Land and Buildings

Ross Walk Workspace

"Bigger, better and more office units for budding entrepreneurs"

The centre will greatly contribute towards a drive to encourage more businesses to be set up amongst the disadvantaged communities in Leicester.

Organisation: Leicester City Council

Completion Date: 30/08/2004

Location

Ross Walk, Belgrave, Leicester, LE4 5HH

Project Description

I am excited with this new development, which I feel will greatly contribute to the enterprise agenda within the region. The need for dedicated incubator and 'grow-on' units with business support is vital to ensuring that businesses have a better chance of being set up and surviving - Jeff Miller, Service Director, Leicester City Council

Background
The project seeks to improve facilities in the Wyvern Business Centre and develop an unused section of the building to create 13 new 'Intermediate Business Units' to meet the growing demands of businesses that are expanding.

The Wyvern Business Centre is a managed workspace centre providing incubation units for new business start-ups. These units provide an opportunity for the unemployed to explore self-employment in low-cost accomodation with the benefit of on-site business advice, administrative and secretarial support. By providing clients with these services on a 'one-stop-shop' basis, it significantly reduces overheads due to the sharing of costs. It also improves the survival and growth propects of the new start-ups.

Upgrading facilities
The proposal seeks to upgrade the general environment in the centre by replacing an antiquated heating system and repositioning the reception and admin work area. This will facilitate the creation of two additional units to bring the total number of incubation units to 30.

The 13 new Intermediate Business Units (IBU) will accomodate businesses graduating from the start-up programme housed within the existing units at the Wyvern Business Centre. The IBU project will provide space for supported growth enabling businesses established in the centre to remain within the local economy. This will allow them to continue to be supported until they become sustainable while at the same time providing an increasing range of employment opportunities for members of the local community.

Units
The first phase of the project (four units) was completed early this year and tenants are in occupancy. The second phase (nine units) is due to be completed by the end of August 2004. In total over 13,000ft2 of high-quality office accommodation will be created.

Funding
The project only became possible last year when Leicester City Council successfully obtained over half a million pounds grant funding. A grant of £240,000 was approved from the European Regional Development Fund under Objective 2, while a further £285,000 has been approved by the Leicester Shire Economic Partnership (LSEP).

Outcomes

Number of jobs created - 27
Number of new businesses created - 26
Number of jobs safeguarded - 3

Project Contacts

Project manager:
Ismail Patel
Tel: 0116 268 1341
E-mail: patei002@leicester.gov.uk
Website: www.leicester.gov.uk
Location address: 111 Ross Walk
Belgrave, Leicester, LE4 5HH

LSEP contact:
Andy Rose
Tel: 0116 257 5677
Email: andyr@lsep.co.uk
Website: www.lsep.co.uk