or Alcan in Lynemouth, we’re aware of closures and job losses.

Yet I also know so many people, in the North East and beyond, who work in manufacturing and - not including the 5,000 who build Nissan cars just up the road from me - are making all sorts of things. Foodstuffs, for example: maybe that’s not the classic British

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

heavy manufacturing of the past, with noisy machines and operators in overalls, but we’re still making things on a large scale. I know, too, people who make other things: performance monitoring solutions for diesel engines, fuel-saving accessories, caravans, even boats.

When I leave the office tonight I won’t use any UK-made products – a German car, a Chinese-made

fashionable clothes so many want to wear, or the newest gadgets we all love to own.

But things we all want, need or can’t do without are still made possible by those vital people still employed in what are, according to official statistics, industries now growing, however slowly. Not, then, the end of Made in Britain, as doomsayers would have us believe.

The British desire to tinker in sheds means we will always be experts in changing lives, and bridging that final gap when others have long since given up and gone home smartphone designed in California, Italian plates, French-made glasses, a Japanese television and even a mattress made in Denmark. Yet my life wouldn’t be the same without British manufacturing.

Obvious though it may not be, we ARE still making things. Maybe not the things we’re constantly touching, the

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Under the bonnet of my favourite motorsport I find expert British manufacturers head a global marketplace of unusual, innovative, and highly specialised products. Our expertise in niche manufacturing and specialism in high-accuracy engineering has British firms dominating Formula One and many other top-flight motorsport series on

four and two wheels.

Every British based F1 team supports a wider group of expert manufacturers making cutting edge products designed to give critical tenth of a second advantages over rivals; with the majority of cars both designed and built in the UK, there are more than 40,000 employees within the UK motorsport industry, generating annual revenues estimated to exceed £7bn. While we may no longer have home-grown volume British car manufacturers, the technology we rely on daily - from tyres keeping us safe on the road and crash structures which protect us, to engine technology, “drive by wire” control systems, emissions reduction and even hybrid technology - has all been delivered, thanks in no small part, to developments within the industry of motorsport.

Jetting away on holiday this year, only 110 years since the Wright Brothers’ first powered flight in a manned aircraft, travellers from the North East will cover millions of miles across our skies. Few will consider that another UK manufacturing success is responsible for their safe delivery.

A manufacturer in Derby for more than 100 years and builder of more than 13,000 jet engines currently in service, Rolls-Royce proves that UK manufacturers can be

globally successful.

Its cutting edge technology powers hundreds of thousands of flights a year. Rolls-Royce is rightly acknowledged as being at the forefront of the global aero-engine industry.

Every day too, billions of us rely on another technology resulting from British endeavours. An Englishman, Tim Berners-Lee is credited with the “invention” of the worldwide web. That may not qualify as manufacturing in itself, but despite the backbone of the internet being built on hardware assembled in the Far East, UK electronics manufacturing is among the most highly regarded globally. Parts designed and made here are crucial enablers to technology we use every day.

Engineering and manufacturing talent in the UK, responsible for so many inventions which change our world, is still alive and well. Gone may be the days of steam hammers, furnaces and heavy machinery. But the British desire to tinker in sheds means we will always be experts in changing lives, and bridging that final gap when others have long since given up and gone home.

Manufacturing isn’t dead. We just need to begin to believe it. n Dan Burrows is senior business consultant with Waterston’s Ltd, the Durham business and IT consultancy.

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BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

ENTREPRENEUR

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in association with

Growing is a Vertu In just six years Vertu Motors has become the UK’s seventh biggest in its business, with a 3% share of the new car market. It operates from 76 UK locations with 93 sales outlets and 16 franchises.

With three more purchases in rapid succession, the Gateshead group most recently strengthened its position in Yorkshire and broke into Cumbria. Brian Nicholls asks chief executive Robert Forrester: where to from here?

BN: Vertu Motors has already entered the pantheon of outstanding home grown businesses in the North East, alongside the like of Greggs, Sage and Bellway...

RF: I wouldn’t call us outstanding yet. We’ve got the makings.

Can the formula for your fast success apply to other businesses?

It’s the same as for slow success. Have a team of very good people, a clear vision of where you want to go, a strong set of values about how you want to conduct your business, and work hard. There’s no rocket science.

Motor manufacturing and retailing was greatly helped during very difficult times by the Government’s scrappage scheme.

Do companies like yours still feel the benefit, or is the going tougher again?

We undoubtedly benefited from scrappage.

The new car market rose substantially. People also sometimes bought a new car instead of a used one. It helped both manufacturing and retail. After scrappage came off, the industry went through a lull. It was quite tough – 2011, I don’t think, was the industry’s best year.

However 2012 was better and I think 2013 will be much better. The UK economy is showing robustness most people didn’t think

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

it would show. We forget we’re the world’s sixth largest economy. The over-all European economy is in a desperate position.

Manufacturers with car plants in the European Union have to make cars – they can’t close plants easily – so they must find somewhere to sell them, and the best place to sell them in Europe is the UK. The UK consumer feels nowhere near the uncertainty, distress and despair being felt on mainland Europe.

How do you view the imminent entry to market of electric cars?

Ask me again in ’20-21. It’ll be a very slow process, I think. I think they’ll be niche products. I could be wrong. We do sell them now. But I think they’re expensive to date. In fairness, a new Renault coming out is about £14,000 rather than £24,000. The Zoe might make a difference. I think there’ll be a number

of early adopters liking the idea of having an electric car. They’re good to drive. I used a Vauxhall Ampera as my main car over the summer. It was great. With the Ampera you have the 100 mile or so restriction on distance per recharge but you also have 400 miles of fuel in the back. So you never run out. I think that car has something about it. There are some great electric cars but they’re not a mass proposition. I think what will slow their adoption is the technological development of the internal combustion engine, which is now going at an absolute pace – largely, in fairness, driven by requirements on manufacturers to reduce CO2 emissions in their products. The one litre eco-boost engine Ford developed is undoubtedly the best engine ever. They’re putting that one litre engine into Ford Focus and Ford Mondeo. It drives like a 1.6 and >>

I’ve been lucky in coming across people who’ve taught me a lot. And I still have people around me who guide me.

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ENTREPRENEUR

BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

ENTREPRENEUR

but has the fuel consumption of a one litre.

Faced with that, the economics of making the electric vehicle work with or without subsidies becomes more precarious. My wife likes the idea but never really used the electric car.

There’s as much research going into the internal combustion engine, which will be the majority propulsion mechanism for at least 10 or 15 years. There are far more electric charging points in Newcastle by a factor of 10 than there are electric vehicles. Somebody got carried away there, in my opinion. That was an uneconomic decision by somebody who wasn’t paying for it.

Vertu’s empire stretches from Dunfermline to Exeter. Where are you not yet represented, and what might your priority expansion targets be?

I don’t think there are any areas we’re not in but would like to be. We’re in the major areas of population. I’d have said that’s best. Sheep haven’t learnt to drive yet.

What activity in business gives you greatest pleasure – going over accounts?

I keep out of finance as much as I can. The people side gives me most pleasure. This business doesn’t function without great

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people. Seeing people develop and get better, and who, given a fresh challenge, beat it.

You’ve a great business then, haven’t you?

We’re not near where we want to be yet on that. But we’re making great strides. Bringing people from outside can be great. But they bring a different culture. It takes a while to get them into your culture.

Could standards of British management be higher?

They’re a heck of a lot higher than before.

Gone are the days of four different restaurants for different levels of employee, with chauffeur-driven Jaguars sat outside, and a view that in management everyone else has to serve you. It’s recognised far more that it’s the

people in the business who make the difference, not just management.

You consider each customer complaint personally. Does this contribute to maximum efficiency?

[He shows a list of current complaints from all operations on his laptop screen]. I’ve got 53 outstanding complaints reported in this group with £1.3bn turnover. Many of these are for me to check at the weekend. Hopefully they’re already all resolved. I know 13 are, and await my review. It’s something we take very seriously. We don’t get a lot of complaints.

There’s probably a month’s worth there. We’re getting better at resolving them, and tracing why they arise in the first place. [He shows an e-mail just received from a customer profusely thankful for how his complaint was handled and assuring he’ll remain loyal]. You may get some complaints around product but the majority centres on management. That means refocusing the particular management on customer service. If they can’t refocus themselves they tend to become exmanagement. We also tend to put our own people into the management when we take over a company. I’m a great fan of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People.

What’s the most notable change in buying trends?

Customers are going for smaller, fuel efficient cars. The sub-£6,000 used car market has become very strong. That’s recession driven.

They’re very interested in how much fuel they’ll have to use. The greater fuel efficiency in new cars makes them more affordable because less will be spent on fuel. They use the internet, mobile devices, iPads. Shopping online at John Lewis they get excellent service within 24 hours. They expect that from car dealers. Also, someone told me once a >>

There are some great electric cars but they’re not a mass proposition. I think what will slow their adoption is the technological development of the internal combustion engine, which is now going at an absolute pace

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ENTREPRENEUR great Chinese proverb – “man who cannot smile should never open shop.” One of the first things I do entering a dealership is ask myself: “Are they smiling, or do they look like they’re waiting to go home?”

Some growing companies hesitate to enlist on the AIM. Does Vertu find it a satisfactory door to private investment?

How else could a team like ours with no money create a business in late 2006 and now have 3,700 employees, £1.3bn turnover and hardly any debt? That’s the benefit of living in a capitalist society, and living in the UK. We’re massively fortunate to live less than three hours away from the world’s financial capital.

If you hadn’t launched into this business what might you have been doing instead?

[The one question he has to ponder over]. I’d have found a job. Whether in the North East or not, I’m not sure. I think probably not in the North East, and my family don’t want to move from the North East.

Might Vertu eventually rise to top or second largest car retailer in the UK? We’re not really bothered about size. Scale is important in motor retail because you can invest in systems and specialists, and have important relationships with manufacturers.

Being best rather than biggest is what’s important. We have scale. If we bought no more businesses for two years we’d still have lots to do getting our performance up to maximum profit and share price growth.

We look to that.

Do you envisage an ideal size eventually in sales or outlets?

Our present turnover, I think, shows our scale of growth. People find landmarks interesting but it’s, really, have you a good business with the right people, are you making a good return for shareholders? We could make plenty of turnover yet not a lot of money.

People don’t realise that in our business for every £100 of sales we make profit of about 80p. We’ve a 0.8% return ourselves. That’s about industry average. There’s lots of scope to improve because we’ve bought a lot of businesses yet to perform at a level we want.

We think we can improve them substantially.

That’s our proposition for shareholders.

You’ve been quoted as saying you’d never sell the business. Why?

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As chief executive of a plc I don’t think I’ll ever be accurately quoted as saying that. I’ve a responsibility, with the board, to shareholders.

So selling is technically possible. I think shareholders’ best interests lie now in generating profit streams and share price growth. Personally, I enjoy the business and

Robert Forrester In person Birthplace: Blackburn. Moved with his family to Shropshire when young.

Education: Oxford University. MA, ACA. Qualified as a chartered accountant with Arthur Andersen. Later finance director of Brookhouse property investment group in the North West. Director of Reg Vardy plc (2001-2006) - finance director from 2001, managing director from 2005.

On the Economic Affairs Committee of the Confederation of British Industry for more than eight years now.

Winner of the Dale Carnegie Training Leadership Award – only the third UK recipient in five years. Winner also of industry awards as Outstanding Achiever and Personality of the Year.

He and his wife Helen, a doctor, have three children – Emily, nine, Annabel, eight, and Charlie, four – and live in Gosforth.

Age: 43.

my job immensely. To stop, there’d have to be something special for the shareholders.

What are the essential considerations that precede an acquisition?

The potential. What’s its location? What are

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the property arrangements (ours is a property based business)? Size of market? What franchise does it have? And what scope for improving management if necessary.

We do a financial model on how we see the next three years for that business.

You pay immense tribute to Sir Peter Vardy, for whom you were managing director at Vardy Group. What did he do for you?

I knew nothing about the car industry before I worked very closely with Peter for six years.

Peter was clearly an exceptional motor retailer, if not the best then certainly one of the best the UK has developed.

Working closely with him to understand how his mind works, and how the business works, is something you’d pay for. I was lucky someone paid me as I did it.

How does Vertu spot sound takeover prospects?

People ring and say: “I’ve got this – what do you think?” Or their accountants ring. Or they speak to the manufacturer who rings.

Have you had to close or curtail some operations after an acquisition?

It can happen. In North Tyneside and Newcastle, for example, Honda’s market wasn’t big enough to sustain two dealerships.

Everyone including Honda recognised that.

It made sense to consolidate into one.

[The North Tyneside one recently closed].

Sometimes locations change. You must constantly look at your portfolio. But we tend to open more than we close!

What do you attribute your personal success to?

I’ve been lucky in coming across people who’ve taught me a lot. And I still have people around me who guide me.

Perhaps the only question about your ability to spot a winner lies in your unfailing support for Burnley football club. Would you ever consider a reassessment there?

Not at all. We’ve won the League since Newcastle United won it.

I’ve had immense pleasure supporting Burnley.

There’s no fun watching a team that wins every week. We’ve played in the Premier League and my dad didn’t enjoy it. We got stuffed every week. n

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25/01/2013 11:55:41

COMMERCIAL PROPERTY

WINTER 13

Tailoring for tallest in the land, office business eases back, leisure lift for Darlington, ice cream owners come in from the cold, further investment at Rockliffe, and parks’ prospects rise Farrey says: “Over the past year we have seen a trend for office refurbishments in central locations where landlords have recognised the need to upgrade office space in order to secure new tenants. The office market is very competitive. So vacant space needs to be presented at its best to stand apart from competition. We have assisted a number of clients similarly.”

BNP Paribas Real Estate and Storeys Edward Symmons agreed a 10 year lease with Foster Wheeler Energy, which will occupy the floors by mid-year.

>> National centre plan

Further refurbishment is under way for Middlesbrough’s tallest building

>> More tailoring for borough’s tallest building The tallest building in Middlesbrough, the 17 storey Centre North East, is undergoing further refurbishment.

Silverstone Building Consultancy has been appointed management co-ordinator for construction design on the latest phase of work there – total refurbishment of the two top floors.

Since the building fronting Albert Road and Corporation Road was acquired in 2010, work has been carried out on a number of floors. Richard Farrey, director at Silverstone, says the latest two floors are being stripped out and refurbished to suit the incoming tenant, Foster Wheeler Energy. The building offers open plan offices around an inner core, allowing flexible use of space.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

An international centre for low carbon vehicle development is being established in Sunderland - with Gateshead College at the wheel. It has bought the 2,000sq m Barmston Court facility, once home to Nissan’s design centre, and it stands beside the new Turbine Business Park. The college will be building on the success of its neighbouring Skills Academy for Sustainable Manufacturing and Innovation (SASMI), which opened last year.

>> Hotel closes The Grade II listed Embleton Hall at Longframlington near Alnwick is to close as a hotel and instead become the private home of a couple from Tynemouth, who are both accountants and paid the asking price of £875,000 in a sale.

Trevor Thorne, a county councillor formerly employed by the Bank of England, opened the 1730 building as a hotel with his wife Judy in 1986. It won an award as best small hotel in Northumberland in 1993.

>> Office business eases back The office sector has seen the lowest level of take-up in a quarter for two years in Newcastle city centre with just five deals over the three month, fourth quarter, period at an

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average of only 2,500 sq ft. Total city centre take-up for the year at 154,177sq ft was a 20% reduction on 2011 though out-of-town letting activity at 578,087 sq ft was marginally higher than 2011. The research is based on combined feedback from leading office agents namely BNP Paribas Real Estate, DTZ, Gavin Black & Partners, GVA, Jones Lang LaSalle, Knight Frank, Lambert Smith Hampton, Naylors Chartered Surveyors, Sanderson Weatherall and Storeys Edward Symmons.

Chris Pearson, offices partner at Gavin Black & Partners, says figures for city centre take-up are clearly low “but taking everything into account – the recession, occupier uncertainty, city centre under supply and out of town over supply - it wasn’t surprising. “The low average size of office lettings in the city centre continues the trend for smaller lettings driven by activity across the board from small and medium sized businesses that can make local decisions. There is clearly economic activity in the size-band of up to around 5,000sq ft, which is encouraging.”

Aidan Baker, offices director at BNP Paribas Real Estate, says it’s a good time to seek office space. “For occupiers there is a good spread of incentives ranging from significant rent free periods to lower rents to shorter, more flexible, leases and so on. This is especially noticeable in demand for quality refurbished space to serviced office accommodation.

“However the city centre has seen a recent letting at a headline of £21.50 psf so while rents are under pressure the lack of supply of new, Grade A, space is acting as a balancing effect – with a shortage of Grade A supply meaning headline rents are relatively stable and incentives are likely to decrease as further space is acquired,” he adds.

“The city centre development pipeline is almost without product bar Silverlink’s start on site at its Stephenson Quarter scheme that will bring forward an initial 35,000sq ft of grade A space. That’s the only start on site in 2013 in Newcastle city centre as regards to new space.

While there have been just five city centre

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deals in the last quarter of 2012 with just over 13,000sq ft let, there is room for confidence that the trend for smaller lettings will continue and that correctly priced space will let to local businesses or national businesses seeking good space at competitive overall occupational costs.” Major lettings during last year included one to Amec at Lingfield Point, Darlington, and Duco’s 12,000sq ft letting at Cobalt 33.

Demand has been mostly indigenous but for the 11,354sq ft letting to DAC Beachcroft, the international law firm, at Wellbar Central in Newcastle. DAC Beachcroft, which employs more than 2,200 staff globally, has taken the top floor of Wellbar Central beside St James’s Park for its North East office.

COMMERCIAL PROPERTY

>> Retail parade opens

>> £20m community hub

A retail parade is now open on Quorum Business Park, with Tesco Express and Greggs among retailers signed up. Development was carried out by Northumberland Estates, with Esh Group the main contractor.

Work is expected to start within three months on a £20m leisure and community centre at Ashington.

It will be situated where Asda supermarket previously stood in Lintonville Terrace.

Facilities will include a swimpool, sports hall, gym, spa, studio space, a public library, a contact and advice point, as well as a registrar’s office, a cafe and meeting space.

>> Land grabs award

>> Leisure lift for Darlington By this time next year Darlington should have a new £30m leisure complex which is anchored by a nine screen multiplex cinema.

It will also have an 80 bedroom hotel there, plus restaurants, bars and shops. Developer Terrace Hill has signed an agreement with Darlington Borough Council to redevelop a 1.9 acre former bus station at Feethams in the heart of the town.

