Major investment at University’s Eden Campus

The University of St Andrews has been awarded £1.128 million to develop a world-class test space that will enable academics, technicians and small and medium-sized companies to work together at its Eden Campus site.

The Scottish Government-supported funding was secured through the Advancing Manufacturing Challenge Fund (AMCF) and announced by the Economy Secretary Fiona Hyslop. The AMCF is a partnership between the Scottish Government, Scottish Enterprise, and Highlands and Islands Enterprise. The total investment is £15.8 million across 12 projects, with £8.3 million from the European Regional Development Fund, £590,000 from the Scottish Government, and the remainder in match-funding from the chosen projects.

The project at the University’s Eden Campus in Guardbridge will enhance innovation in companies working in energy storage and conversion, by providing scale-up facilities for moving research and development into early prototyping and proving technology before moving to large scale manufacture.

It will do this by developing a range of processing capabilities of relevance to battery, fuel cell and catalyst manufacture. The investment will also support test and development space where companies operating in the energy storage and conversion sectors can have access to high-quality equipment and facilities and University know-how and expertise.

In addition, the investment will support company engagement events, business-to-business activities, and placements within companies for knowledge transfer activities.

The new state-of-the-art facilities at Eden Campus are aimed at companies developing new products, and which need access to technical equipment beyond the reach of many small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

St Andrews Chief Operating Officer Derek Watson said: “This investment is a welcome vote of confidence in our operations at Eden Campus.

“Supporting entrepreneurship is at the heart of the University strategy and the Advancing Manufacturing Challenge Fund provides us with a significant step change opportunity to target SMEs.

“The manufacture, test and development space will be open to all companies, large and small, with a recognition of the nurturing and networking obligations among the wider network of larger companies in our support of SMEs.”