Summit forges closer links between Indian and UK business

A MANUFACTURING summit in Birmingham has helped to forge closer links between businesses in the UK and the sub-continent, the Indian High Commissioner has said.

Nalin Surie said the summit, held at Birmingham Council House, had brought together SMEs from India and the UK and the partnerships created would hopefully lead to new business opportunities.

“British SMEs are keen to expand using the opportunities that Indian markets provide for them. SMEs on both sides can complement each other, particularly in advanced engineering, clean technology, energy efficiency systems, renewable energy, and many others.

“This is an important time for both economies and events such as this will help to forge closer ties between our two countries,” said Mr Surie.

The event, which followed on from Prime Minister David Cameron’s visit to India earlier this year, attracted delegates from more than 100 firms across the UK.

Birmingham was chosen as the venue for the event because of its central location and close ties with the Indian community.

Aside from the networking opportunities, the trade conference was an opportunity for Indian businesses to explore potential business collaborations with UK companies in the manufacturing and technology sector.  

It featured a number of workshops on critical developments taking place within the Indian and UK economies, in particular in life sciences, low carbon technologies and advanced engineering. The latter was lead by delegates from Tata Motors, who explained about the new electric vehicles being developed by the company at its European technology centre in Warwickshire.

Other contributions came from Aston University, Loughborough University and the Warwick Manufacturing Group as well as nine visiting Indian business organisations such as Delegates Engineering Export Promotion Council of India and The National Small Industries Corporation of India.

Cllr Mike Whitby, Leader of Birmingham City Council, which hosted the conference, said manufacturing was set to play a vital part in the future of both economies and Birmingham was keen to play its part.

“Manufacturing will play a hugely important role in the UK’s economic recovery, with our highly skilled workforce and favourable exchange rate for export it already accounts for 11% of our economic output,” he said.

He said he supported the Prime Minister’s view that the UK should look to strengthen its trade relations with India, to the point where the UK was India’s partner of choice.

Cllr Whitby, who is also President of Business Birmingham, the city’s inward investment programme, added: “The West Midlands has always enjoyed healthy trade relations with India being second only to the US for foreign job creation in the region between 2003 and 2009 – higher than the rest of the UK.”

He said the conference had helped Birmingham strengthen its business ties with the sub-continent and “become an ambassador for the UK’s ongoing relations with Indian business”.

After further discussions last night, the Indian delegates were today touring manufacturing facilities at Jaguar Land Rover and research facilities at Aston and Loughborough universities.