A planning application for the 140,000sq ft development was being submitted early in the New Year, with completion expected

by December 2014.

Negotiations have been under way with VUE Entertainment for the cinema, and with Whitbread for the 80 bedroom hotel and family restaurant. Strong interest about the remaining space has been expressed by a number of national, as well as independent restaurant/leisure operators, says Philip Leech, chief executive of Terrace Hill.

>> Blaydon boost Home Bargains and Iceland are among the big names committed to occupying the new Precinct shopping centre to serve Blaydon. Operator Rockspring Property says supermarket group Morrisons took up a 20 year lease too - on 70,000sq ft that includes a petrol filling station.

Paul Connor and Sheila Leyden, of Archers ice cream parlour in Yarm, with their planning consultant Rod Hepplewhite, of Prism Planning

>> In from the cold An ice cream parlour has been allowed in from the cold. Brother and sister Paul Connor and Sheila Leyden opened Archers parlour in May after taking a lease on empty premises in Yarm High Street. Connor invested £185,000 in refitting it and kept in contact with Stockton Council about his plans and believed he was doing right. But a letter later told him he did not have planning permission.

Planning consultant Rod Hepplewhite, of Prism Planning in Darlington, pointed out that the premises had long been vacant, that it was the only ice cream parlour in Yarm, and that it did not compete with main retail businesses on the street. Almost 2,500 people and Yarm Chamber of Trade backed him. Permission has now been granted.

Land Securities, which owns The Bridges shopping centre at Sunderland, has been named Landlord of the Year at the annual Property Managers’ Awards. The awards recognise and reward landlords that have demonstrated the best practice and the best schemes in the UK. Ever since the early ‘90s Land Securities has been a key stakeholder in Sunderland. During this time The Bridges has seen several big changes including a recent £15m Primark expansion to Walworth Way mall.

In the past 12 months, The Bridges has seen many leading high street brands open, including Superdry, The Entertainer and Krispy Kreme. The latter opened last November and further cements Land Securities commitment to improving the centre’s catering offer.

Gerald Jennings, portfolio director of the North at Land Securities, says: “We are over the moon to receive this award. It recognises everyone who has supported our centres and helped shaped them into today’s success.”

>> Brighter shopping Hartlepool’s Middleton Grange Shopping Centre is getting £1m worth of new energy efficient lighting. All internal ceilings are being replaced to give a brighter interior.

ONLINE: For breaking commercial property news and other business stories and insight from the North East visit: www.bq-magazine.co.uk/north-east

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BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

COMMERCIAL PROPERTY Rockliffe Hotel: Further investment

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The closure of the smelter was a blow to 515 workers. But German energy giant RWE has bought the 420MW coal-fired plant there and a decision is expected soon on whether to convert the plant to biomass. It is hoped 120 jobs might be safeguarded that way. Other employees have been taken on by nearby manufacturers, and some are reportedly moving to the Gulf to stay in smelting.

>> Celebratory move >> Hotel invests more The five star Rockliffe Hall Hotel at Darlington, which only opened in 2009, has received £200,000 of investment to start 2013 with. It is to renovate the Old Hall to increase the capacity of its flagship restaurant, Kenny Atkinson at The Orangery. Around 20 jobs will be created in coming months, adding to the 40-strong team already in place at the Old Hall.

The hotel’s original transformation of the early 19thC building from an abandoned hospice to its present purpose cost £65m.

TGA Consulting Engineers on its 50th anniversary has relocated within Durham from Abbeywood Business Park to the Rivergreen Centre in Durham. The firm, which employs 26 engineering staff, is currently tied up on design projects at Durham Cathedral, Durham University Business School and the Hitachi Rail Plant in Newton Aycliffe.

It recently finished work on the £26m Institute of Transplantation development at the Freeman Hospital site in Newcastle.

>> After smelting...

Manufacturer Aartoft is the first new tenant onto the Lynemouth site where Rio Tinto ended aluminium smelting operations recently. The company, a maker of concrete bathroom pods for use in assembling large buildings such as hotels and student accommodation, is taking about 18,000sq ft of space that was previously the smelter’s garage facility. The business, which normally employs 25, is relocating from Cramlington where it has been since 2003. The move will provide the additional space to give it the option of doubling the size of the workforce when the economy recovers. Managing director Niels Sandahl says the firm will now have the space that would be needed to double the size of the workforce, calling it “an outstanding location”. The cranes available there have proved a big attraction.

Prior to its departure Rio Tinto has been running a programme to bring new jobs into South East Northumberland.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

Opportunity beckons: The Washington site where 130 jobs will be created

>> Parks’ prospects rise A shortage of good product is predicted as lettings have picked up on North East trade parks. Knight Frank, acting jointly with DTZ and Naylors on several deals, has seen exceptional demand activity in sizes around 7,500 sq ft.

On Tenth Avenue Trade Park, Team Valley, Gateshead, acting for UK Land Estates, lettings have included a 5,941sq ft unit to the Original Sofa Co, a 3,587sq ft unit to Topps Tiles and a further 2,700 sq ft unit to Greggs Bakeries.

North of the Tyne, a 7,696sq ft and a 2,600sq ft unit are under offer at UK Land Estates’

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Tyne Tunnel Trade Park to quality national grade suppliers.

Mark Proudlock, Knight Frank’s associate, industrial agency, suggests: “This spurt of activity is very encouraging - hopefully a sign of improved confidence among suppliers to the trade.”

Knight Frank has been instructed to market a 6,000sq ft unit on the Stadium Trade Park, Felling bypass - a prominent location already home to Hilti and Howden Joinery.

C & C Group, a business and IT services organisation, has taken 1,784sq ft within Morston Assets’ new concept in business centres introduced last year to the North East through a £2.5m investment in the former BT call centre now branded Yours Business Networks, and which is now home to 18 companies.

Knight Frank’s Patrick Matheson, who is advising Morston Assets, on its Metro Riverside Park at Gateshead, says it continues to attract occupiers due to its flexibility and high specification. “Enquiries are active in the region and we are finding a good level of interest below 5,000sq ft. And in fact Kuehne & Nagel, a world lender in logistics, has taken 2,578sq ft also in Northumbria House.

Morston Assets, based at Holt in Norfolk, was founded in 1991 by Tom Harrison and Scots entrepreneur Sir Tom Farmer, founder of Kwik-Fit. It has a portfolio value of £166m, with £27.1m turnover and a pre-tax profit of £3m currently.

At Washington a major production facility has been sold for the asking price of £3.33m on behalf of owners and former occupiers TRW Automotive. Jones Lang LaSalle’s Newcastle office found a private investor who agreed on paying what amounts to a net initial yield of 9.5%. Shortly before, the same agency successfully let the unit on a 10 year lease to Nissan supplier SNOP, having carried out £320,000 of enabling works for TRW to secure the letting. The 150,000sq ft warehouse sits on a 12 acre site on Rainhill Road half a mile from Nissan’s car production plant. SNOP is currently investing £6m refitting the factory where panels will be assembled for the frame of Nissan’s Qashqais. The company is expanding its UK operations to meet growing demand. About 130 jobs will arise there.

WINTER 13

COMMERCIAL PROPERTY

>> Borrowing options grow The global recession and failure of the funding markets has left property developers and local authorities looking for new ways to fund key regeneration, development and infrastructure projects.

But local authorities can now borrow under the prudential borrowing framework to provide funding for infrastructure and development works. The private sector has also started to establish infrastructure banks and fund projects by debt or equity funding.

Steve Cole, senior surveyor (national markets, investment) with GVA writes: The private sector is also looking to invest in waste and energy projects.

Pension funds are looking for low risk capital projects with long term repayment profiles (25 years) that are inflation linked.

The private sector is therefore interested in

funding infrastructure, development and regeneration that offers the right risk profile and funding structure.

Funding sources that have been attracting more attention recently include the Joint European Support for Sustainable Investment in City Areas (JESSICA).

This uses ERDF/European Investment Bank funding, matched public sector funding and potentially private sector funds to offer debt, and some equity, funding.

>> Forward move Gavin Black & Partners is bringing forward over 8,000sq ft of refurbished office space in New England House, Ridley Place, Newcastle, for La Salle Investment Management.

Steve Cole

Regional coverage from offices in Durham and Sunderland

For your pleasure: The bar at the new Hood Street Club

>> Like father, like son Hood Street Club is leisure-operator Fluid Group’s latest opening in a prime city centre location, a stone’s throw from Grey’s Monument in Newcastle.

Mark Dobbin, partner in real estate at Sintons LLP law firm, which acted for Fluid Group, says: “It’s an example of a leading leisure operator in the region creating a distinctive and new quality venue for a night out in comfortable surroundings.”

Ollie Vaulkard of Fluid Group said Hood Street Club is in the building that housed one of his father’s first leisure venues in Newcastle in the late 1970s. “People of a certain age now will remember it as Grobs or 42nd Street. I hope some of my dad’s good fortune will remain in the building and Hood Street Club will be a successful format for today’s market,” he added.

Serving the North East property sector since 1985 Chartered Surveyors, Commercial Property Consultants Durham

0191 375 5777 Sunderland

0191 565 8844

www.lofthouseandpartners.co.uk

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BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

INTERVIEW

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Companies eager to be in the running – on roads as well as in offices and shopfloors - can expect an exhilarating April 28. Feeding our sustained euphoric post-Olympics sentiments further, Steve “the Jarrow arrow” Cram is lining up four athletic events to suit everyone, whether they can run 42K or even only 3K. Steve - world champion, Olympic silver medallist, former records holder, chief BBC athletics commentator and events organiser – will that day make Sunderland’s streets and picturesque seafront the setting for the city’s Festival of Running. The event programme has been excitingly devised to enable 6,000 club runners, charity fundraisers and enthusiastic individuals to test their fitness.

Besides an established Marathon of the North and a Sunderland City 10K, he’s also organising a new Half Marathon of the North.

Within the full marathon there is also an

photo by Mark Shearman.

opportunity - in collaboration with BQ magazine - for teams of six to run the distance in relay, the longest stretch being 10K and the shortest 3K. Steve says: “We’re doing all we can to appeal as widely as possible. The new BQ Team Relay at the Marathon of the North illustrates that. It’s something we hope will attract teams from businesses and charities especially. With shorter legs of the relay measuring just 3K and 5K, there’s an achievable target even for runners with little or no experience.

“Charity running on the day will be made as easy as possible too. Besides a lower than average cost of entry and the marathon relay option, there’s an individual run distance to suit every fundraiser. They can support our official charity, Cancer Research UK, or another good regional or national cause.”

He observes: “There’s a big health agenda >>

His target: Steve Cram the “Jarrow Arrow”, seen here at the peak of his running career, now makes running a joy for others regardless of their ability

Steve Cram tells Brian Nicholls of the planning behind a festival of running, and suggests why businesses might consider backing their workers there

Fun on the run BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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INTERVIEW

BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

INTERVIEW

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after the Olympics. It’s all very well some saying they want to get healthy. They need enjoyable ways to do this. So we’re trying to

provide for that here.

His company DS Media and Events is organising the day for Sunderland City

500 make it all possible Around 500 people will work on the day to make the runs a success – the majority around the course and 150 at the Stadium of Light.

Organising staff are few most of the year. Steve plans courses and logistics, looking from a runner’s point of view. And on the day he’ll watch for youngsters with star potential. Dave Roberts, a lifelong friend who runs D and S Events with Steve, was a co-founder of the Great North Run with Brendan Foster. He handles sponsorship and other business and administration duties. On the weekend itself there will be a central crew of about 20.

D and S Events is also behind the Salomon Kielder Marathon. Steve says theirs is a business like any other. “If you take care of details your business will flourish and you won’t lose customers.

Organisationally, that’s what we try to do. We’re keenly priced too. But you have to put a business hat on.”

On the day there will be about 300 volunteers doing anything from manning water stations to massage. A medical crew of about 40 is provided by North East Ambulance, the Red Cross and mountain rescuers who are also used to taking part in such events. A full medical centre will be complemented by two field medical tents.

Sunderland Marriott Hotel is providing a feed station, and charities can run water stations. The Stadium of Light and its facilities have been hired for the convenience of entrants from a “very helpful” Sunderland football club, many of whose stewards will also assist. On a stage outside the stadium, medals and other presentations will be made.

Steve describes the volunteers as “a real mix”. Many come from sports clubs knowledgeable about such events. They will include members of Sunderland Strollers and three or four other local athletic clubs who aren’t running. Such helpers are invaluable, Steve says, and often marshal cross-country and other events at weekends.

Other volunteers will come from various organisations. Steve explains: “Volunteering has become especially popular since the Olympics and with the Commonwealth Games coming up in Glasgow a volunteering programme has been started there already.

“The Tony Blair Foundation brings quite a few. Then there are Sea Cadets and members of other local organisations. Sunderland and Northumbria Universities provide students who are growing their knowledge and work experience in events organising and massage as part of their courses. We’re trying to get people involved from other parts of the region and the UK.” Steve says that while Sunderland’s runs have been growing yearly there’s no bid to approach the size of the Great North Run or the London Marathon. “The GNR is a massive international event now, and not everyone manages to get an entry. So it’s great so many other events are around.

In my day the idea of millions of people running like this would have sounded silly. But it’s great.

As these events take root they become a fixture people understand and expect. Even if you’re not running you may want to come and watch.”

An advantage of scale here too is that some roads on the runs will be only half closed. He points out: “Unless you’re as big as the London Marathon or the Great North Run many events like this cause upset with their traffic disruptions. We try to cause least disruption.”

The overall aim, hopefully with local business support, is to show people wherever they come from that Sunderland is a good place in which to live, work and do businesses.

“The more things going on, the sharper will be the city’s profile, and the bigger the opportunities for the city.”

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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Council, and while a team of six for the marathon relay might simply be pub mates, college friends, or workmates on their own initiative, Steve hopes businesses will also sponsor or part sponsor any half dozen from the firms’ own ranks who enter.

He finds corporate events popular abroad – in Japan, for example. Singapore’s many legal and financial companies, too, get intensively competitive at this. Steve says: “Prizes there are coveted – not cash prizes. They don’t care about that. A trophy’s what they want.”

How does a corporate relay team work?

“Some folk in the workplace may organise it among themselves. Other times there’s a push within a company. If the company wants to find little ways to incentivise people, is on a drive about health for staff or just wants to show a healthy workforce, it will go further.

“Matched funding, for example. Participants

Some folk in the workplace may organise it among themselves. Other times there’s a push within a company.

If the company wants to find little ways to incentivise people, is on a drive about health for staff or just wants to show a healthy workforce, it will go further

WINTER 13

raise some money for their chosen charity and their employer matches it. Or perhaps the company already supports a charity and will encourage their employees to run for that.”

Those who simply want to run for selffulfilment will also line up. Steve explains: “In these marathons, half marathons and 10K events you have races within races. You can have thousands on the starting line, all with their own target. Some may be trying to beat a personal best, others just hoping to complete the distance, and the rest trying to beat someone else. Tackling 3K you can probably even walk if you want to, though team mates may encourage otherwise!

“Everyone can line up with some goal in mind.

When I ran in my early days you used to get shouted at as you ran around the streets because you were odd. Now, just while we’ve been chatting here on Sunderland seafront,

many people have run past.”

This is the third year of Sunderland’s celebration for runners. The 10K was held first. The marathon was added last year, this year the Half Marathon of the North and the team relay within the marathon make their debut. “The half marathon bridges a gap,” Steve explains. “For some, 10k is not enough of a challenge, whereas the full marathon is too much. We’re growing the festival by making it as accessible to as many as possible.”

Excitement is promised because marathon and half marathon runners start together from the Stadium of Light and finish there. They cover 13 miles on the south side of the River Wear.

On return to the stadium the half marathon pack turn in to finish. The marathon carries on for 13 miles more on the river’s north side.

Meanwhile, 30 minutes after the start, the

INTERVIEW

10K participants will have set off.

The 10k winner should reach the finish about the same time as the leader of the half marathon, and there will be two separate finish funnels. The full marathon is then expected to come in just as stragglers of the 10K finish.

Courses will suit participants with disablilities too. Last year there were wheelchair entrants and partly sighted runners. Indeed the 2012 Paralympic Games gold medallist Richard Whitehead (the “British Blade Runner”) will launch the Half Marathon of the North. Steve got to know Richard through running in the London Marathon.

At the London Olympics Richard stormed to victory in the T42 200m final, his home straight burst bringing a world record. Steve says: “He’s really a marathon runner. Now he’s planning a John O’Groats and Land’s >>

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BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

INTERVIEW

WINTER 13

If you take care of details your business will flourish and you won’t lose customers.

Organisationally, that’s what we try to do. We’re keenly priced too. But you have to put a business hat on

Good to see, good to try: The Sunderland runs promise spectacular scenery

How to enter the events Entries for the Marathon of the North and the Half Marathon of the North are being accepted at www.marathonofthenorth.com. Entry to the marathon is £34 (club runners) and £36 (non-club runners). Entry to the half marathon is £30 (club runners) and £32 (non club runners).

Entries are also being accepted for next year’s Sunderland City 10K (£20 for club runners, £22 non- club) at www.sunderlandcity10k.com. DS Media and Events, a company set up in 2010 by Dave Roberts and Steve Cram, will oversee the organisation of all three events.

BQ teaM ReLay@MaRathOn OF the nORth 6 RUnneRS, 6 diStanCeS, 1 day Ever wanted to run a marathon with your friends or colleagues?

End run, working his Sunderland visit into it.”

Richard says he loves the inclusive nature of the long distance runs. Sunderland City Council says its aim is to build on its present portfolio of public events. Steve says: “I’m really pleased the council shares my team’s ambition for a major running festival in the city, and one we intend to make a major event on the region’s sporting calendar. If April 28 proves the success expected, the festival could be even bigger next year – in competitors and in spectators.”

He suggests that while the half marathon will suit club runners in the north of England or southern Scotland who want a spring road race to tackle, there will be appeal also for fun runners hungry for an achievable challenge for the first half of next year.

Councillor John Kelly, who leads on Sunderland City Council’s public health, wellness and culture responsibilities, predicts: “Sunday April 28 promises great sport and a great showcase for our city.” n

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

Well now you can at the Sunderland Festival of Running on 28 April 2013 The distances: the team will run the total distance of the marathon which is 26.2miles.

The approximate distance of each leg is outlined below.

