ADVANTAGE West Midlands has published details of how it intends to dispose of £400m of assets ahead of its closure next year.
It has recommended that major business parks such as Ansty Park in Coventry, Longbridge and the i54 site outside Wolverhampton are retained within the public sector for future investment in order to continue generating new jobs.
Land at the former Jaguar works in Browns Lane, Coventry should also be retained but with minimal public investment it has said. The same goes for Advantage House in Quinton – the current home of Business Link West Midlands.
Land interests at Bilston Urban Village, Castle Gate in Dudley, Walsall Waterfront, City Wharf in Lichfield and the Towers Business Park in Rugeley should be disposed of in the medium term, while it has also recommended the short term disposal of other interests.
These include iCentral – a one hectare site next to Wolverhampton Science Park, the James Bridge Copper Works in Walsall, part of Stoneleigh Park in Warwickshire, the remainder of its interest in Birmingham’s Eastside scheme, Stoke-on-Trent’s Central Business District and 6.5 hectares of land in Staffordshire’s Chatterley Valley. It has also recommended the former site of the BBC studios at Pebble Mill be transferred to Calthorpe Estates.
The proposals, which have been sent to stakeholders for comment, also include the transfer of 11 venture capital and loan funds currently under the control of the agency. It said these should be transferred to a limited company in the West Midlands so SMEs in the region could still access the finance.
The only exceptions to this are the Digital Media Fund and the Advantage Media Production Fund, managed by Screen West Midlands. The recommendation is these are transferred to NESTA – the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts. Failing this, it says the Arts Council should take on responsibility.
The 169-page Asset Liability Plan also includes plans for the sale of online stock exchange Investbx. The exchange is currently up for sale but if no sale is forthcoming by the end of March the business will be wound-up and the assets transferred to AWM.
Business Link West Midlands will close by the end of November but the bulk of its staff will leave at the end of March and only a skeleton staff kept on to oversee its closure.
The plan also recommends an early settlement of the deferred Eastside sale loan with Birmingham City Council. Failing agreement, the matter will be transferred to AWM’s successor.
In a letter to partners, AWM chief executive Mick Laverty said: “The plan sets out the agency’s view on the disposal and transfer of the assets and liabilities held to support our work to promote economic growth in the region.
“Our approach has been to set out our rationale and vision for the assets and liabilities that we have acquired, consider options against that vision, and then recommend the option which we feel can deliver that vision and provide the best return on investment.
“We see this as very much the first stage of this process.
“The second will be to work with partners and interested organisations to consider and agree the appropriate destination for these assets and liabilities.
“It will be vital to secure Government’s early support for our strategic approach to enable us to engage in that detailed dialogue with confidence and certainty.”
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