INVESTING

 

INVESTING IN THE COUNTRY :

Partnerships : Thomson-CSF has gone into a joint venture with Pilkington Optronics creating Barr and Stroud (which designs and developes systems for la Défense). It employs nearly 577 people, 30% of whom are engineers. Foreign and national investiment in Scotland was 8.25 billion francs in 2004 (European companies, dominated by American and Japanese companies).

A public organization exists in Glasgow called the Scottish Enterprise which deals with investments (creating jobs, improving production and internationalization). It has 13 local branches in Scotland (Local Enterprise Companies). The public organization 'Locate in Scotland' (which is a joint venture between the Scottish Enterprise and the Scottish Office) is a unique guide for foreign companies. It offers services like finding a site and industrial buildings and financial aid, and also gives recommendations in choosing sub-contractors or training staff. 112 projects for setting up or expanding foreign companies in Scotland have been treated by Locate in Scotland. This represents a total value of 7.7 million francs and 16,000 jobs.

Scotland has two commercial zones which benefit from special aid. One is to the east of Glasgow and the other is at Prestwick airport. They offer all the necessary infrastructures for companies wanting to set up there.

In East Kilbride a technological park has been opened near the UK National Engineering.

Over a 10 year period these commercial zones offer (during the first year) an exoneration from local land tax and a 100% exoneration on taxes on new buildings.

The Selective Regional Aid is a very carefully accorded subsidy . Grants of up to 15 to 30% of the investment costs can be given (including the cost of buying the installations, machines, buildings etc). Employment and training grants can cover up to 50% of the costs.

Scotland also benefits from European aid. European structural funds participate (as regional assistance) in more that 16% of the total amount of 5.219 billion ecus allotted to the UK (860 million ecus). The first objective (Highlands and Islands) amounts to 311 million ecus. The second objective (Western Scotland - Eastern Scotland) receives 407 million ecus. Objective n° 5 b (Dumfries and Galloway, North and West Grampians, the Borders, Rural Stirling, upland Tayside) receives 141 million. Scotland also benefits from community programmes (Urban, Stride, Konver, Employment Initiative, Leader, Pesca, etc) and from specific support for small and medium sized companies and from loans from the European Investment Bank.