LEG

DISTANCE

Leg one

10k

Leg two

8k

Leg three

3k

Leg four

10k

Leg five

5k

Leg six

6.2k

The team: a team of six runners 16 years or over.

The format: each runner must run one leg and hand over to their next team member who will run the next leg, this continues until the 6 legs (26.2 miles) have been completed.

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Members of the team running or finishing at legs 2, 3, 5 & 6 will be transported to and from the start back to the Stadium of Light.

Recognition: The winning team will receive the BQ Team Relay Trophy, which they will be presented with at an Awards Dinner.

The goodies: a great experience, finisher medal, technical t-shirt and goody bag.

The costs: the BQ Team Relay costs £135 a team (£22.50 a person). The price includes the shuttle bus.

The entry process 1. Round up six friends or colleagues 2. Choose a name for your Team 3. Enter via the online registration form on www.marathonofthenorth.co.uk/team relay registration 4. Decide who is running which leg of the relay 5. Get training

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SUCCESS STORY

WINTER 13

North East know-how is behind major advances in technologies worth billions to business.

And North East expertise is helping firms of different activities to speed the launch of their new products.

Nigel Perry tells Brian Nicholls how

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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WINTER 13

SUCCESS STORY

AT LAST A LAUNCH PAD Say “catapult” to Nigel Perry and the eyes of a normally phlegmatic individual light up as he launches into rhapsodies of praise, like a young lad with his first sling. Perry’s treasured catapult however, far from lethal, is for businesses to strike gold with.

Sitting in one of the serene offices at labyrinthine Wilton Centre, and sharing French cakes with visitors and colleagues in celebration of his 56th birthday, this boss of CPI, the Centre for Process Innovation, admits: “I’m absolutely over the moon about Catapult Centres, something we’ve been working towards at CPI for five years.”

We’d better explain: the centre at Redcar, an architectural legacy of ICI and with more than 200 high calibre scientists and engineers inside, is the heartbeat for intensive commercialising of technical research in the North East. Rich in office space, laboratories and test areas, it occupies a 75 acre laked and landscaped park, a homogeneous home also to 60 multinationals and other companies. And: Cpi there helps companies prove and scale-up processes leading to new products, thereby creating more sustainable, efficient and economic industries of tomorrow.

Catapults, of which CPI has become part, are now Britain’s means and hopes of driving key sectors and businesses forward faster in the fight for market gain.

Both the present and the previous government have had a hand in bringing Catapults on.

Perry himself addressed parliamentary select

committees on the need to open the public purse to them. He says: “In most developed economies you’ll find in the gap between academia and industry, and between publicly funded research and private profit, there are what are known as intermediate centres for collaboration, or technology and innovation centres.”

Ours was previously about the West’s only economy without. We did have them once before. They were research institutes.

In a fit of Thatcher era madness they were disbanded. Now these Catapults, a publicprivate partnership, are driven by an industry

Board. So once more we have technology and innovation centres to bolster UK ability to bring on new products and services in priority areas, driving economic growth. Championed by the like of Sir James Dyson (of bagless vacuum cleaner fame), Catapults are getting £200m over four years to accelerate our high value manufacturing, cell therapy, offshore renewable energy, satellite applications, connected digital economy, future cities, and smart power grids.

The CPI is the Government’s process partner in the manufacturing Catapult, applying its low cost, low carbon manufacturing approach to

We can speed the rate industry moves at. We can give its money a leverage effect. We can lower variable and fixed costs. Bring in a much wider range of skills than one company might hold on its books that indicates its need by putting money up and explaining breakthroughs it would like to achieve. When suggestions are taken up, the public sector assists and derisks what might otherwise seem an unattractive proposition for one company.

That, then, is the strength of the Catapults network, formed by the Technology Strategy

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high growth markets that could benefit from CPI’s expertise, new technologies and processes. Perry’s confident the UK can rebuild and enhance its manufacturing supply chain and truly drive its economy.

CPI fulfils four critical roles. It’s working with, and helping, indigenous companies to grow, develop and bring on their next generation >>

BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

SUCCESS STORY Look at Nissan, Rolls-Royce, Jaguar Land Rover. Companies in the process sector too. World class operations in what’s called our high cost economy. I’m convinced others can succeed of products and processes which, trends indicate, have to be indeed innovative.

Secondly, it woos inward investment. Perry explains: “If you’ve an international company keen to invest, it examines many factors including support for research and development, for developing products and employing highly skilled people. Go to Germany and other enlightened places. The support is clear.

“Now Catapults will level the playing field for inward investment. We’ll compete country to country on something different.”

Thirdly, some new technologies and innovations require deep, advanced levels of skills and knowledge. CPI and Catapults are delivering. The fourth role is under-recognised but essential in Perry’s view, particularly in the process sector - a bulwark of the North East economy though most of its companies are international.

He points out: “Most financial investment decisions in these cases are taken outside the UK. The Catapult enables us to work with local regional managers and develop the best arguments they can put forward to their own internal competitive processes in bids for inward investment.”

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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A double boost there, then, for inward investment. The CPI was founded to stimulate innovation. Says Perry: “We do it in the process industry and by the process industry.

If you pour it, settle it, filter it, pump it, dry it, distil it – it’s process industry. So that covers

oil, gas, petrochemicals, fast moving consumer goods, fine and speciality chemicals, food, pharmaceuticals, steel - anything using a process approach.”

Manufacturing is normally envisaged as assembling. Isn’t an aircraft or car wholly >>

Tomorrow’s wonders today Technologies that CPI is deeply into include plastic electronics, also known as organic, printable and flexible electronics – all a white hot tip to revolutionise the electronics industry.

Already through this, LG has launched the first Oled TV with a viewing angle of almost 180° and a mere sliver of a screen. It is lighter in weight and cheaper to produce. The Samsung Galaxy phone, uses the technology. Sony has a concept video that shows a folding maplike television screen, easily portable, to read whatever it’s being pointed at.

Less dramatic progressions widely evident include point of sale displays in supermarkets, such as talking posters, and the power gauge on the side of some Duracell batteries. “Other similar technologies may be on the market in the not too distant future,” Nigel Perry ventures. The razor in one of the James Bond movies even had an Oled display.

Basically, electronic devices are being made now from carbon-based, organic materials and parts using printing processes, not traditional and often costlier silicon-based, inorganic materials. Very large areas of electronic devices can be produced like this - photovoltaic cells, lighting systems, and display panels going into large TV screens, for example.

CPI’s equipment at Netpark in Sedgefield enables prototype parts and devices to be built. It’s putting together and testing, for example, very fast organic transistors and light systems – not room lights but niche application lights, whether for concept cars or medical applications. CPI works with the like of Tata Steel on photovoltaic systems, and with other companies on domestic lighting, whereby you can make an entire ceiling of light.

PragmatIC Printing Ltd, the Cambridge creator of pop-up cards with Oleds emulating a firework display, recently announced a start of commercial productions at CPI’s national printable electronics centre. It has greeting card projects shared with Hallmark-subsidiary Tigerprint and security labels with the global leading integrated printer of commercial banknotes, De La Rue. Progress in these technologies offers the UK possibilities of a 10-15% share of a multi-billion pound global market that could place it prominently into international supply chains, and niche manufacturing at home. Through relevant academic centres – Newcastle, Durham, Cambridge, Imperial, Southampton, Manchester, Swansea and Bangor – the UK has knowledge and expertise that CPI and its main electronics centre, with all the other participants nationwide, can commercialise to earn up to £10bn or more.

Our main rivals in all this will be Japan, Germany, USA, the Netherlands, Taiwan, Korea and Singapore. Recently publicised graphene, like printable electronics, has great potential and the North East has a key role in its development.

CPI’s working on this at Wilton with Durham Graphene Science, a spinout from Durham University. CPI has built and engineered it, and here could come the world’s first large-volume commercial graphene unit. “The research institute concerned is at Manchester, but Durham Graphene Science has trusted us to develop the kit for them. It has been built and is now being commissioned,” Perry says with just a hint of pride.

Graphene can be a transparent conductor allowing interaction by touch and promising a new generation of touchscreens. iPads, iPods, and indeed any computer. Perry cautions however: “Indications here are that Korea and Japan are leading the patents discovery process.”

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SUCCESS STORY

Nigel Perry in person A chartered engineer who’s spent 30 years in the global process Industry, two-thirds of that time with ICI, in engineering, operations, technology management, also project and business management, and working in Asia, Europe and the US. After ICI, he joined PwC Consulting, focusing on the European high technology sector. He’s been director and chief executive of CPI since 2003. Perry is a Fellow and past technical vice-president of the Institution of Chemical Engineers, and a Fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology, and of the Royal Academy of Engineering.

He has an MA in engineering science from Oxford University. He is an Alumnus of the Accelerated Development Programme at London Business School, and the Entrepreneurship Development Programme at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is also a visiting professor at Newcastle University. Under Perry, CPI in a decade has worked with more than 2,000 companies regionally, nationally and internationally, and has successfully completed more than 100 projects exceeding £235m in value. With assets of £60m-plus, it has also helped establish more than 50 European projects valued at €118m.

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manufactured? But paint, polyester and polyurethane used on them also has to be produced. So the CPI can be relevant to manufacturing of many kinds. “They can ask us, what if we could do this? We can then work through the Catapult and trace suppliers, set up projects and collaborative programmes and develop the proposal.”

The CPI itself demonstrates why public money should be committed. Initially public funded, CPI in nine years has delivered more than 1,000% return on that public investment – “one of the best returns the public purse has got,” Perry suggests.

“To the private sector we’ve delivered over quarter of a billion pounds of projects. 60% of which have been funded by industry or collaborative research, paid for partly by public and partly by private money. That’s covered more than 300 very discreet projects and programmes. Industry keeps coming back, too.

So the private sector is voting by investing in us, and the public sector is starting to see the value of engagement. That’s what Catapults are about.”

Think of the burgeoning German economy; 70% is based on mechanical engineering, even before you think of electrical engineering or the sciences. Most of that activity is underpinned by Fraunhofers, the German research centres. Globally successful Nokia, supported by Finland’s version VTT, came from a country the North East’s size in population.

Perry says: “It’s not about commercialising university science. It’s about grabbing industrial challenge and pulling appropriate university science and knowledge towards it.

“We can speed the rate industry moves at. We can give its money a leverage effect. We can lower variable and fixed costs. Bring in a much wider range of skills than one company might hold on its books. We leverage skills, knowledge, science, and money. And for the public sector we’re generating economic outputs that create jobs and inward investment, and ultimately secure tax revenues.”

Catapults already show about 60% growth a year. Perry says: “During recession, firms have cut back on investment and research. But companies are also starting to outsource and work with us. So we are seeing this white

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knuckle ride.” The opportunity is open to minnows as well as dolphins.

Many SMEs are prepared to pick up a tab.

Even smaller SMEs are spending seven figure sums to get acceleration. Perry explains: “There are involvements in collaborative programmes with public grants, and if we think an idea is particularly brilliant we might even work for nothing, seeking instead an equity position in the company. We’re very flexible. If a proposal’s taken up, and a company pays for the project, the intellectual property remains theirs.

“We might suggest an arrangement whereby we get a share, or ask if we can develop alternatives and parallels that would not compete with them.

“We’ll act as referee for funding due diligence, trying to put firms into contact with further funders if necessary. We offer incubator facilities too. We like working with small companies. Their principals make decisions fast. We like working with big companies too.

But reaching an agreed position there takes a little longer, and is a little more difficult.”

Yet a Catapult, with its overview of different sectors, can often see a company’s problems have been tackled elsewhere already and they didn’t realise. Perry declines to be drawn on the myopia that had our research institutes abolished, but agrees industry was disadvantaged. “We know we can do better,” he declares. “Look at Nissan, Rolls-Royce, Jaguar Land Rover. Companies in the process sector too. World class operations in what’s called our high cost economy. I’m convinced others can succeed.

“The USA is high cost but turns out world class products. Ground we may have left fallow for more than 20 years, we may recover remarkably quickly.”

What will it require? Classic management: Vision, constancy of purpose, consistent allocation of resources and firmness in the belief you’ll get there. Perry adds: “One of the challenges will also be to manage people’s expectations.”

Encouragingly, though, Nigel Perry believes, as someone who has worked widely in the world, that despite Fraunhofers’ 60 year lead, a good shot from the Catapults might now require only 10 years to catch up. n

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COMPANY PROFILE

Adding value to investments Launched in 2010, and having just passed the half way mark, the North East Finance for Business Fund is continuing to provide much needed growth finance for ambitious businesses across the region.

The £125 million portfolio, which is overseen by North East Finance (NEF), has so far invested £64 million into almost 500 businesses. Structured to provide a continuum of finance for early stage businesses, it has successfully invested in a broad range of sectors including waste, healthcare, manufacturing, engineering and green businesses But the programme is about far more than just money. The advice and expertise the six fund managers bring to the table is proving equally important in helping investees to develop their businesses. By offering access to enviable network of business angels, venture capitalists, experienced entrepreneurs and mentors, the programme is helping to create sustainable businesses, jobs and drive long-term growth in the region.

“Sometimes it’s not just about the access to finance,” says Alasdair Greig, director of Newcastlebased Northstar Ventures, which manages the Proof of Concept and Accelerator Funds.

He adds: “Investees securing finance from our Accelerator Fund usually have an experienced management team in place, but often there are gaps in the team. So we help them with recruiting to fill these roles, making introductions from our networks and advising on the skills required to scale the business rapidly.”

One such company is Cramlington-based Palringo, which was set-up in 2006 by Martin Rosinski and offers an instant messaging platform which allows users to set up groups, share photos and have voice chats and discussions wherever they are.

Alasdair adds: “At Palringo we brought in Tim Rea who is now CEO and has over 20 years’ telecoms experience. Tim has overseen the business grow from just one employee to a successful mobile instant messaging business handling over 40 billion messages each month.”

Joanne Pratt, fund manager at FW Capital, which runs the Growth Plus Fund, agrees. She explains:

Alasdair Greig, director of Northstar Ventures

Investees securing finance from our Accelerator Fund usually have an experienced management team in place “Our investment is just the beginning. As a long-term backer, committed to building the value of the SMEs we invest in, we know they’re more likely to succeed by combining our backing with a structured funding package.

“It’s the combination of our capital and expertise that helps the business to deliver its growth plans. We work with management teams to help to shape strategic direction either on specific projects, or by introducing trusted advisers, non-executive directors and sector experts from our extensive network to provide an independent perspective. We also encourage the sharing of best practice. We find that management teams appreciate an independent perspective.”

Mentoring is an important part of the package for growing companies as Simon Johnson, senior investment executive and NEL Fund Managers, explains. He comments: “The principle of

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mentoring is largely looked upon favourably by investee companies, many of which are small enough not to have ‘complete’ management teams and therefore welcome the help on offer.

“There are many hard and soft benefits to SMEs and our experience is that it’s not just the start up stage but any stage in the business cycle that can benefit from the principle of mentoring. The value of it as a service has proved to increase turnover and employment which is clearly an area close to our all-round investment goals aside from the cash itself.”

For those investees needing to secure follow-on funding to further commercialise their ideas, the relationships of the fund managers with other venture capitalists and investors has helped to secure additional investment and larger funding rounds. Rivers Capital, which manages the Angel Fund, even provides bespoke coaching for those seeking fresh funding.

Natalia Blagburn, investment executive, said: “We coach founders preparing them for new funding rounds. We have helped companies secure places to pitch in front of angel syndicates of private investors both inside and outside the region and mentored them through their pitch presentations.

As a result a number of our investee companies secured investment offers both from private investors and syndicates of angels.”

With an additional £65million of private sector funding secured, over 600 jobs created and a further 1,200 secured already, this extra support is certainly playing dividends.

For more information, companies should visit the North East Finance website on http://www.northeastfinance.org.

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ENTREPRENEUR

There’s an art to landlording

How do you put new life profitably into old buildings? Make them look good and give them a bit of culture, Peter Broome tells Brian Nicholls People ask Peter Broome why someone brought up in the artists’ paradise, Ambleside, prefers spending his working life scouring industrial areas of the North.

“It’s a nice part of the world,” he admits of the Lake District. “But in business and jobs not a lot goes on there apart from the tourism.

You’ve really got to do that kind of thing for a living. I always saw myself staying this side.”

This side, is the North East region.

Broome, Manchester born, got to know the North East from 1978, as a Northumbria University undergraduate.

Today he pairs commercial tenants, including growing ranks of would-be entrepreneurs, with some fine old buildings.

Start-up space for as little as £60 a week

figures among the offer as his company restores and adapts buildings that otherwise might shamefully languish, decay and come down. Broome’s flagship property, Cargo Fleet Offices at Redcar on Teesside, besides housing his business partnership Python Properties, also provides 35,000sq ft of other business accommodation – three floors of remarkable Edwardian baroque architecture that might all have been lost but for Broome and his business partner Martin Johnson.

Cargo Fleet, the redbrick and cream stone former home of Teesside’s iron and steel industry, stands out heroically on Middlesbrough Road, its pediments and colonnaded entrance like a colonial parliament or regimental barracks, especially with the

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Union Flags waving from the roof.

Built in 1916 Cargo Fleet Iron Company, and home to British Steel on Teesside until the mid-1980s, it was - horror of horrors - doomed to demolition and replacement by modern business units before Python intervened. This firm takes its name from Monty Python, the surreal TV comedy that both Broome and Johnson Idle-ised – sorry, idolised – but there’s nothing facetious in this business.

Broome explains: “We specialise in commercial, mainly office, developments with a slant towards historic landmark buildings people love.”

Cargo Fleet Offices is a £1.5m transformation into a business centre with sturdy modern office space of 100sq ft upwards inside, >>

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ENTREPRENEUR five minutes’ drive from Middlesbrough’s centre. It’s also an attractive public venue featuring an airy and spacious bistro and art gallery where receptions, exhibitions and meetings can be held too.

He reports how Python writhed to get the building. “When I was a chartered surveyor,” he explains, “we were involved in acquisition work for Redcar’s town centre development.

We met here regularly in the late 1990s.”

Redcar and Cleveland (previously Langbaurgh) Council had in fact operated there prior to Eston. “It was pretty ropey then,” Broome recalls. “The council, knowing they were going to move, didn’t spend money on it.”

Where a car park once stood, a welcoming sward of grass now fronts the pillared entrance. Broome chuckles... “We put down the first grass ever here. The landscaper said it would be so contaminated the grass would never take. It’s growing like mad. He’s told me since: ‘I stand corrected’.”

On the council’s departure, the building was sold (PFI) to construction giant Mowlem.

