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Coventry Economic Forum 2009
More than 100 businessmen and women attended Insider's latest economic forum at the Ricoh Arena in Coventry. They heard invited panellists discuss key issues relating to the local economy including Ericsson's decision to close down its local operation, Coventry Airport's battle for survival, the city's ambitious regeneration plans and the parlous state of the city centre's retail offering.
John McGuigan, Coventry City Council's director of strategic planning and partnerships and Philip Roberts, partnerships director at Advantage West Midlands were amongst the panellists.
Unsurprisingly, the Ericsson decision was at the top of the list of topics for discussion. Roberts told the audience that the Ericsson news was a blow to Coventry and the sub-region.
“We have to focus initially on the people side of that. And that’s the immediate focus of the task force that has been set up. I understand that the decision won’t be reversed whatever is said. The task force will look at what will be the alternatives for the people involved. This is a group of highly skilled and much sought after people,” he said.
On the wider picture, he said some perspective was needed.
“The other issue is to consider the impact on the Ansty Park development. The Ericsson buildings comprise less than 10 per cent of the capacity of the site. There is planning permission in place there for 1.4m sq ft of buildings. Yes Ericcson was the anchor and kicked the whole concept off but now we need to think about what’s going to happen on the rest of the park. We are keen that whatever goes into those buildings doesn’t compromise Ansty as a research and development park,” he said.
McGuigan said decisions such as this were inevitable in the world we live in.
“We live in a global world and the decision Ericsson made is the sort of decisions companies make across the world. We are going to have knockbacks. It isn’t always going to be good news. But the city has been phenomenally successful with inward investment,” he said.
“We can’t compete on a level playing field with the Far East and Eastern Europe. We have to be very good at what we’re good at. We need to distinguish ourselves and not be part of a herd.
Clive Read, a partner at law firm Martineau, said: “ Everybody is very disappointed. It is a reflection of the current international situation but there is a lot of good news about Coventry and we all need to champion Coventry. The city council has taken the lead and there are some excellent universities and world class facilities for research and development. What I like is that it is a dynamic city and people want to make things happen. As long as everybody keeps banging the drum the city will thrive and prosper.
Dr Sue Rivers, acting dean of the School of Lifelomg Learning. Coventry University, said: “It’s ironic in a way because Ansty was established to pioneer the high tech and innovation side of things and we are always told in this global world that we need to innovate as we can’t compete on labour costs and yet it is actually at Ansty that we’ve lost Ericcson.
“But whilst it’s a setback it’s certainly not all there was to Coventry by any means. We have got to be really positive that organisations such as Severn Trent and QCA are relocating here.”
Read the full account of the forum in the February issue of Midlands Business Insider.
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