Growth in technology and engineering businesses in the Thornbury and North Bristol area is an encouraging sign for the local economy.
Systems engineering company Optima Systems Consultancy has opened new offices on the Thornbury Office Park due to the strong growth in demand for their services in engineering consultancy in high tech market sectors such as defence, aerospace, cyber and transportation.
Optima Systems Consultancy, which is focussed on providing pragmatic approaches to the development of high technology systems and the wider management of such systems through life has a steadily-growing client list including several large industrial prime contractors and government departments.
Such growth in Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) is helped by the UK Government’s procurement policy which has established a target to increase the proportion of expenditure involving SMEs to 25%. This target applies across all government departments, includes direct and indirect contracts, and is intended to enliven economic growth and foster innovation on a national level.
Optima Systems Consultancy’s Managing Director Chris Lamb was pleased to announce that the business has just been awarded their first direct contract with the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD), involving specialist technical support to navigation radar procurement.
While the business has provided a substantial amount of support to the MOD through other intermediaries and in collaboration with other businesses since starting in late 2012, such direct contracts with clients often offer better value for money and responsiveness to the client.
Fostering young, agile businesses in the technology and engineering sectors is important to Government and large industry corporations for other reasons as well.
Captain David Matthews, Submarine Combat System Group Team Leader at , Defence Equipment and Support, who is in charge of procuring the complex tactical systems which give the UK submarine flotilla its operational edge, opened Optima Systems Consultancy’s new office.
He said: “UK high tech companies are bringing innovative thinking, fresh ideas and talent to the complex challenges faced by my team.
This contribution is instrumental in finding smart ways to stay ahead in the face of fast-moving technological advances and rapidly-changing security threats.”
It’s notable that Thornbury is also attracting other SME businesses such as Folium Optics who produce novel display technology that is being applied to innovative products in the medical sector and is currently undergoing evaluation for use in adaptive camouflage applications for defence.
Folium have recently moved base from the Bristol Robotics Laboratory at UWE, which acts as an incubator for high tech start-ups and spin-offs from academic research.
While there are several well-established technology and engineering businesses in Thornbury, it may well be that increasing population through recent and ongoing housing development around the town and in the north Bristol area provide further impetus to the growth in the number and size of locally based advanced technology companies, giving some of the economic stimulus needed in the area.