Absorbed later by Carillion, Mowlem sold the building to Jiffy Developments, a London firm whose “vision” was to demolish it and build industrial units.

Python was just then battling to save another building, North Riding Infirmary on the edge of Middlesbrough. It hoped to save the facade and, despite its cash offer in excess, the building was sold to Aldi. Supermarkets triumph again.

“We saw Cargo Fleet on the bounce,” Broome recalls. Johnson’s father had worked there once. Now it was vandalised and arson attacked. But too good to let go. “It wasn’t on the market. Our lawyers identified the owners who’d messed with it for years.

“In 2007 we bought it with difficulty. We had bank finance in place but entered a nightmare applying for a European grant. The hoops you have to go through! Ultimately the funding body told us our application had failed because the scheme was, in their words, too small. It fell below the grant budget.

“One North East stepped in to fund it under single regeneration budget. To their due, they replaced the grant. But when we finally got the grant in place the bank turned round and said: ‘Oh, we’re pulling the funding.’

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Tenants know if there’s a problem they can ring the owners and not have to go through some managing agent who may be in Edinburgh representing an owner who lives in London. This often happens with a lot of properties “I rang the manager. He said: ‘I’ve talked to the valuer. He said values have fallen. Now it won’t stack up.’ I knew the valuer and rang him. He said: ‘They’ve never rung me.’

So then we had to refinance. Very, very difficult. The problem really lay with the bank, events proved. So it was probably a blessing in disguise.

“We eventually refinanced with Santander but it became touch and go. Things had gone on so long the grant was about to be pulled. One North East thought the money would have to be redirected to another scheme. But we worked very much as a team with Santander and got it sorted, got on site and did it.

Funding? That’s a history all of its own!”

The building has now been occupied for about 18 months with about a third let - the ground floor. “We’ve three prospective tenants and had a second viewing this morning,” Broome tells. A spacious foyer behind the magnificent entrance exudes character and taste. Red carpeting blends with panelled walls of oakwood giving no hint a mere fraction is original. Magnificent chandeliers that once hung in a Glasgow bookshop now put Cargo House in new light. The large reception island where manager Dawn Chapman greets visitors is imposing.

The original, now golden-gated, cage lift will shortly be encased in glass to give scenic rides.

Upper floors are stripped, ready for fit-out.

Affection for the project is spreading.

The magnificent glass cased models of old Teesside ships setting off the foyer have been lent by Redcar and Cleveland leisure department. Metalwork students at Middlesbrough College are meanwhile

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creating copies of balustrades that were previously stolen. Anyone proud of Teesside might be moved to volunteer their bit.

Python is reviving buildings in Middlesbrough too. such as the art deco former department store the Co-operative had on Linthorpe Road.

And, like Cargo Fleet Offices, it has also won an award. Royal Middlehaven House beside the railway station and Boho One digital city building, is another. Victoria House on Albert Road is a third. The latter, a modern building, has always been offices and was bought six years ago when consulting engineers Scott Wilson vacated after 20 years.

Now it provides £60 a week space. Broome says: “Start-ups soon grow and take another room, which is great. That’s where demand is. Our suite size was probably about 2,500 to 3,000sq ft four years ago. Now it’s almost all under 1,000sq ft. But small businesses usually want to be in or close to town.”

Python also entwines Bolton, Warrington and Bradford, and altogether runs four art galleries in tandem. “Our location policy is anywhere within two hours’ drive of here. We tend to avoid big commercial centres like Leeds and Manchester where property is too expensive.

But Bradford, Bolton and Warrington work well. We’d like to do a scheme in Newcastle.

It’s just finding the right opportunity...”

In central Bolton, St George’s House is an ornate former Co-op haberdashery store of 10,000sq ft subsequently used as NHS offices.

“We bought that a year ago and even in the current climate we’re attracting tenants.

If it carries on filling up we’ll probably look for something else later this year. When we bought Cargo Fleet we’d actually bought >>

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ENTREPRENEUR

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ENTREPRENEUR five buildings at once. That was too much.

There’s quality of life to consider. We were running ourselves ragged.”

Broome, married and living at Nunthorpe, likes time to kickbox and indulge his classic cars – Rolls-Royce, Austin Healey and a Jaguar – all of modest value, he stresses.

The 10 storey property at Bradford has been in the portfolio for five years. One of the 1960s office buildings Python is developing, it has always been fully let. Bank Quay House at Warrington is fully let too.

“We find North West more affluent than the North East,” Broome observes.

“Warrington soon filled, all private sector tenants. There seem to be lots more private businesses there, and doing well. That’s the North East’s challenge.”

Connectivity with the M6 and M62 contributes. But also, he adds: “Our scheme there is in the town centre. Most other Warrington developments have been out of town or otherwise aren’t very good. We’d like to have done another heritage building there but silly money was asked. You don’t want to be spending huge amounts buying buildings.

That’s money tied up. Cargo Fleet, even at one third full just now, pays for itself.”

Not all Python’s ambitions are realised, though.

They wanted to convert Billingham House, the old ICI headquarters, superbly situated yet derelict beside the A19, into prime office development. “Sadly, that has now been demolished. The council lost patience with the owner, Busy Bee.

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We put down the first grass ever here.

The landscaper said it would be so contaminated the grass would never take. It’s growing like mad. He’s told me since: ‘I stand corrected’ “The council knows us, knows our track record. But we couldn’t convince them we were in the driving seat. We didn’t spend lots of money on that but we did spend a lot of time. You can’t win them all.”

Another disappointment followed a bid of £750,000 to rectify 30 years’ neglect at Thornaby Town Hall. The Grade II listed building was owned by Stockton Borough Council. But Thornaby Town Council, in two small rooms there, refused to vacate for work to be done. Delays forestalled any completion before funding criteria ended. The Stockton authority agreed eventually to sell the 122-year-old building to the Thornaby body instead, for around £100,000.

Undeterred, Broome says many other fine but unloved buildings await attention on Teesside.

The snag now for many developers is scarcity of funding.

Broome, who chairs North East Chamber of Commerce in Tees Valley and serves on the regional council, explains: “Finding bank finance for speculative development

A mix to suit When Python Properties was formed in 1997 both Peter Broome and Martin Johnson kept on their day jobs. “For five years I worked eight days a week,” Broome laughs.

Johnson, educated at Acklam High School in Middlesbrough and Warsash Maritime Academy at Southampton, had retired a cruise-ship captain, moved back to the North East from Hampshire and, on selling his New Forest cottage, invested in property.

Broome for more than 20 years was with agents Storeys:ssp, a director at Teesside and Leeds.

He also had a personal portfolio of student properties. When Johnson met him as a client a mutual liking for older architecture led to their joint venture.

More than 500 student rentals make up about half of Python’s business today, commercial estate the rest. Because Python owns and maintains its own office buildings it’s able also to provide a tenant mix that suits existing occupants.

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is impossible. We’ve funded the Bolton project from our own resources.

“At a chamber meeting the other night, every business person commenting round the table on state of trade, was saying exasperatedly: ‘The banks...’ I know people have been whingeing for a long time, but it seemed then to affect only certain sectors. Now it’s across all sectors.”

That empty parts of commercial buildings don’t incur charges helps, though, and Python also runs on a lean team.

“We manage all buildings ourselves, and it works well. Tenants know if there’s a problem they can ring the owners and not have to go through some managing agent who may be in Edinburgh representing an owner who lives in London.

“This often happens with a lot of properties.”

The art galleries, besides enabling local artists to display and sell, give the office buildings they’re in public presence. Galleries opened at Royal Middlehaven House, Warrington, Cargo Fleet then Bolton.

Broome says: “When we were developing the 1960s nondescript building in Warrington, we could never get local press interested.

We introduced the gallery when lettings temporarily stalled. We were struggling, having let one and a half floors out of five.

“The gallery idea had worked elsewhere for us so we took a rent surrender from one of four existing tenants to create gallery space.

Our agents called us mad. But within eight months we had more tenants. The gallery changed the entire ambience. The gallery was opened by the mayor with 150 people there.

More people followed. A bit of culture works wonders. We like doing it.”

A sentiment the good folk of Ambleside would probably share... n

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Give us youth to reward The issue: How do we improve skills and training within the engineering sector to allow us to prosper and perform as a world class region, and what are the key issues for consideration to ensure future growth and development?

What they agreed • Image of engineering and manufacturing must be redressed • Seek co-operation of parents, teachers and school governors in making detail of the career advantages for young people fully and accurately known • Target children aged between seven and 10 • Stress benefits of apprenticeship and graduate entry vis-a-vis a debt-ridden degree that might not guarantee a job • Form one to one ties between firms and schools • Seek training reforms through City Deal • Consider workers near retirement as trainers or, on retirement, as stand-ins for apprentices away on training • Make it easier for SMEs to take on apprentices • Circulate among neighbouring industrial firms the job applications surplus to needs

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• Colleges to offer assistance to firms on recruitment approaches • Win union co-operation on upskilling • State difficulties and recommendations for consideration in North East Economic Review directly or through a body on NELEP website • Act now The debate: Geoff Ford said an issue even before skills shortages is image. If young people can’t be attracted to manufacturing, the skills issue won’t even arise. Andrew Hodgson said that, given the Government’s present stress on manufacturing, now was the time to tackle the image problem.

Ralph Saelzer: (on young people) In Sunderland at last something’s moving.

We recently had a business-schools event, and ideas were brought on to develop cooperation. Subsequent meetings have been held. Fingers crossed, something may develop.

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Taking part Nick Batey, Technical Director, Altec Engineering Andy Collier, Membership & External Affairs, EEF Ralph Saelzer, Managing Director, Liebherr Alison Smith, Relationship Director, Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets Ross Smith, Director of Policy, NECC Alistair Moore, Head of Operations Recruitment, Nigel Wright Recruitment Lynn Tomkins, UK Operations Director, SEMTA Andrew Hodgson, Chief Executive Officer, Soil Machine Dynamics Cllr Paul Watson, Leader, Sunderland City Council Vince Taylor, Head of Strategy & Performance, Sunderland City Council David Land, Operations & Engineering Director, Tallent GMF Anne Isherwood, Principal, Sunderland College Gary Cumiskey, Head of Construction, Sunderland College Colin Millington, Investment Unit Manager, Northumbrian Water Lindsay Middleton, National Manager for the North, SEMTA Geoff Ford, Chairman of Ford Aerospace and Ford Component Manufacturing, was a participant unable to attend but submitted a discussion paper.

In the chair: Caroline Theobald, BQ Live Venue: Stadium of Light, Sunderland BQ is highly regarded as a leading independent commentator on business issues, many of which have a bearing on the current and future success of the region’s business economy. BQ Live is a series of informative debates designed to further contribute to the success and prosperity of our regional economy through the debate, discussion and feedback of a range of key business topics and issues.

Gary Cumiskey: You also have to educate parents. If they say it’s important to get qualifications it will have an effect. A few years back, children were threatened if they didn’t get qualifications they’d end up in a factory.

David Land: It may still happen that factory work is considered a dead-end job. But for the majority of our people, if you look around the car park you see modern new cars – no longer rust boxes. The majority of the workers have holidays abroad. Many have their own houses,

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or at least decent standards of living. A job in a factory, on the shopfloor or in management, is good income now. We’ve tried hard with schools to get that across. But we’re struggling. I think it does lie with parents.

Often they don’t give the positives. They give negatives.

Alistair Moore: At what age are children impressionable? Think of the Olympics. Seven to 10-year-olds seemed particularly impressed.

That may be the age group particularly impressionable. They get excited then, talk about things and ask questions.

Andy Collier: The EEF has just championed a programme called Primary Engineer. This focuses on seven to nine-year-olds - a bit like getting them involved in STEM subjects [a programme to interest young people in science, technology, engineering and mathematics]. In Primary Engineer they make things and someone comes in to tell them in simple terms what engineering’s like. They do all sorts of activities, very simple, classroom based and getting across the pleasure of making things, also mechanics and electrics. A bit of inter-school competition too.

Moore: I think, as a parent, joint discussion between child and parent is important. If nutrition and food comes up I get invited into school with my child and there’ll be talk about what is and isn’t healthy. I’ve never been invited into a school to talk about an engineering subject like the latest robotic stuff. I think that’s a pity. Do school governors get involved?

Tomkins: The Government’s growth strategies are being built on manufacturing. If we don’t act now we’ll have lost the opportunity. [In other parts of the country, she said, school responses to invitations to big plants was patchy. Some companies had gone to the governors “really banging the drum”. A subsequent successful round brought a lot out]. A skills show brought in 120,000 school children. They were all in the manufacturing tent where you could build a Euro-fighter or a JCB digger. Employers had put a lot of time and effort in. It is starting to turn. If we consider the £9,000 fees to attend university against an apprenticeship starting at £16,000 pay and finishing at £32,000 there are lots of positive messages going out.

DEBATE

Somewhere among 11 to 16-year-olds we have to have an influence in helping someone to shape the curriculum – not necessarily getting involved though, because we’d mess it up!

Ross Smith: We’ve made concerted efforts to help our members get into schools and there were opportunities. I asked one of our policy advisers to identify these so we could map them and guide our members. There are millions of schemes and initiatives. All very well meaning and I’m sure they all do some good. But organisationally it’s a bit of mess. If you want to get into it no-one knows where to start. A cottage industry has developed. If we could pull that together, creating a simpler interface between businesses and schools,

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similar to what has started in Sunderland, we could with the improved co-ordination get so much more.

Land: We try to get pupils in for a day, then tomorrow something else takes over. We promote “a job for life”. I don’t think anyone believes this. At Jaguar Land Rover they’re struggling to find 800 people. During four assessment days when up to nine people were expected in respect of well paid engineering related jobs, maybe only one or two turned up sometimes. So it’s not just about schools. >>

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DEBATE

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It’s about attitudes.

Saelzer: In Germany if you’re an engineer your status is high.

[Tomkins cited the German practice of introducing someone as Herr --------, Engineer, whereas here a sign on a toilet door may say “this is out of order. An engineer has been called.” Vince Taylor felt gains could be made taking business into schools, and in teachers seeing in their personal development.

Otherwise, he said, they might spread their

Sunderland’s City Deal. Part of the deal is to have a manufacturing skills academy in the city centre. Certain people thought we could live off financial services. But there must be something to buy and sell in the middle.

Throughout the years from the Big Bang to the Big Recession Sunderland continued living off manufacturing, as did the North East. We all want a bit of commerce too, but manufacturing is in the North East’s DNA. That’s why we’re the only region with a

You have to educate parents. If they say it’s important to get qualifications it will have an effect. Children were once threatened if they didn’t get qualifications they’d end up in a factory own perceptions of manufacturing – “better than nothing, but not as good as people from engineering and manufacturing in the schools doing it, or getting kids out into the factories to see for themselves.”]

Saelzer: Things like the Ambassador Programmes.

[One participant felt it had to be done within the school curriculum. It couldn’t be done as something external].

Paul Watson: Schools have specialisms now - sports colleges, business academies - so you need to pick the right schools to go to. We’re doing that now as part of

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positive balance of payments.

Land: There are up to 140 pupils in Year 11 of the school we go into. Never more than 15 apply for an apprenticeship. The school has tried to stop A or B group students from applying. We try to explain there’s a multitude of jobs on offer including designers and engineers who need degrees, and for which we offer fully sponsored degrees.

The school thinks we’re doing a good job but I’m disappointed.

[Saelzer said his company goes into a school purely trying to whet appetites, and not to seek apprentices directly].

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Hodgson: The subsea industry tried a standard procedure but it didn’t work. It’s better individual businesses form unique relationships. But we do have success with events called Energising the Future. We get about 5,000 schoolchildren into something whetting the appetite. People there are interacting. What worked best but is difficult to replicate was when we set up a classroom for 14 to 16-year-olds in the technical area of a factory. They saw directly what was going on and the latest equipment at work. That had impact. At the end of the year we brought parents and children to a buffet when the factory was still at work. The kids could tell their parents what they’d been doing. We saw a change - from parents not proud of children going down the apprentice route to being very proud. That’s very high maintenance activity not easily replicated. But high contact and involvement with parents works.

Anne Isherwood: I sometimes think colleges as providers focus on qualification as the output. If we could focus much more on career opportunities, would we succeed more in engaging young people?

Tomkins: If you make systemic changes where schools dissuade youngsters against engineering and manufacturing, highlighting bursaries or reduced fees to do science, technology, engineering and mathematics some might consider it an alternative to going deeper into debt.

Land: Somewhere among 11 to 16-year-olds we need an influence in helping someone to shape the curriculum – not necessarily getting

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involved though, because we’d mess it up!

Alison Smith: A lot of parents have been unemployed. To them it’s, “get out of anything manual because we were made redundant.”

A re-education to get some respect back will come through teaching organisations.

Taylor: It may even be grandparents putting youngsters off, as used to happen down the pit.

Land: A training organisation told me of a diligent lad who’d left school but didn’t have

to be at the end of the day. We weren’t given time in the school calendar other than for pupils to come one day to our boardroom.

Saelzer: I can mirror that. Until recently we hadn’t been able even to get through the school doors.

[Subsequent speakers thought it was within schools that change had to come. Age 11 was suggested as a good approach time. Trying to reach high achievers at 16, firms find schools want them to go on to sixth form. From there

No-one asks small organisations: “Excuse me, do you know you can have this?” You must go and look.

Without tremendous tenacity you won’t get to endgame a job for months.

When he was offered an apprenticeship his mum told him to turn it down because it would restrict her benefit allowance. He turned it down.

Colin Millington: We find in schools the approach isn’t sustained. You can’t easily bring in new attitudes and there’s a stigma to engineering. Engineering needs passion.

Someone has to show that passion for others to follow.

Land: We wanted to get into a school’s year 9 but were only allowed 10 minutes at morning assembly to do a bit of a promo. All else had

they could end up four years in debt and with a degree they can’t get a job in.]

Saelzer: There are examples at this table of people who’ve worked up from shopfloor to high position.

Taylor: Engineering has to be encouraged for everyone from vocation to graduate. There aren’t many graduates in engineering even now. Engineering should have the standing it enjoys in Germany.

Land: We’ve taken on two graduates recently.

They’re used to doing things in regimented fashion. Sometimes you want to take those shackles away and say: “Just have a go.”

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Taylor: There may be opportunity through City Deal in which local government and central government come together. They’re looking at skills funding and skills performance management so that skills funding that does come to the region, instead of being just doled out, is more related to incentives.

