Businesses across the East of England keen to cash in on opportunities created by the booming energy industry are being urged to accept a free helping hand from experts.
A specialist roadshow is to cruise the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and Essex over the next three months offering information, advice and an overview of the industry to those who believe their businesses could benefit.
The roadshows will be run by EEEGR, the East of England Energy Group, which piloted a similar scheme a two years ago attracting widespread interest.
The focus will be on EEEGR’s supply chain development programme, part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund, which allows companies in the region to find the support they need to develop growth plans and win new contracts.
“Much has happened since the last series of roadshows and we’re sure there will be big opportunities for the region from the multi-billion pound development of offshore windfarms, the resurgence of the offshore gas sector and the expected progress of Sizewell C nuclear power station,” said Simon Gray, EEEGR chief executive.
“Our fear is that the region’s businesses could miss out because they don’t recognise the opportunities or maybe think they are not relevant enough or don’t know enough about the industry to understand how they could become involved.
“As our roadshows are free to attend there is nothing to lose but much to gain. We already represent more than 400 companies across the region but non-members are equally welcome to come along.”
EEEGR is working with a team from Nautilus Associates who have the insight, experience and industry expertise to help deliver growth for businesses and the supply network.
Nautilus director Johnathan Reynolds said the variety and scale of planned developments in the region’s energy sector, meant companies across the East of England faced a host of new business opportunities.
“The benefits could be enormous promoting economic growth, creating thousands of new jobs and securing many existing positions, in high value energy and low carbon sectors,” he said.
The roadshows have a three-pronged approach looking at:
Press release, April 29, 2014; Image: Greater Gabbard OWF