In Brief: 99p store; Twenty Four Seven Nursing; York Science Park; University of Hull; FSB

AN empty unit has been brought back to life and 30 new jobs are being created as a new 99p store opens in the Ridings Shopping Centre.

The shop will be taking the 7,000 sq ft unit located on the middle mall of the Wakefield-based shopping centre.
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NURSING and homecare recruitment agency Twenty Four Seven Nursing is moving to larger premises in Ilkley to allow the business to double in size.

The agency, which has 25 staff, is also set to open a new office in Birmingham early next month to serve the demand for qualified nurses in the West Midlands region.

The growth comes after the West Yorkshire company secured a place on the new Government Procurement Service (GPS) framework for the supply of agency nurses and social care workers across the UK public sector.
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YORK Science Park has welcomed three new businesses to its incubation space, Springboard.

These businesses are GameSparks, Haider Green and Expresso Investments.

Managing director of York Science Park, Tracey Smith, said: “I’m thrilled to welcome three more entrepreneurial start-up businesses to our exciting incubation space, Springboard. From mobile games development and energy consultancy to product design, these diverse businesses will contribute to, and benefit from, the dynamic environment that Springboard offers.

“As some of our existing early stage businesses are now established and moving on to the next stage of their development, we still have room for more new businesses.”
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ENGINEERS at the University of Hull are part of a successful £6m bid to create a Centre for Cryogenic Energy Storage with the University of Birmingham.

The project will revolutionise how energy is stored, ensuring that power is always available when it is needed.

The grant was announced by Minister for Universities and Science, David Willetts, as part of a £85 million investment to support and strengthen existing research in the areas of robotics and autonomous systems, advanced materials, and grid-scale energy storage.

One strand of the research will be led by Dr Meihong Wang from the school of engineering at the University of Hull.

Based at the University of Birmingham, the Centre for Cryogenic Energy Storage will be the UK’s first dedicated research facility for energy storage using cryogenic liquids.

The University of Hull will use the funding to purchase high performance computers and software for modelling the integration of energy storage processes into power generation.
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NEW research from the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) shows that 58% more of the money spent by local authorities with small firms is re-spent in the local economy compared to that spent with large businesses in the same area.

In an exclusive report the FSB and the Centre for Local Economic Strategies surveyed local authorities across the UK and found that in the last year they spent a total of £8.7bn buying goods and services in their local area.

The findings highlight how doing business locally is better value for money as small local firms generated £746m more for the local economy compared to large local businesses – even though more than £500m less was spent with them.

The research shows that for every £1 spent with a small or medium-sized business (SMEs) 63p was re-spent in the local area compared to 40p in every £1 spent with a larger business.

The FSB wants to see more local authorities using businesses in their areas to help boost economic growth. The business group believes that if each authority had spent an additional five per cent of their budget locally and committed just three per cent more of that to small local firms, an additional £788m could have been generated for local economies.