Isherwood: I’m heartened that Sunderland Council is now ensuring there are educationists on its economic committees. Until now, I’ve seen too big a gap between education and economics.

Tomkins: We wrote to 30 top universities that do engineering. Three years ago I wouldn’t have got a reply. Last year every one pitched up at vice-chancellor level, including Cambridge. A lot of small companies wouldn’t know how to offer a job to a graduate. But if we don’t include the supply chain, growth in recruitment doesn’t come.

Hodgson: I spend a lot of time with head teachers and get to see their story. They have to find time for the curriculum and time for a lot of things dictated to them. They have to implement health and safety. When people say they can’t get into the school it’s often because time can’t be found within the curriculum.

Perhaps we have to work on that through the like of City Deal and the skills debate.

Nick Batey: To improve skills in industry we’ve got to work through apprenticeship schemes.

Make sure employers are looking to take on apprentices. There was a big spell when apprentices weren’t taken on. Because of that we’re facing a loss now.

Saelzer: You have training providers with >>

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set schemes they want to introduce. In the end that won’t meet needs. Employers have to raise their voice.

[This was suggested as another area where system change is needed since a lot of people aren’t interested in training. Attempts have been made through public policy to effect change, but many who are concerned regard it as tinkering. What change is needed to get more businesses more competent to take responsibility on this, other participants were asked?]

Land: There is a need for better training providers. From what I’ve seen over years it’s more about who’s got funding than who can offer what. Also employees must be freed to attend courses. We’ve 48 multi-skilled technicians. I couldn’t free five to go. To do that I’d need another five.

[Lindsay Middleton said it would be difficult to send a provider over for five trainees.

Land said firms wanted bespoke training, not

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bespoke packages.]

Land: We talk about an ageing workforce.

People near the end of their working lives, perhaps not as agile or as fit as before, are probably the best people to train our 16-20 year olds. We’ve also got to consider the retraining of mature people. This can come by freeing up people, and there are enough people unemployed to meet that problem.

Cumiskey: Some companies invest lots of time

and money in training only to find someone else come along and cherry pick.

Saelzer: If an apprenticeship is run properly it pays for itself. For us, about year three is breakeven point.

Taylor: If you’re a company of 10 people and one apprentice and that apprentice is taken from you it’s difficult. We have a predominance of small and medium enterprises.

Tomkins: Only 18% of employers in manufacturing were being offered apprenticeships. Numbers of apprentices have gone up massively in the last two quarters in this and other regions. As money goes to the provider, who decides what’s being given, a small business may walk away because the arrangement is too difficult. Small companies that have never taken on an apprentice – that’s our target. We’re making inroads but you have to hold hands. If money to train apprentices was with employers they’d get a lot more attention from the provider perhaps.

Isherwood: It’s suggested perhaps the employer wants a bespoke trainer. If there was scope within new funding schemes to focus on an employer’s needs, and the provider was able to use the funding in a slightly different way, rather than being hamstrung by a framework often focused through the sector skills council, would that be the sort of thing to get policy change on?

Saelzer: A framework is nice because it can be flexible. We can mould it to our needs.

Middleton: We don’t produce any framework that employers haven’t developed.

[The meeting heard that in Wales small employers who may only want one apprenticeship place can go out and buy it.

There, colleges and providers made bids and employers decided who got it. Quotes for an

A lot of parents have been unemployed.

To them it’s, “get out of anything manual because we were made redundant.” A re-education to get some respect back will come through teaching organisations

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We mustn’t forget that case centred on the benefit system. We can’t change the benefit system but highlighting cases will be helpful HND had been received ranging from £2,000 to £8,000 from colleges. They said they’d never had to do a commercial quote but simply got an allocation from government to deliver. The scheme now into its second year isn’t only about qualification. Grants can be had for upskilling. Employers had agreed what a fair grant was. Colleges now said they were developing real relationships and specialisms.

And employers were in control].

Land: No-one asks small organisations: “Excuse me, do you know you can have this?”

You must go and look. Without tremendous tenacity you won’t get to endgame.

Taylor: Wales has shared employment for apprentices. If one small employer can’t give the whole range of opportunity, then it can be shared. Both Arriva and Nissan, big brands, say they have far more apprenticeship applications than they can take on. They may get 100 applicants when they want 20. They send out 80 rejections instead of doing what they’re now thinking of doing – referring people to other companies. The reaction to one rejection may have been: “Well, I won’t do that then.”

And that’s engineering out the window.

[Smith said Caterpillar was good at linking with others in this way].

Middleton: We’re having discussions with Nissan and the supply chain. In the East Midlands around our regional council table we have Caterpillar, JCB, Toyota, Rolls-Royce. They get maybe 4,000 applications. Some may get a reject letter from all those companies. Yet one businessman working in the space industry and employing 17 people could offer a young person a massive opportunity just 500 yards from Rolls-Royce. He’d advertised 18 months and no-one responded because his was a small business and no-one knew. Now aptitude testing will go into the schools, through the colleges, taking the 4,000, identifying, core testing, and producing a list of standards.

Young people not joining big companies will be introduced to a common framework, and some of these big businesses have spare capacity in their training facilities anyway. So there’ll be training on the doorstep for a group of businesses. I think we should look at that here, where we have clusters of companies.

Collier: We’re looking at how EEF can do a collaborative programme. It’s well on our radar.

Tomkins: Nissan asked: “Why can’t we have a clearing house?” They’re committed to that.

Isherwood: The college would engage a number of others, SMEs and so on, to try to

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DEBATE

come up with a recruitment process, develop a brand to go into schools.

Middleton: We’d be pleased to look at that and other models.

[Isherwood suggested publicity material would help promote careers and was told SEMTA had made a DVD with young people saying what they get out of apprenticeships, and employers explaining their side. It was asked: Why so few women in engineering?]

Taylor: Look how other professions have changed. Medicine, now a majority of women.

Law, now in the majority among entrants.

[Maybe the shortfall reflected on perception, it was suggested. But Taylor said this had also been the case previously in other professions].

Hodgson: (citing aerospace plants mainly staffed by women because dexterity was essential) the public image of the industry is often moulded by men for men.

When the BBC considers manufacturing in the North East it continually shows an >>

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There are millions of schemes and initiatives. All very well meaning and I’m sure they all do some good. But organisationally it’s a bit of mess.

If you want to get into it no-one knows where to start image of Redcar blast furnace. I’m fifth generation steel family. I love the industry.

But if you put a blast furnace on, smoking away, that kind of imagery makes a difference.

We’ve got to demonstrate something else.

Middleton: The frustration for me is that the EEF Apprentice of the Year in the region was a girl. The top three apprentices in the country in engineering were female.

How much of that has been in the press? We let ourselves down. We don’t shout that the culture is changing.

Some cultural differences have been happening where businesses have looked at their female workforce.

Hodgson: You have to be careful it isn’t perceived as tokenism.

Smith: We want the best person for the job but would also like to widen the pool. It’s a matter of getting a greater percentage of people to realise here’s a very skilled career not as physically demanding as many females might think.

[Then the question: Could the 60-65s leaving a business be retained as stand-ins when, say, five apprentices go off training?]

Land: I’d think of them more as trainers. I went into a factory at 16.

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A guy quite mature looked after me. He took a serious responsibility for my future. Mentoring has gone.

Watson: When there was a dearth of nurses many were brought out of retirement. It worked there.

Smith: One problem is that training people have been lured back into business with big wage offers. It’s like a snake eating its own tail.

As soon as you gap-fill you perpetuate the problem.

Millington: We’ve an age profile in engineers of the 40s-50s. We have apprentices but the middle ground’s empty.

Smith: The position’s similar across a lot of industries.

[All felt a message for teachers and parents should be: Please take engineering seriously.]

Smith: A system change is needed, agreed.

We’ve got to do it now because of things being devolved to a regional and local level.

If we can put the pressure onto the decision makers we have that opportunity to get it right.

Millington: The age factor needs to be employer led.

Middleton: I think we need to share with you case studies we have from around the country, things like a graduate toolkit: What you might

want to put in a letter to a graduate, and the wages you might want to pay. Then we can look at how to follow up.

Isherwood: Could we do something like a toolkit in a box, with possibly letters for teachers, employers and parents?

Hodgson: If we don’t try to change the system the energy and the passion will evaporate.

Saelzer: And why not get school governors to do their bit?

Tomkins: We mustn’t forget that case centred on the benefit system.

We can’t change the benefit system but highlighting cases will be helpful.

[Saelzer felt that, in upskilling, trade unions which had already done a lot to encourage numeracy and literacy should also be involved].

Hodgson: I think regional actions are going to come pretty quickly. It’s our opportunity to ensure the actions are the right ones.

Land: Our big problem won’t be fixed in small bits. It has to be fixed as an entity. Wherever a lobby comes from it must be put onto an agenda and fixed.

Hodgson: The North East Economic Review is an important part of that. You can go to the North East Local Enterprise Partnership (NELEP) website and submit directly or through a body. n

Careful yet speedy response needed on skills It is clear that there is no quick fix to bridging the engineering skills gap, but equally there is a need to act quickly to address the problem. Plugging the gap will require investment in time and resource. So, how can this be achieved whilst taking appropriate action now to ensure we have the skills in our region to support its future growth?

A multi-disciplined approach to solving this problem is needed. More collaboration is required between schools, colleges, employers, the business community and local and national government, to ensure that training and development programmes achieve the right results, and most importantly can be sustained for the long term.

Colleges and other providers need to take a closer look at the needs of the local and national economies, talk to, and work closely with employers to ensure that their programmes meet specific needs so that skills can be developed in the right area. The role of colleges and employers will also be pivotal in providing progression into employment for young people.

At Sunderland College we’re currently developing approaches that will work towards delivering these improvements, through collaborative working with employers and others, we are committed to bridging the engineering skills gap in the North East.

Anne Isherwood Principal, Sunderland College

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North East

Brave new world Law firms have undergone rapid changes during Martin Soloman’s tenure at the helm of one of the region’s longest established firms.

Here he reflects on almost 30 years in the business over lunch with BQ’s Andrew Mernin

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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For Martin Soloman the perfect antidote to a working life spent indoors is climbing mountains, especially in Switzerland and France. So no chance the mere blanket of snow and travel chaos that precedes our lunch will stop him from turning up.

And so it transpires.

“The best thing about living in Gosforth is how close it is to work – that’s also the worst thing,” he tells me as we’re ushered to our table in Marco Pierre White’s latest venture in Newcastle’s Hotel Indigo.

Soloman has, for almost 30 years, been a one company man, having worked through the ranks at Newcastle law firm Hay & Kilner.

Much has changed at the business since the Welshman left his council job to seek his fortune in the private sector in the mid 1980s.

Now senior partner, he remembers fondly the days before the firm took up its vantage in the old brick of Newcastle’s Cloth Market some years ago.

He recalls the mystique of the subterranean vault and specially built security tunnel at its former home in the one-time Bank of England building on nearby Grey Street. But it’s not just the surrounds of his job that have changed over the years. “You used to hear a lot more people using the expression ‘the practice’ or ‘I practice’ rather than talking about us as a business. There was no marketing department back then either.

“Now we continually talk about our business and our business development.”

This shift in commercial awareness among law firms is perhaps most noticeable at the level of senior partner. It’s a role far more focused today on revenues and image than it was in the era when Soloman joined. “I always feel the need to spend more time on business development because you can never spend enough. I have a substantial management role but also do a lot of client work, and am still acting for clients I acted for in 1985.

“A lot of people assume that if you’re in my position there are so many things you have to do in management terms that you can’t then do client work. Just yesterday I was speaking to a client I first acted for in 1985 and I’ve done work for him in every year since. So I suppose the answer to finding a balance is that I work quite a long day. To do both client

BUSINESS LUNCH

There’s no substitute for learning on the job, but certainly young people coming into training in the profession know elements of business development and marketing are part of the job

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work and the management work means you have to put quite a lot of time in.

“If you go back to the early 1980s you would build working relationships with people, but the concept of customer relationship management (CRM) and having strategies to doing seminars and the wide range of other activities didn’t exist.

“Would an interview like this have happened in the 1980s? I suspect not.”

So does he pine for the days filled purely with client work? “Occasionally, but things change at a faster pace now and I’m a person who likes change.”

Among the numerous specialisms Soloman has picked up in his years at Hay & Kilner, is intellectual property (IP). “When I first started doing it in the mid to late 1980s there were certain types of sectors very attuned to the need to have IP. But in the last 10 years or so there has been a perceptible change – namely, that a lot of people including start-up businesses, individuals, and companies in all sectors consciously ask themselves what they should do to protect things, and whether something someone else is doing is contravening their rights.

“It has broadened out in terms of the awareness of people’s rights, and their wish and willingness to protect their IP in the first place.”

In more general terms, Soloman has witnessed a streamlining of court proceedings during his tenure. “Changes to the courts have taken place in recent years to make parties to disputes more focused on trying to find solutions rather than going through the different stages of the court process, and the inevitable trial at the end. While I would say that was still actively practiced in the early 1980s, it is more actively done so now.”

Soloman was raised in the 1970s and ‘80s “in the bottom left hand corner of Wales” – a land of “dramatic peninsula with dramatic coastline” - if somewhat limited career prospects. In Pembrokeshire, and later as a student in Kent then Liverpool, his working life began with a crash course in mundane jobs – including cheese factory worker, “highly motivated dishwasher” and scaffolder’s mate on an oil refinery.

He moved to the North East and a position >>

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in Newcastle City Council’s planning department. Today he follows avidly the current plight of his former employer as it makes a reported £100m worth of cuts and 1,300 redundancies over the next three years: “The council faces huge challenges which may impact on us all in a number of ways.”

After three years in the public sector he joined Hay & Kilner. “I guess law was something I always wanted to do.

“You do get the opportunity to make a big difference to a person’s life, hopefully in a positive way, which is very satisfying.

“You quickly become conscious you can deal

Soloman says. “Our markets when I first joined were probably residential property and conveyancing. We also did a lot of personal injury litigation.

“Then in the early to mid 1990s there was significant growth in commercial legal services.

So we now do a lot more for a wide range of partnerships in all sectors. In addition, we’ve seen significant growth in demand for private client services - not just in residential property but wealth management, wills and trusts and other related issues.”

Future plans for the firm don’t include rapid national rollouts with new offices elsewhere in

private capital expert who also chairs regionally the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners. In general, Soloman says, the movement of legal heavyweights between firms is a modern phenomenon.

“Probably until the last 10 to 15 years it was relatively rare to take people from other firms but not now.”

He recoils at the term ‘poaching’. “I’m not sure I see it as that. Perhaps it’s people feeling they’ve achieved what they can at another firm and that they could achieve more somewhere else maybe?”

Also changing in the battle to snare the best

with a wide range of situations and issues, intellectually or factually, and a wide range of personal issues. You meet and deal with a huge variety of people. We all say we’re interested in people, which we are, but it’s particularly interesting if you get to know lots of different people in lots of different situations. In generic terms I’d say that’s my career highlight.”

The law firm Soloman joined in 1984 employed around 50 people and had been largely static in terms of size for several years prior. It is now back up to its pre-recessionary size, with a 160-strong workforce, having spent the last three decades expanding its commercial capacity like most upwardly mobile law firms that lived through the 1980s and ‘90s.

“There has been a consistent but steady development of a greater degree of specialisms within law over the years,”

the UK or beyond. Rather, Soloman believes the firm is at an optimum size and made up of the right mix of expertise to continue to prosper in what are difficult economic times for the region.

“We’re big enough to have genuine experienced specialists in all the necessary areas. And we’re able, because of our size, to deliver that in a very personal and committed way. If you look at the nature of the North East market, with a lot of SMEs, owner managers and private clients, that method of delivery is what people here look for.”

While there are no plans for a mass recruitment drive, Soloman says the firm will look to add the right people should they become available at the right time. Such appointments in recent years have included the addition to the Hay & Kilner team of Richard Freeman-Wallace, the prominent commercial property lawyer, and Alison Hall, a

available talent is a weakening in the pay demands of law men and women. “Salary expectations have changed, although salary aspirations haven’t,” he says. “Lawyers are no different to everybody else, and most people have had to adjust their expectations haven’t they? The recession has resulted in the need for everybody in life to reflect and adjust their expectations. Lawyers are no different.”

Acquiring young talent, meanwhile, remains the lifeblood of any law firm looking to cement its long term future.

As talk turns to the dire situation facing today’s law school leavers, the sky outside blackens and the winter downpour begins.

Pathetic fallacy, as an A-Level study guide might say. But it’s not a completely lost cause for budding bar members.

Although Soloman admits to a notable adjustment in the profession - at a time when young people dominate the dole queue – his

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firm is not alone in maintaining its commitment to creating new positions for promising stars. In general I think it is a significant concern for the country to get lots of talented young people with the opportunity to use their talents,” he says.

“We’ve just had two trainees qualify for us and there were genuine jobs for them with a future in the firm at the end of it. My feeling for the future is that, as a firm, there will be growing opportunities for young people to go

BUSINESS LUNCH

in and make a career there.”

Demand for young talent is, however, being increasingly dwarfed by supply. For the two or three annual slots on Hay & Kilner’s graduate trainee scheme, the firm receives hundreds of applications a year, a number that’s growing.

The lucky few that do make their way onto the career ladder are leaving university with a far wider skills set than in the past. “There’s no substitute for learning on the job, but certainly young people coming into training in the

Lawyers are no different to everybody else, and most people have had to adjust their expectations haven’t they?

63

profession know elements of business development and marketing are part of the job.” No such luxury was afforded Soloman in his day. He’s had to learn the essential corporate skills along the way. With a foot in both camps – client work and business leadership – the senior partner says his days are marked by early starts and late finishes. He does, however, have time for more than a little goodwill in his life, through his role as chairman of North East-based charity The Sunshine Fund.

The charity, backed by ambassadors like Paralympian Stephen Miller and TV personalities Ant and Dec, is today in a relatively healthy position compared to many similar organisations facing an uncertain future in cash-strapped Britain. This is largely thanks to the generosity of fundraisers within the North East business community. But it wasn’t always so. >>

BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

BUSINESS LUNCH The charity was founded in 1928 by King George V when he visited Newcastle to open the Tyne Bridge. While there he donated £15 to give underprivileged children a day out to the coast. The Evening Chronicle newspaper adopted the idea of giving to children in the area. The Evening Chronicle Sunshine Fund was thus established. But by the mid-1990s, when Soloman was approached by the then editor of the newspaper to get involved in re-establishing and growing the charity, it was struggling to survive. He became chair in 2001 and it has recovered under his watch, with initiatives like this summer’s Go Bananas dress down day, and an annual Sunshine Run helping to provide specialised equipment to children with disabilities in the region. “We’ve a very committed team and I would certainly say we’re in a stronger position this year than at this time last year.” And Soloman takes great pride in its continued success. “It’s very rewarding and there’s a sense of responsibility to it. We’ve helped an enormous amount of young individuals and their families over the years. Like everything else, of course, I could give it more time.

