Solihull has received a major inward investment boost with the news that engineering services giant Balfour Beatty has moved one of its operations from Tamworth to Blyth Valley Business Park. It has relocated its health and education and regional business operations to the business park just off junction four of the M42 in Solihull. Around 80 staff will be based at the Trigen House building and will support the firm’s health and education contracts including projects such as phase one of the £316m Acute Birmingham New Hospital which BBES recently completed ten months ahead of schedule. Paul Rubincam of Liberty Property Trust UK, which owns Blythe Valley Park in partnership with Doughty Hanson & Co Real Estate, said: “Balfour Beatty Engineering Services is a major player in the international engineering world and will be co-ordinating highly complex projects across the country from the park. We look forward to working closely with the company’s management team and assisting BBES with their growth plans in any way we can.” Blythe Valley Park boasts more than two million sq ft of office space and is home to companies such as Arup, Virgin, Scott Wilson and UK Athletics.

Simbal, the Chapel-en-le-Frith-based electrical supplier, has undergone a management buyout under managing director Steve Woolley. The company, which supplies equipment to the crane and materials lifting industry, acquired an undisclosed funding package from the Royal Bank of Scotland to complete the buyout. Woolley replaces Brian Ball as the majority shareholder of the business, which has an annual turnover of £1.5m.

Stadco, the automotive body-in-white supplier based in Shrewsbury, has secured several new contracts with Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) to work on vehicles across both brands’ product ranges. Dermot Sterne, Stadco managing director said: “We are delighted in taking on additional work from Jaguar Land Rover, which will not only assist the company in its strategy of consolidating its UK supply base, but will also safeguard jobs and production in the UK.”

ICT education specialist XMA, based in Wilford, has secured a national contract to deliver equipment to children with special education needs and physical impairments as part of the government’s home access programme. Alongside assistive technology firm iansyst, XMA will provide up to 12,000 individually configured computer programmes for children through the contract, which is one of its most substantial to date.

Power System Services, which carries out performance improvement services for heating and air supplies to 15 power stations, has completed the purchase of a second manufacturing facility after being awarded a grant of £200,000 from the East Midlands Development Agency (Emda). The purchase of the 33,992 sq ft manufacturing facility at Sheepbridge Trading Estate, Chesterfield, at a cost of £1.05m, will enable the company to compete effectively in growing markets for technologies to reduce harmful emissions.

The NEC in Birmingham has won the Sustainable Initiative of the Year award at the association of event organisers (AEO) awards. The venue’s team were given the award for the site’s £330,000 waste pre-treatment centre, which enables materials collected on-site following live events and exhibitions to be sorted and transported to local recycling centres, rather than to landfill sites. In its first year of operation, the centre has sent 992 tonnes of waste to be recycled.

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The investors behind Fosse Park, based near Leicester, have hired chartered surveyor Franc Warwick to sell the £360m site to a shortlist of investors. The Irish owners of Fosse Park Partnership bought the 417,000sq ft site in 2006, which is the number one ranked retail park in the country. Franco Sidoli, founder of Franc Warwick, said: “This is a unique opportunity to buy the best retail park in the country at a yield significantly ahead of medium term financing rates.”

East Midlands business adviser Cooper Parry has sold half of the 17 bedroom mansion of 17th Century Clifton Hall near Nottingham. The property is a Grade 1 listed building based in Clifton Village with a long and colourful history dating back to the English Civil War. It was part of Nottingham Trent University but more recently it was owned by the Rashid family. The remaining part of the property is still on the market with an asking price of just under £1m.

This week, chief executive of Birmingham-based property consultants Rider Levett Bucknall, Lance Taylor, discusses the significance of the £30m redevelopment of Edgbaston cricket ground in Insider’s weekly guest blog. How can this investment in sport help a community in the face of adversity? And is this the first of several steps towards the region's economic recovery? Click here to find out.

More than £3.6m of property in the Midlands will go under the hammer at a sale in Nottingham. The auction, which will take place on 13 July, is being held by Nottingham-based chartered surveyor Heb, and will feature 30 residential and commercial properties. Matt Hilton, auctioneer and partner, Heb, described the properties for sale as “a real mixed bag” which would include pubs, houses and investment opportunities.

A property expert has suggested that focusing efforts to encourage retail development in Staffordshire’s towns and cities could help the area emerge from the commercial property downturn. Speaking at the latest InStaffs ‘Developing Staffordshire’ event, Cushman & Wakefield’s head of retail development Mark McVicar said: “Success will be delivered through greater preparation and more creative marketing of new opportunities, a willingness to be flexible in title and development agreements and through simplifying and accelerating the planning processes.”