Firms across Teesside involved in supply chains within the manufacturing sector could stand to benefit as the latest round of applications for a national funding competition opens, Alex Cunningham has said.
With supply chains underpinning the high value manufacturing sector, the Advanced Manufacturing Supply Chain Initiative was launched in 2012 to enhance Britain’s global competitiveness and attract major suppliers to locate in the UK. And Stockton North’s Labour MP has urged firms across Teesside to submit applications in an effort to improve capabilities and capture contracts currently delivered overseas.
Since 2012, 44 projects have secured joint public-private investment worth almost £500 million and over 180 organisations are involved in their delivery – many of them SMEs.
Alex said:
“While the £100 million on offer in the latest funding round is only a very small part of the large scale investment needed to ensure firms in the UK are able to compete internationally, even this amount of funding is to be welcomed.
“With the current 2014 funding round now being open, I hope that firms across the Tees Valley will present applications and bid for a slice of the funding available to attract both business and businesses to the region and to build in current momentum in such sectors as offshore wind power.
“Teesside has a rich industrial and manufacturing heritage, and successful applications for additional funding will help to safeguard the skills and knowledge that exist in the region for future generations.”