“The issue with doing a number of different things is that you can always see the scope to do more.”

With the suggestion of early retirement instantly shot down, Soloman looks likely to continue to tread this careful balance between client, corporate and charity work for some time yet. n

There has been a consistent but steady development of a greater degree of specialisms within law over the years

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Precision in the expertise: Hotel Indigo Poached egg, says Martin Soloman, is the measure of a chef’s expertise.

On this occasion it’s done with precision – perhaps unsurprisingly given that the chef somewhere along the line has passed the test of the so-called godfather of contemporary cuisine, Marco Pierre White.

The celebrity chef’s Steakhouse Bar & Grill, sits on the ground floor in one of the region’s newest hospitality venues, Hotel Indigo, in Newcastle city centre. We’re both here for the first time and both equally impressed by our starters. Martin clearly a poached, rather than scrambled or soft-boiled, man - goes for the Lyonnaise salad “beautifully presented” and with a cured sausage carrying “a real kick to it”.

My chicken terrine makes for a hearty start to our midday winter feast but has enough colourful crunchy accompaniments to keep it light rather than filling. “I always try to order fish when I’m eating out,” Martin confesses as he picks the herb-crusted fillet hake for main course. I opt for lamb, prompting Martin to warn me it’s not Sunday, and there’s work rather than laziness to be done in the afternoon. “The fish was excellent with a nice firm consistency,” says Martin afterwards. The lamb is faultless and served with the finesse one would expect in a venue with Marco Pierre White’s name above the door. Unfortunately we had no room for dessert but emerged into the snowy world outside warmed by the glow of just the right amount of good old-fashioned locally sourced grub.

Marco Pierre White Steakhouse Bar & Grill, Hotel Indigo, 2 - 8 Fenkle Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 5XN. Visit www.mpwsteakhousenewcastle.co.uk or call 0191 300 9222.

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Business users only. Typical example: Audi A6 Saloon 2.0 TDI SE (177PS) Manual. Contract hire based on 6+ 35 profile with 10,000 miles per annum, total contract mileage 30,000 miles, excess mileage 6p per mile (plus VAT). Further charges may be payable when vehicle is returned. Indemnities may be required. Subject to status. Available to over 18s from participating North East Audi Centre’s only for vehicles ordered before 31st March 2013 (subject to availability). Offer may be varied or withdrawn at any time. Specification correct at time of publication.

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(l/100km): Urban 26.2 (10.8) - 48.7 (5.8), Extra Urban 42.8 (6.6) - 64.2 (4.4), Combined 34.4 (8.2) - 57.6 (4.9). CO2 emissions 190 - 129 g/km.

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

WINTER 13

SWAN ON WINE

TO SUNNIER TIMES

Andrew Swan, partner, head of regulation and financial crime at Short Richardson & Forth LLP, shakes off a chilly start to the year with a warming Portuguese red and a summery Italian white altano douro 2010 It was a bitterly cold January weekend, with snow falling by the hour. After a busy day at work and a difficult commute home, I sat down with my wife to enjoy a glass of Altano Douro. It is a well priced red wine from the Douro region of Portugal. We enjoyed it with a warming plate of beef ragu. The rounded flavours of the wine complemented the meal perfectly. The first taste brings a smooth warmth, which is followed by a dry, balanced texture with complex flavours of fruit and a hint of dark chocolate. The wine is medium to full-bodied and very palatable.

We had planned to go out that evening, but with the cold weather, ice and snow, we decided a night in was a much better idea.

With the fire glowing we enjoyed the rest of the wine as we chatted about our work days and weekend plans.

At only £6.99 a bottle, we decided our plans would include buying another Altano Douro for the next snowy evening in.

Cavit “Mastri Vernacoli” pinot grigio

By Sunday the weather had eased off a little, although it was still freezing cold. After a pleasant morning with our daughter Laura

and son James, we headed out for a long bracing walk along the seafront. The North Sea was fierce and the wind coming off it was fresh, to say the least. Well wrapped up, it is a wonderful time to enjoy a coastal walk. Laura and James are both grown, so we left them to finish preparing the Sunday roast, with the wine chilling in the fridge.

After a few miles stretching our legs, we enjoyed a beautiful meal of roast pork with all the trimmings.

It was complemented perfectly by the cool Pinot Grigio. My wife is more of an expert on white wine and she commented that it was one of the best Pinot Grigios she had tasted.

From the Trentino region of North East Italy, the wine is a pale lemon colour with wonderful aromas of citrus and summer fruits. We found it to be dry and lightbodied on the palate, with a beautiful lingering taste of fruit. It is crisp and refreshing, which was perfect after such a long walk. At £6.99 a bottle, we added it to the shopping list next to the Altano Douro. Two excellent wines at such a reasonable price. We would highly recommend them! n

From the Trentino region of North East Italy, the wine is a pale lemon colour with wonderful aromas of citrus and summer fruits

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The wines Andrew tasted were Altano Douro 2010, £6.99 and Cavit “Mastri Vernacoli” Pinot Grigio, £6.99, both available from Fenwick, Newcastle.

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MOTORING

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A GRAND DAY OUT Bill Lynn, director of Storeys Edward Symmons in Newcastle, never understood the hype around Maserati until BQ gave him the opportunity to put one of the Italian master’s grand tourers to the test

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I was fascinated to find out from friends with whom I confided that I was about to test drive a Maserati that it was the car of their dreams. I wondered why? From an external styling point of view, the Maserati fell short in my opinion of many of its rivals despite being designed

by Pinafarina. Having been lucky enough to have driven a number of super cars, including Aston Martin and Ferrari, and having been a long time Porsche owner, I was interested to see how the Maserati Gran Turismo would compare. I think, however, having now had

the opportunity, it’s unfair to compare the Gran Turismo with any of the aforementioned marks simply because it is a Gran Tourer in all senses. It has four generous seats such that an average height man can sit in the rear in comfort. It even has a boot that will take two sets of golf clubs and is altogether a different vehicle to the Porsche or Ferrari for example.

I have to say it was an absolute delight to drive. Its 4.7 V8 engine (which starts life as a Ferrari) generating 454 break horsepower and 0 - 62 in 4.7 seconds was more than enough

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for anyone, but then it should be given its engine capacity. The throaty noise generated with the twin exhaust pipes was every petrol head’s joy, particularly when in sport mode using the up and down gearshift paddles on the steering wheel. Gear changes were quick and responsive in either this or fully automatic, but certainly more fun with the paddles. It had been reported to me that the back end was a little twitchy, but I have to say even in difficult conditions I found this not to be the case.

However, when on a reasonable surface >>

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MOTORING

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and with an open road ahead of you it was in its absolute element and a joy to drive. Unlike many performance cars it didn’t object to more sedate driving which many of them do.

However, what was noticeable after a number of miles at the wheel, was that it was still comfortable and great fun to drive. It’s certainly a very adaptable vehicle given its ‘superior’ status. True, it’s not as good into corners where on a ‘heavy turn’ the steering wheel was fighting back, but then again its a tourer. Moreover when you compare it with other supposed grand tourers, such as

The exterior still doesn’t quite do it for me, but it’s a class act in the field of grand tourers for sure

the Bentley Continental or even say a DB9, it’s extremely good value at £94,000 - a lot of money I know, but a figure which is significantly less than its competitors. Servicing is every 20,000 km or two years, which is not bad again by comparison to some of its peers.

It was hard to pick fault with the vehicle, albeit if now doing so I’d say that the climate control part of the interior was a little old fashioned and the rear heated windscreen the slowest I’ve ever come across, but otherwise the interior was luxuriously appointed in cream leather and carbon fibre. The exterior still doesn’t quite do it for me, but it’s a class act in the field of grand tourers for sure. n The car Andrew drove is priced from £90,750 and is available at www.drivebenfield.com/maserati

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What Bob says...

Maserati was launched in Bologna in 1914 by five brothers who were all car-racing obsessives. They raced for the Diatto group, and when they finished motor racing, decided to build and race their own car. When the brothers sold their shares, the company was taken over by the Orsi family. The Citroen group subsequently purchased it and they sold Maserati to the De Tomaso group. In 1993, Maserati finally came back into Italian ownership when Fiat purchased the business. In 1997, Fiat sold a 50% stake in Maserati to Ferrari who managed to make them a profitable business, but 2005 saw Maserati split from Ferrari and merge with Alfa Romeo. In 2007 the Gran Turismo was launched and the car helped re-establish Maserati as a cool brand. The car was launched with a 4.2lt engine and the car had a top speed of 177mph. The GT was launched in 2008 with a 4.7lt engine, which helped propel the car to 185mph.

The cars six speed sequential gearbox and optional Skyhook suspension helped the car compete with the Porsche 911.

In 2012 the GT Sport was launched and again an upgraded engine helped the car get up to 187mph, as well as quickening the 0-62mph dash to 4.7 secs. The interior is still on par with both Aston Martin and Bentley, and it just oozes class and quality.

I would stick with the standard automatic gearbox, as the optional MC Shift allows manual and automatic shift modes, as well as being a £3000 option and not as good as the standard box. Pressing the sport button brings the car alive with much quicker throttle response and the engines note becomes far meatier.

Bob Arora is an independent car reviewer and also owns Sachins restaurant on Forth Banks, Newcastle. kulmeeta@hotmail.com

p

s B 5

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plus 5 Years warrantY** until tHe end of marcH safetY Both Alfa MiTo and Giulietta models have the 5 star Euro NCAP safety rating.

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fuel consumption With the Alfa MiTo range you can enjoy a combined fuel consumption of up to 80.7 mpg and with the Giulietta range up to 64.2 mpg.

without heart we would be mere machines.

Benfield WarWick Street, NeWcaStle upoN tyNe Ne2 1BB 0845 481 6224 www.benfieldalfaromeo.co.uk dax.pearce@benfieldmotorgroup.com Models shown: Alfa MiTo 875cc TB TwinAir 85 bhp Sprint at £14,150 OTR† excluding Alfa Red special paint at £425 and Alfa Giulietta 1.6 JTDM-2 105 bhp Lusso at £19,950 OTR† excluding Ghiaccio White special paint at £490. Range of official fuel figures for the Alfa Romeo range: Urban 26.2 – 64.2 mpg (10.8 - 4.4 l/100 km), Extra Urban 48.7 – 97.4 mpg (5.8 – 2.9 l/100 km), Combined 37.2 – 80.7 mpg (7.6 – 3.5 l/100 km). CO2 Emissions 177 – 90 g/km. ^0% APR finance Hire Purchase available over a 2 year term with a minimum deposit of 45% on selected Alfa MiTo Models and over a 3 year term with a minimum deposit of 45% on selected Alfa Giulietta Models. Offer applies to selected models registered between 1st January – 31st March 2013. Retail sales only. Terms and conditions apply, see www.alfaromeo.co.uk for full details. Offer correct at time of printing. Finance subject to status. Guarantees may be required. Alfa Romeo Financial Services, PO BOX 4465, Slough, SL1 0RW. †On the road price includes 12 Months road fund license, vehicle first registration fee, delivery, number plates and VAT. Figures and prices are correct at time of print. **The 5 year warranty consists of 36 months’ unlimited mileage warranty (incl.24 months’ Pan European warranty) plus an additional warranty of 24 months’ or 100,000 miles, whichever comes first, excluding wear and tear items. For full details please see www.alfaromeo.co.uk.

rolling back the years Retro riding is on the rise thanks to a heady mix of classic mechanics, timeless fashion and rebellious poster boys like Steve McQueen.

Josh Sims charts the new wave of old biking

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EQUIPMENT It costs well into six figures in any currency.

And perhaps that is to be expected. The Brough Superior, after all, is not only a hand-built motorbike, but one with history: the company behind it was established in 1919, made its last motorbike at the outbreak of World War Two and, notoriously, this was the bike on which Lawrence of Arabia was killed in 1935 (swerving to avoid a pedestrian, an accident so celebrated it lead to the introduction of the first motorcycle helmets).

The difference is that this Brough is bespokemade now, an exact replica of the 1927 spec original, built at a rate of just five bikes a year by the original, recently re-launched company.

Nor is Brough alone in being part of a growing retro bike scene. British bike brand Triumph, for example, has seen a resurgence thanks to the launch of its ‘modern classic’ line of 60s-style bikes, notably the Thruxton and Bonneville. Royal Enfield has launched an updated Bullet 500. Norton has also been revived. These are throw-backs to the post-war eras of classic biking, when, in the UK, so-called Ton-Up Boys raced up the A1 to eat egg sandwiches at the Ace Cafe, and in the US, Marlon Brando ensured bikers were forever associated with rebellion thanks to his role as Johnny in 1953’s ‘The Wild One’. They have also prompted a new wave of highprofile urban bikers, the likes of Brad Pitt, George Clooney and Ewan Mcgregor, for whom the style is a large part of the appeal.

“The retro bike scene is a growing sub-culture that is part of the same non-conformist interest in vintage clothing,” reckons Brough’s new owner, Mark Upham. “It’s an appreciation not only for the very high >>

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EQUIPMENT

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standards of products made in the past, but for its original design, of lasting influence.”

It is, of course, also an appreciation of cool one the brands understand.

In 2009, Triumph, ahead of the curve, became one of the first classic bike brands to launch not a technical biking clothing range, but a t-shirt line. In part to celebrate the 50th birthday of the Bonneville, the shirts featured old ads for the motorcycle, as well as, inevitably, images of Triumph fan Steve McQueen. Triumph has collaborated with designer Paul Smith on a small collection too.

That motorcycles with the styling of yesteryear but the tech of today might well find a ready market - akin to car industry’s embracing the past over recent years too, Ford with its relaunched Mustang, VW with the Beetle, BMW with the Mini, and so on - is an idea catching on beyond classic British makers too.

David Angel is owner of the UK’s F2 Motorcycles, Europe’s biggest dealer of Ural motorcycles, a name unfamiliar next to brand giants the likes of Harley-Davidson, Ducati and Kawasaki, but arguably more characterful all the same.

For one, the Ural comes not from the great biking nations of the US, Italy or even Japan, but from Russia and, as Angel points out, “there are still some people who would equate any bike out of Russia with poor quality, though that’s certainly not the case now”. For two, Ural motorbikes are the >>

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essence of pared-down, uncomplicated, elemental mechanics - its original manufacture was launched in 1942 in order to mobilise Soviet troops against German invasion, so a hardy machine capable of dealing with rough roads (which turned out to be a reverse engineered and beefed-up BMW) was essential.

“And that has always been part of the Ural’s appeal, because it has always offered huge potential for tinkering and personal improvements,” Angel adds. And, last, but certainly not the least, the classic Ural bike - at around GBP12,000 - comes, wait for it, with a side-car.

Angel, naturally, can sing the praises of the side-car: enough space for luggage, or camping equipment, or, if you must, a friend, but without sacrificing the flexibility and freedoms of the motorcycle to explore the back routes and backwoods. “It’s not about speed. It’s about having a great time getting there,” as he puts it. Indeed, it seems a loss that the side-car has largely disappeared from

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the roads over the past half-century - a product, Angel explains, of the advent of the small, economical and affordable car during the early 1960s, which meant that, “unless you were passionate about side-cars, there wasn’t any reason to own one,” he says. “In

Not that riding a motorbike with side-car should be dismissed as beginner’s stuff. Rather, Angel assures that riding three wheels requires training and practice to counteract the asymmetric balance of weight. “You have to read the road ahead all the time,” he says,

Ural has always offered huge potential for tinkering and personal improvements...It’s not about speed. It’s about having a great time getting there fact, there still isn’t any reason to own one.”

Apart, of course, from its history - Ural takes its name, for example, from the Russian mountain range near to which production was moved later during WW2 to avoid Luftwaffe bombing - its sheer retro charm - which ensures a dedicated owners’ club - and its stylishness among identikit macho super-bikes.

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noting how the thrill of riding an old-style motorbike might well be most strongly felt less in the style stakes as the fact that these machines will not, unlike their more modern counterparts, ride themselves. “That’s what makes riding a Ural so exciting against other motorbikes. It’s a much more involving ride.

You need to be in control.” n

52670 GW Mill BQ Mag Volvo 260x205 18/01/2013 15:14 Page 1

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The price is based on a V40 D2 ES FUEL CONSUMPTION IN MPG (L/100km) Urban 70.6/4.0, Extra Urban 83.1/3.4, Combined 78.5/3.6, CO2 94 g/km. Based on personal contract hire. All rentals and excess mileage rates are inclusive of VAT and are subject to vehicle availability, credit approval, manufacturer’s price changes, volume related bonus and purchase through Volvo Car Leasing Supplier Network. The payment terms are 12 month(s) in advance £2,388, followed by 35 monthly payments commencing in month 2 payable by Direct Debit, with a mileage of 8,000 miles per annum. Vehicle returned must be in good condition and within agreed mileage, otherwise further charges will be incurred. Excess Mileage 10.44p per mile. In the event of cancellation of an order, you will be liable for such costs to be confirmed to you in writing. All other terms and conditions are as per the Master Hire Agreement or Customer Agreement between yourselves and Volvo Car Leasing. Prices correct at the time of going to print, are subject to change without notice and do not take into account any variation to government taxes or charges arising after date of publication. Subject to availability at participating dealers for vehicles registered by 31/3/2013 or while stocks last. Not available with other promotions. Volvo Car Leasing Contract Hire is Provided by Lex Autolease Ltd, trading as Volvo Car Leasing, incorporated and registered in England with company number 1090741 & registered office at 25 Gresham Street, London EC2V 7HN. Car shown for illustration purposes only.

FASHION

“Put most menswear on a table and it all somehow looks the same now,” says the flamboyant Angelo Galasso. “You have to open the jacket to see the label to know what you’re looking at. What I want to offer are clothes of distinction.” Blurring into the great morass of grey conservatism is one thing Galasso has never done. His may not be a name to rival fellow Italians Armani or Versace, but he has had his influence on menswear: Galasso is the car salesman turned investment banker, turned shirtmaker, who launched the Interno 8 brand in 1990, bringing with it not just the Gianni Agnelli-inspired watchcuff - a section cut out of the cuff to better accommodate a statement, and typically extra large watch - but a trend for towering collars, open necks and loud prints that defined the style of the premier league and, in many instances, still does that of TV presenters.

In short, he rescued the humble shirt from wardrobe obscurity, creating a 100 shop international business in the process.

“But,” Galasso adds of his decision to sell up, “I like to work with passion and just didn’t feel it anymore.

“We’d built a new reputation for the shirt but I spent a lot of time on the shop-floor and could see that the the market was going towards something more haute couture.”

And he isn’t kidding. Haute couture may sound like an exaggeration, but Galasso’s >>

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

a step above the norm Driven by a passion for mens fashion with distinction, Angelo Galasso continues to challenge consumers to dare to be different, as Josh Sims reports

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FASHION latest incarnation - as the front man of an eponymous brand, via launching Billionaire Couture with Flavio Briatore, with whom he has been through a protracted and “stressful” legal battle - comes close. It is not for the wallflower: lavish print and colour, crossed with a high Italian luxe creates the kind of menswear one does not forget, for good or ill. Everything, from fat ties to pointy shoes, is available in a more bespoke version should you wish to turn the volume right up. Shoes, in fact, are a good example, available as they are in crocodile and ostrich, but also stingray, python, goat, mink... Even jeans may weigh in at £5,000 a pair, thanks to gold rivets.

“It’s about selling the right fashion for the right customer,” says Galasso, now 53, who admits his determination to stand out probably comes from his growing up in a big family - even as a teenager he was using local factories to alter his clothes, having brightly-coloured piping put on, for example, or jackets made of blanket material.

“And there is a customer who wants something different, something bolder. Too many brands just use womenswear to sell menswear - they just put out a few suits as an afterthought. There isn’t really anything special out there for men.”

Indeed, for those more comfortable with muted sobriety, Angelo Galasso’s clothes may prove a leap too far. After all, as he notes, most shoppers - and for that matter, most shop buyers - are “scared of buying anything too different because they’re used to buying the same thing over and over”. But for those bored of the same old, same old, his style is a breath of Neapolitan or Florentine air. For those who can look beyond the extravagant detailing - a jacket lined with tie silk, for example - it is, Galasso argues, actually all rather traditional: Savile Row on a psychedelic high. “Savile Row,” says Galasso, “because that’s where the most elegant men are. There, and in Naples.”

Galasso concedes that, despite the rapid launch of womenswear and even childrenswear spin-offs, his new brand is niche - more a case of ‘build it and they will come’ than answering a clear need. But he hopes >>

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FASHION to, as he puts it, “catch the right moment” in a changing male sartorial psyche.

“Whenever we open a new shop it’s a risk of course. But so far they have always shown that there’s a customer for what we make,” he argues. “I think so many men out there feel that designers rarely think about what they want, or understand that now the male personality is different, and that men want to look different, to dress more expressively - perhaps a little more flashily, but certainly differently, and to get complimented for doing so. You can’t overdo the flashiness, of course - you do it with one piece, not head to toe.

Some people will still think it’s too much, and that’s fine.”

Fine perhaps because Galasso - who thinks he could build his young business up into another 100 store chain - has something of a track record of going his own way and finding enough men to follow him. It was while he was working in finance and unable to find clothes he liked for himself that, despite a lack of training, he started to make his own. Soon colleagues were placing orders, enough that he decided to make it full time - with the novelty of having 14 women on motorbikes bombing around Rome taking client measurements at work. Soon after that, the unlikely combo of Jay-Z, Tony Blair and the King of Jordan started buying too. Similarly, his own label has attracted the custom of Paul McCartney, David Beckham, Michael Caine...

“When Coca-Cola was launched its growth was all about word-of-mouth,” says Galasso, by way of analogy. “People just asked for it, until an agent turned up, started pushing it, and then suddenly everyone wanted it.”

Similarly, now, he reckons, we style-conscious men are all undergoing what might be called - turning to another foodstuff - the mozzarella transformation. Think back, Galasso asks, just a decade, to a time when mozzarella could be bought almost anywhere in the UK. Now think of the kind of burrata mozzarella that can be bought today and which comes, coincidentally, from the southern Italian region where Galasso was born. It’s in another class.

It’s the kind of difference men are seeing in their clothing choices. Just don’t drip the olive oil on any of it. n

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So many men out there feel that designers rarely think about what they want, or understand that now the male personality is different

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KARI’S LOOKING ANGELIC

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ENTREPRENEUR

Becoming a Woman Entrepreneur of the Year prompts Kari Owers to consider what she might do to help other people take the plunge into a business start-up. She tells Brian Nicholls her intentions Kari Owers’ first considered reaction on being acclaimed a Woman Entrepreneur of the Year wasn’t to ponder what it could do for her company, but what it could do for other women aspiring to start a business.

After all, the meeting room of her company is already stocked with around 30 awards in the business’s name, amassed within seven years.

Indeed her personal success came just a week after the company, OPR, had been named the North East PR Agency of the Year. She puts you a little in mind of Nicola Adams, the flyweight who recently became Britain’s first woman boxer to win an Olympic gold medal, for Kari Owers too is petite yet, in her own craft, punching far above her weight.

“I was really delighted and shocked at first, though. We’re not a huge business, and I thought these kinds of awards were for really big businesses. Then I was told it wasn’t about size but about impact in what I was doing to inspire other women in business,” she says.

The Susan Dobson Award for Entrepreneurship, annual recognition of a North East Woman Entrepreneur of the Year, was made by Women into the Network organisation. Owers admits: “I don’t necessarily go to women-only networking events. I’m not really a big fan of that kind of thing.

“But I think it’s important to celebrate women in business because it’s tough for a woman – not tougher necessarily than being a man – but in many cases we have family issues, children to raise. So it’s important to pat women on the back when they strike out to

create jobs and wealth. We need far more of their kind.”

As OPR further gathers revenues, profits and awards, she now wants to be a business angel to other young people. She already mentors as a member of the Entrepreneurs’ Forum. “It’s funny,” this mother of two says in her gentle Irish accent. “I still see myself as a start-up in many ways.

“But a talented young woman approached me after I won the award. She has built a very interesting online fashion business. But she needs experience and help and some investment. We’re working through that now.

Sometimes if you’re only a year or two further down the line it’s still fresh, and I too have benefited from mentors over the years.”

It might seem odd at first that Kari, still only 39 - and who has worked with more than 400 clients in nearly 18 years - should consider online fashion. Those previous clients have included fashion designers, true, but also schools, landscape and architectural firms, surveyors, builders, lawyers, retailers, accountants, building societies, advertising and design agencies, educational bodies and public sector initiators.

She helped launch a radio station, a mental health campaign and... (here she concludes her instances with one of her periodic and engaging outbursts of laughter)... “You know, I’ve worked on everything from an alternative funeral business to a naan bread manufacturer.”

Exploring fashion now, when her primary tools of her trade for so long have been words, is less surprising, however, given her background. Words permeate the genes on one side of her family, fashion on the other.

Her grandfather and grandmother on her mother’s side were in tailoring and millinery.

On her father’s side, excelling for the 142-year-old Belfast Telegraph (recently adjudged Best Regional Newspaper of the Year by the Society of Editors), grandad was a journalist all his working life from the 1920s. He retired at 74 – “they must have discovered him in a back room somewhere,” Owers chortles.

“He was a reporter who became a top sub-editor and was well respected.”

On the same paper, her great grandfather Jack Watson was a reporter who became a noted columnist. Her uncle was a reporter >>

I remember in the attic rocking our newborn daughter in her car seat while trying to speak with a business editor.

A crazy time

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at the Derry office during the troubles and rose to political editor, since when he has been in PR for about 25 years. Her dad writes on ecology, and Kari’s brother John Stewart Watson, besides being an editor at Edinburgh University Press, has his own publishing business, Stonecountry Press, which specialises in outdoor subjects and recently published one of their father’s books.

Owers is part of the cherished asset of talented people who alight on the North East to study then want to call the region home.

On leaving school she doubted she’d take to writing. She put a pin on the map and found herself studying art and design at Newcastle College School of Art and Design.

There she met her husband and business partner Rob. She then achieved at Nottingham Trent University, a BA (honours first) in fashion design.

Despite offers from London, she returned to Tyneside. “I’d spent just a year here earlier but absolutely loved the North East,” she says. “I’d

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realised writing was more a passion than I’d thought. I enjoyed fashion and popular culture so thought to have a go at PR. She joined a Newcastle firm in its ascendancy and covered, besides the North East, Leeds, Manchester – and London. She broadened her experience at several more firms. Then she left a large agency working on big corporate brands to join a former colleague, ex-BBC, who was introducing the first “pay as you go” agency, causing flutters of dismay in the established PR dovecot.

Her route now led her into the dotcom boom and work with entrepreneurs – “challenging but exciting,” she recalls. “So fast paced - businesses being valued at telephone book numbers, and the business owners only in their teens sometimes. I could see the impact building.”

Owers’ children, Joseph and Ailis, are now 10 and 7. Soon after Ailis was born her mother felt compelled to set up for herself. She was aware after the birth that “pay as you go”

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could be a difficult business model if you weren’t coming to the office “to put energy and shoe leather into the job again”.

Her boss agreed that doing her own thing would be timely. Her assets were £1,000 in the bank, a mobile phone, a computer and oodles of tenacity. “I was lucky to start with one client I’d worked with for years, one of my dotcom successes. That one client paid the bills at start-up. By the end of month one, though, I had three clients. Should I take on staff? Three months later I’d more clients than I could cope with. Business had taken off. That was it.

She’d launched from the attic of their Tynemouth house. Now they live at Ponteland for family convenience. “I remember in the attic rocking our newborn daughter in her car seat while trying to speak with a business editor. A crazy time. But that’s what women often do when they start businesses. Life doesn’t stop. Families don’t stop. You just get on with it.” >>

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ENTREPRENEUR To quote a converse, behind every successful woman there’s often a man. Rob by then was prospering in an advertising agency. But he told her: “You know, you can do this. You can freelance. I’ll help you.”

Nine months after the 2005 start-up she was so busy that he joined her in work as well as marriage - “a big decision for us as a family but I was winning work,” she recalls.

Business partners initially, they are now co-directors of a limited business. She is chief executive and he is responsible for O Digital, producing all multi-media content.

Enterprise was big on the government agenda then, as now, and over the years the firm has worked with the likes of Young Enterprise North East, The Prince’s Trust, Enterprise UK and the Entrepreneurs Forum, the latter now using OPR for its social media strategy. They worked from an office on the Quayside at Newcastle for a couple of years. Now their offices nestle beneath Byker’s mighty bridges overlooking Ouseburn, for they became one of the first firms into this long neglected heart of Newcastle’s 18th and 19thC industrial revolution following its revival.

Old buildings of character have been uplifted internally by the talents of architects and designers. “This was one of the best things we ever did. The team could enjoy coming to work here. It has helped us develop a creative culture. Ouseburn has had lots to do with our success,” Owers says against background sounds outside of chickens clucking, sheep bleating, and trains roaring overhead in this magical district mix of farm, pubs, media, culture and entertainment.

Kari Owers sees her personal award as also helping to confirm PR as an industry. “I’m really, really passionate in the belief we’re a very serious business discipline,” she says.

“PR is often considered at best a bit of a luxury, or something nice in good times, or at worst sheer spin. It just isn’t any more. You can’t spin now. Things are so transparent.

Truth is all that works.

“Some journalists tell me they can’t profile PR because it’s not really a proper business.

Pardon??? We’re the business behind the business, influencing other businesses’ strategy. I’ve had clients who, through strategic PR, have sold their business, won

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

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huge contracts, grown performance.”

Weber Shandwick, a global leader in PR, put out a survey suggesting about 84% of business executives rate PR as having most influence on their reputation. But only 59% of them have given a communications person a seat at the top table of senior management.

“I think that needs to change,” Owers says.

“As a consultant I’m lucky in having had a seat

I was really delighted and shocked at first, though. We’re not a huge business, and I thought these kinds of awards were for really big businesses. Then I was told it wasn’t about size but about impact in what I was doing to inspire other women in business at the top table with a number of entrepreneurs and businesses, and have been privy in being able to help them shift and grow their business. In larger corporates we certainly need more PR and communications people at board level. This is the decade when you need a board expert on reputation. If that can be a woman, even better.”

Why this? “The impact of social media on business, in terms of us living now in a world of such transparency that truth is all important, and being able to influence and get your message out correctly, means our sector

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is burgeoning. The challenge has been getting businesses to understand that shift.

“You can no longer just put out a press release knowing someone will print it and everything will be great.

“We need to think about all the different media channels out there now - and the fact that customers can talk back, and they can talk directly to them. They need to build relationships through social media and online.”

Also, she agrees sadly, many young people today don’t read – often can’t read. So her company also employs live presentations, almost street theatre. It helped Nexus launch its Pop card, the Metro’s equivalent of London’s Oyster. Connectivity with young people was seminal. Under 16s were the first target. Besides Facebook and Twitter OPR applied its street shows, stunts and public happenings. “Unveiling the brand on the side of a moving train was a logistical nightmare but great for media pictures,” Owers says.

The agency is keenly into inward investment, promoting Science Central site and Quorum Business Park. “Quorum with its Tesco Bank headquarters is a national beacon, and hopefully Science Central will be once it materialises. I think there will be positive news on that in the coming years,” she adds.

Other clients include Benfield Motor Group, the North East’s biggest privately owned motor dealership, and OPR also helped the Metrocentre to celebrate its 25th anniversary recently. It also feels privileged to have joined Ringtons, a firm with 105 years’ experience, in launching Victory, its online-only tea brand.

The company team totals 10, co-directors included. The core team are client managers, a freelance network having also been built of videographers, photographers, journalists and writers and other specialists.

“I think we’ll grow over the next five to 10 years and I do want to grow the team,” she says. “But I’ve no intention of growing big for big’s sake. I don’t ever want us to lose quality.

We’re a boutique agency.” Plans to form a senior management team acknowledge, however, that in seven years some “extraordinarily good talent” has developed within. It will also enable her personally to find the time her angelic intentions will require. n

WINTER 13

COMPANY PROFILE

The digital remedy for the high street blues Is it RIP to the Great British High Street? After healthy pre-Christmas sales that seemed to point to a muted recovery, in the past few weeks the collapse of high street stalwarts like Jessops, Blockbuster, Comet and HMV has served as a painful reminder that no matter how well-loved or long-established, no business is immune from economic recession.

Their demise has been met with a veritable outpouring of grief from consumers nostalgic for the gilded age of the high street. However, behind the eulogies for these familiar and much-loved brands is a crucial home truth that business would be well-advised to heed.

No doubt each of these businesses has their own individual story of decline and fall. The common thread, however, is that each have cited their inability to compete with online rivals as a decisive factor in the failure of their business.

But it’s here that the eulogies should stop. The explosion in online retail and transformation in consumer behaviour we have witnessed over the past decade should come as no surprise to high street bosses. Amazon, after all, has been in business since 1995. These brands have had ample time to adapt and survive; their failure to do so is perhaps a matter of hubris.

Plenty of other bricks-and-mortar businesses grasped the digital nettle, shifting their focus from shop front to home page in order to keep pace with – and even outrun – their digital native counterparts.

According to research by Ofcom, online shopping is more popular in the UK than in any other country in the world. These days, even in the increasingly unlikely event that we cannot complete a purchase online, when we’re looking for a product or service

Gary Boon is managing director of Newcastle-based strategic digital agency, Shout Digital, which has been named the region’s best digital marketing agency at the MiAwards two years in succession our search tends to start with firing up a laptop, a tablet or a smartphone.

That’s where Shout come in. We help businesses understand how customers get from there to the checkout, be it online or offline. And how we can guide their journey and inform their decision-making along the way. The right blend of communications across the digital landscape can extend your brand’s reach – and help you fend off the worst effects of the recession.

We help businesses understand how customers get from there to the checkout, be it online or offline. And how we can guide their journey and inform their decision-making along the way

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Consumers are becoming more knowledgeable, more powerful and more sophisticated. Business can no longer stick its head in the sand. With the challenge of digital come incredible opportunities.

And your competitors are poised to snap these up if you don’t.

Further information on Shout Digital is available on their website at www.shoutdigital.com or call 0191 231 2377

BUSINESS QUARTER |WINTER 13

IN ANOTHER LIFE

WINTER 13

Away from business Graham Payne, managing director of Darchem Engineering at Stockton, is passionate about karting and motor racing.

He has raced on the same circuit as Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell, and has seen the rise of Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton, among other Formula One drivers. Had he not been a top industrialist Payne, who lives with his wife and three daughters at Wolsingham, might have been a full time motor racer instead. He explains why

passion driven by need for speed There’s nothing quite like the exhilaration of racing round a circuit in a high-octane competition against some of the greats of motor racing, such as Senna and Mansell.

While, sadly, I never beat either, I am delighted to have recently been named national British Kart Champion, a title I first won 22 years ago.

The championship is held over eight official rounds, and the winner is the driver to have racked up most wins over a year. No trumpet blowing but, honestly, I’m delighted to have beaten my competitors, most of whom were 30 years younger. Karting is, as Formula One

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motor racing was for me back in the ‘70s and ‘80s, my driving passion. It ranks alongside running a successful and growing company like Darchem Engineering.

As a teenager, my inspiration on the Formula One motor racing circuit was James Hunt.

Hunt the Shunt won the 1976 Formula One World Championship. I admired his actionpacked exploits and desperately wanted to follow in his tyre tracks, ever since passing my driving test as a keen as mustard 17-year old.

In 1977 I bought my first kart, igniting my passion for karting and motor racing. A year

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later, I was competing on circuits in the South of England and progressed to single-seat motor racing. With the bit firmly between my teeth, so to speak, I shared many circuits then with the likes of Nigel Mansell, a truly great British sportsman of the ‘80s and ‘90s. It was thrilling to be on the competitive F1 track with other greats such as Niki Lauda, Nelson Piquet, and Ayrton Senna. The adrenalin rush of competing at that level and coming achingly close to nipping at their heels was amazing.

Formula One motor racing is an expensive addiction and once my Formula Ford sponsorship ran out in the early ‘80s, I decided to return to my original passion: competitive karting. In 1990, I won the MSA British Kart Championship for the first time. I was lured back to the F1 track in the mid-‘90s on moving to Scotland and a directorship with Tannoy.

I jumped at the chance to return to Formula Ford. On return south to take up another directorship in 1999, and eventually moving to the North East a decade later, I took karting up again.

It’s my passion - a break from the stress and pressures of work. Training can be tough especially if, like me, you still want to compete at a high level but I train mainly at the weekends because of work commitments. You must be able to crunch 10lb weights for 240 – 300 reps non-stop and run three miles at a decent speed. While most drivers are aged 22 – 30, I wouldn’t say karting or motorsports are exclusively young men’s games.

You simply need to be fairly fit, and have the will to win. Most people I’ve met in business have that ambition and competitive streak in spadefuls. Maybe more of them should give karting a go! I’ve no plans to hang up my karting gloves. n

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STRUGGLING YOUNG FOLK GET THEIR CHANCE Since its launch in 2012 the North East Leadership Group – a group of leading business figures in the region working together to change young lives - has raised £100,000. And this doubles to a staggering £200,000 with match funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) in helping young people start their own business this year. Thanks to this match funding every £5,000 membership fee we receive is doubled to £10,000. So every one member can potentially provide at least four young people with the financial support to change their lives for the better and boost the North East economy too.

The group now has 20 members, and just this month we’re delighted to welcome our newest member, venture capitalist Jeremy Middleton, who we look forward to sharing in our passion to change young lives, as well as attending our not-to-be missed events and fundraisers. First in our series of unique leadership events this year will be celebrated British author and journalist, Jeremy Vine, who’ll be speaking at the stunning venue of

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WINTER 13

Auckland Castle on March 22. Guests will also have the opportunity to view the recently acquired Zubaran Paintings, with a talk by Dr Robert McManners, who has recently published a book about these fascinating artworks. In June there is also the Trust’s highly anticipated annual Mersey to Tyne Cycling Challenge; make sure to get your places quickly. We’ve an exciting time ahead, and looking back over the past year, the group has also achieved great fundraisers.

These included Benfield Motor Group’s celebrity golf tournament at Northumberland’s Slaley Hall, attended by Alan Shearer, and raising £65,000. The fantastic Ladies Who Rock fundraiser in October, led by Alison Morgan of Portland Group with fashion designer Jeff Banks was also hugely successful.

And our inaugural gala business dinner led

by Ian Gilthorpe of Square One Law, with John Inverdale keynote speaker, took place in January. Members have also been invited to exclusive events to mingle with celebrated speakers including Sir Ian Gibson, former vice-president of Nissan and non-executive chairman at Morrisons, and Sir Charles Dunstone, chairman and co-founder of Carphone Warehouse.

In the North East, money raised through the group helps the Trust to support 3,700 young people yearly. But the vital work can only continue with continued support from businesses, local authorities and individuals across the region. Young people are struggling. They need our help. This year the Prince’s Trust’s annual Youth Index revealed that more than one in 10 young people in the North East feel that they cannot cope with day-to-day life. Unemployed young people are more than twice as likely to feel this way. In the North East, the number of young people claiming Jobseekers Allowance for more than six months has risen 400% since pre-recession.

In the North East, money raised through the group helps the Trust to support 3,700 young people yearly With no job, the long-term unemployed can face other issues. Poverty. Homelessness.

That makes it even harder to get into work.

Mental battles can arise as self-esteem all but disappears. Many young people who come to the Trust for help talk of depression, anxiety and feelings of isolation. One young person desperate for help was Emma Reilly, 31, from Newcastle. Emma had been bullied at school, leaving her suffering from anxiety and depression. Diagnosed as being on the autistic spectrum in later years, she had to leave university. With few prospects, she moved back to her parents’ house and spent the next year unemployed and feeling hopeless and isolated. Yet Emma was determined to make the most of life. She joined the Trust’s Enterprise programme, which helps young people into business. Through this support, she now owns a successful business - The League of Pixels – which specialises in design and production of a wide range of printed t-shirts, stationery and websites. There is much to do in 2013 in guiding the most vulnerable young people in the North East into enterprise or jobs. We’re appealing for more support from the North East’s business community to help us tackle youth unemployment. Only by working together can we increase the number of young lives we improve this year.n

To do your bit...

If you’d like to get involved with the North East Leadership Group and help make a difference to disadvantaged young people across the region, please call John Wall on 0780 291 7615. If you’re interested in taking part in any of our events please call Zoe Mulvenna on 0191 497 3212.

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The Scrutator >> Now you get the picture Bored with the office surroundings? Rachel French offers an answer. She’s development manager at Mima – Middlesbrough’s Institute of Modern Art – which allows firms and organisations to hire some of the gallery’s collection. About 800 of the institute’s 3,500 works feature in the loan scheme. They include paintings, drawings, photographs and prints by local, national and international artists. Huntsman Pigments, the North East award-winning chemical giant serving food, pharmaceutical and personal care sectors, was the gallery’s first client - and president Simon Turner told me why with enthusiasm. He explains: “We’re transforming our business.

This includes a physical transformation from premises in Billingham and Wilton to new facilities at Wynyard Park, where we’re bringing together teams to better serve our global customers.

“We wanted something special in original art and expertise for our employees and asked one of the UK’s leading galleries for modern and contemporary art and craft on our doorstep to deliver.”

The collection was formerly held by Mima’s two forerunners, Middlesbrough Art Gallery and the Cleveland Craft Centre, and Mima has added substantially to the collection since its opening in 2007. Rachel says: “The works for hire hang safely in the stores normally.

It seemed good to have them showing

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instead in places where people can enjoy Middlesbrough’s collection.

“As well as building awareness and advocacy, lending lets businesses show staff and clients they care about work environment, value creativity - and that they support local culture.” Since the scheme’s launch last April, a steady stream of enquiries has come from other local businesses, including lawyers, commercial landlords and accountants. Many works are still available, and gallery staff hope that, as the opportunity grows popular, takeup will be greater. Some works are pre-1950 but, Mima being modernist, the rental rack is mainly in that vein.

While the artists may be less well known, the works are all gallery quality, Rachel says.

The obvious question is values. How are these reached? By qualified art valuation, says Rachel. “All works on loan are deemed worth less than £15k. So they come under employer’s standard insurance, needing no extra premium.”

At Huntsman, Simon Turner had no qualms about insurance or source of hire. He says: “We’re a global business aiming for high performance. We strive to align ourselves with other successful high performance organisations. Our decision to work with Mima was straightforward. They show excellence in what they do and are part of our local community, which aligns with our aims.”

Hire prices start at £650 a year per work for a fully advised delivered and installed service.

The catalogue appears on http://issuu.com/ visitmima/docs/mima_loans_catalogue.

Rachel’s favourites? “Black and white photographs of Middlesbrough from the 1980s and a large painting by Oliver Bevens of a woman in a city, called Hanging On.” Art valued at £75.56m is held by councils in the North East and North Yorkshire - quite a lot never seen in public. The unfavoured could be sold to help offset public sector cuts. Or there’s a Mima alternative... n

The oil on canvas painting Mima registrar Helen Welford shows here is Transporter Bridge, 1986-87, by Anthony Lowe. He worked in the North East for some years after leaving the Royal College of Art with an MA in 1986. More of his work can be seen locally On the Beach at Hartlepool Library, for example, and Metro Morning at Gosforth Metro station. Lowe now works and lives south of Leipzig in the historic town of Altenburg.

See www.anthonylowe.de

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BIT OF A CHAT

WINTER 13

was also impressed on a visit.

Python supports local communities too, as when local Sea Cadets struggled to finance a venue. Python adapted a park keeper’s cottage for them at Albert Park in Middlesbrough. Broome says: “We changed the plans, got it sorted out.

And the Sea Cadets for the first time have a permanent base where they can grow their numbers.”

with Frank Tock >> Ring in the old What rapport exists between Python Properties, which saves good buildings from the demolition ball, and local authorities and conservation groups? A Bolton heritage group has pinned a blue plaque on a Python building, making clear its wish to engage. Links are strong also with Bolton’s main networking group. There are few dealings with the regeneration team at Warrington but contact is good with the museums and leisure department there.

“We find councils patchy in response.

It depends a lot on individuals,” Peter Broome at the Redcar firm says. “Contact with the leisure department in Redcar and Cleveland is good, Middlesbrough Council extremely pro-active.” In fact Broome’s certain Mayor Ray Mallon, when he regularly calls for a coffee at the art gallery in Cargo Fleet Offices, wishes the rescued building, which is only 100 yards on Redcar’s side of the border, was on his fiefdom’s side of the line instead.

The gallery has friends at Mima, Middlesbrough’s institute of modern art.

And Python’s website shows other admirers of its aims in Middlesbrough. Mark Elliott, director of DigitalCity, describes Broome and Johnson as real future thinkers in property development. Bob Cuffe, managing director of Gazette Media, feels the firm has positivity and ambition. Danny Alexander, chief secretary to the Treasury,

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

>> Kari on roaming It was almost instinctive that Kari Owers should have agreed to become a non-executive director of Northumberland Tourism. My colleague who interviewed her says although born of a troubled region, Kari even so loves roaming a remote beach or mountainside more for “getting away from the iPhone” than for escaping any sad memories of Northern Ireland.

The chance to combine her expertise in communication with love of nature appeals to her explorer gene, she says. Her early childhood was spent between the rugged north coast of Northern Ireland and the remoteness of central Africa.

Despite strong family connections with Belfast, she was born in County Antrim, with its isolated glens and rugged Giant’s Causeway.

Her father being a peripatetic ecologist, she found herself at the age of five living in Cape Town. Then at eight she and the family lived at a remote medical research camp in Malawi.

At nine, they all returned to rainy Ireland, she with a lovely suntan that her new classmates thought odd. The family continued to move around, usually between County Down and County Antrim, settling near the sea eventually when her father became countryside manager for the National Trust, responsible for the North Coast of Ireland.

She did of course grow up during the troubles.

“But because of where we lived I often saw only what was on the news, and that was fairly limited because my father would be keen to turn that off in the house,” Owers explains.

“I thank my father because it gave us a natural upbringing really.

“We aren’t a politically motivated family. I always went to religiously integrated schools

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so had a very balanced and non-segregated upbringing. But you still felt the impact, even just bomb scares, and going into Belfast and having your bags checked. It was always there.

A war zone really. Apart from what went on recently it has been great to see Ireland in more peaceful times.”

When are we going to reform rules of receivership and bankruptcy? >> My token protest I don’t walk under ladders but I have been known to carry an HMV gift token and, on presenting it at the onset of the firm’s crisis, was told it couldn’t be accepted but would be eventually.

Moving deeper into the store, I presented a Waterstones token for two books I’d picked. I was told the till wouldn’t accept the tokens that day but might the next.

Earlier I’d paid Comet £43 to have someone fit an oven I’d bought from them.

The fitter who came said he couldn’t do it.

I brought in an electrician from elsewhere who could, told Comet and was promised I’d get my £43 back. The company then crashed and the cheque they’d sent bounced. Thankfully, I’m still hopeful of getting my books from Waterstones, even a record from HMV - a blues number perhaps, in the circumstances.

All credit to Deloittes as administrators who decided £7m worth of customers’ tokens should be honoured. But when are we going to reform rules of receivership and bankruptcy that push consumers so far back in the compensation claims they rarely get anything back that’s rightfully theirs?

In other contexts it would be deemed theft. The moral on this rocky retail road: If you’ve got it, spend it instantly, and don’t pay up front if you can avoid it.

BQ Northeast - BEG Winter Issue:Layout 1

23/1/13

14:42

Page 1

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EVENTS

WINTER 13

BQ’s business events diary gives you lots of time to forward plan. If you wish to add your event to the list send it to editor@bq-magazine.co.uk and please put ‘BQ events page’ in the subject heading

FEBRUARY

4 to 8 Nepic trade mission to India during the Indian Chemical Industry, ICC, international conference, being jointly organised this year by ICC and Nepic.

Supported by UKTI. Contact: lynne.aungiers@nepic.co.uk.

7 North Tyneside Business Forum workshop series: Setting Goals, Quadrant East, Cobalt, (7.30am). Sandra 0191 643 6000, business.forum@northtyneside.gov.uk 8 Competing with IT – breaking through to enable business innovation. Joint seminar at Newcastle University Business School, being held by the business school and Herb Kim (Thinking Digital and Codeworks) to look at 15 high-level case studies ahead of a September conference ruth.warwick@ncl.ac.uk 11 North East Business Leaders Share Expertise with Small Businesses, Route to Investment workshop sponsored by Grant Thornton, Square One Law, and Newcastle Science City, Gateshead Quays, between 12.15 and 5.30pm.

0191 285 7100, michelle.blow@hilaryflorekpr.co.uk 13 Nepic Skills Event, covering apprenticeships, graduates, workforce development and management skills. Ramside Hall Hotel, Durham (8.30am) Contact: lynne.aungiers@nepic.co.uk.

13 UKTI event, Opportunities without Borders, North East England in a Global Europe, Newcastle Marriott Gosforth Hotel. Speakers include foreign ambassadors. www.northeastglobal.eventbrite.co.uk 13 NECC meets at Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle (5.30pm).

4 to 13 UKTI North East market visit to South Africa. 0845 05 05 054 or enquiries@uktinortheast.org.uk 5, 6 UKTI Exporting Insight Visit to Ireland. www.embltd.co.uk 6 Engage: How to Present Yourself, Services Network workshop, North East Business and Innovation Centre, Sunderland (9am) events@service-network.co.uk. 0191 244 4031.

6 The Greggs Marketing Challenge Final, post-graduate student debates, Newcastle University Business School (4pm). www.ncl.ac.uk/nubs/about/events/item 7 NOF Energy Annual Conference, Newcastle tbc. 0191 384 6464. k.leng@nofenergy.co.uk 7 CIM: Developing Sustainable Brands, Newcastle. 01628 427 340. www.cim.co.uk/northeastengland.

11 NOF Energy, Oil and Gas Visit, Norway. 0191 384 6464. k.leng@nofenergy.co.uk 11 to 16 National Apprenticeship Week

15 NECC Coffee and Connections, Gala Theatre, Durham (10.30am).

12 to 14 UKTI Exporting Insight Visit to Poland. www.embltd.co.uk

16 Lifestyle trends for 2013, Trend Bible’s seminar for regional business, Baltic, Gateshead (9.30) enquiries@trendbible.com. 0191 265 0665

15 Building the Capability for Innovation – exploring the barriers. Joint seminar at Newcastle University Business School, being held by the business school and Herb Kim (Thinking Digital and Codeworks) ahead of a September conference. ruth.warwick@ncl.ac.uk

18 NOF Energy, Oil and Gas Business Visit, Houston and Lafayette.

0191 384 6464 18 North East Business Leaders Share Expertise with Small Businesses, Route to Investment workshop sponsored by Grant Thornton, Square One Law, and Newcastle Science City, Gateshead Quays, between 12.15 and 5.30pm.

0191 285 7100, michelle.blow@hilaryflorekpr.co.uk

18,19 UKTI North East market visit to Sweden. 0845 05 05 054 or enquiries@uktinortheast.org.uk

18 to 22 UKTI Trade Visit to Australia with £750 grant for North East firms. enquiries@uktinortheast.org.uk

APRIL

18 to 22 UKTI North East market visit to Mexico. 0845 05 05 054 or enquiries@uktinortheast.org.uk

14 NOF Energy National Conference, Energy – a Balanced Future, Hilton Gateshead, kleng@nofenergy.co.uk. 0191 384 6464

20 Micro Innovation and Its Big Value, debate with Professor Swann and Q&A, Newcastle University Business School (6pm). www.ncl.ac.uk/nubs/about/events/item

25 CIM event, Driving Sales, various speakers, Simon Bailes Peugeot, Stockton (6pm). cimevents@cim.co.uk. 01628 427 340

24 to Mar 2 UKTI North East market visit to India 0845 05 05 054 or enquiries@uktinortheast.org.uk 25 North East Business Leaders Share Expertise with Small Businesses, Route to Investment workshop sponsored by Grant Thornton, Square One Law, and Newcastle Science City, Gateshead Quays, between 12.15 and 5.30pm.

0191 285 7100, michelle.blow@hilaryflorekpr.co.uk 25 to Mar 1 UKTI North East market visit to Panama. 0845 05 05 054 or enquiries@uktinortheast.org.uk 26 Digital Debate: After the Mobile, Newcastle University Business School (5pm). www.ncl.ac.uk/nubs/about/events/item

MARCH 4 North East Business Leaders Share Expertise with Small Businesses, Route to Investment workshop sponsored by Grant Thornton, Square One Law, and Newcastle Science City, Gateshead Quays, between 12.15 and 5.30pm.

0191 285 7100, michelle.blow@hilaryflorekpr.co.uk

BUSINESS QUARTER | WINTER 13

20 IoD North East, Dinner with Sir Clive Woodward, Radisson Blu, Durham (7pm).

25 Building a Tool Kit for Innovation, first steps. Joint seminar at Newcastle University Business School, being held by the business school and Herb Kim (Thinking Digital and Codeworks) ahead of a September conference. ruth.warwick@ncl.ac.uk

The diary is updated daily online at www.bq-magazine.co.uk please check with contacts beforehand that arrangements have not changed. events organisers are also asked to notify us at the above email address of any changes or cancellations as soon as they are known.

KEY: acas: Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service, CiM: Chartered Institute of Marketing, CeCa (ne): Civil Engineering Contractors Association (North-East), hMRC: Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, iCaeW: Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, iCe: Institution of Civil Engineers, iod: Institute of Directors, nea2F: North East Access to Finance, neCC: North East Chamber of Commerce, nSCa: Northern Society of Chartered Accountants, FSB: Federation of Small Business, tba: to be arranged, tbc: to be confirmed, tbf: to be finalised.

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Bamburgh Suite Package Benefits • Direct access to executive seating in the Milburn Stand • A superb 3 course hot fork buffet • Shared tables of 8 – 12 • Pre and post match analysis • Account bar facility • Matchday programmes and teamsheets • Licensed betting facilities • Matchday competition £630+VAT per person

Moncur Suite Package Benefits • Situated on the Chairman’s Level 3 • Directors Box seating • A Superb 3 Course hot buffet • On site car parking • Account bar facility • Pre and post match analysis with an ex-NUFC player • Limited edition badges • Licensed betting facilities £950+VAT per person

BQ Magazine Charity Golf Days in aid of the Variety Build A Bus scheme

Putt it in your diary

Join us once again for two charity golf days and help raise money for our Variety “Build A Bus” scheme. Held at Rockliffe Hall on 25th April and Slaley Hall on 14th June. Teams of four £350 per day or £100 per person. For more information email: bryan@room501.co.uk or call 0191 537 5720.