Aycliffe Today Business Aycliffe Today Business Issue 31 | Page 5

The magazine for Aycliffe Business Park | 5
/NEWS
/ADVICE
Finley Structures have helped to construct
a 550-tonne building on the former Vaux
brewery site in Sunderland.
UNDERSTANDING
ASSET FINANCE
Asset finance is a loan that is used to
obtain equipment.
Steel firm helps to regenerate
Sunderland’s Vaux site
Newton Aycliffe steel firm Finley Structures
is helping to regenerate an important area in
another major North-East city.
After completing steelwork on the
Riverwalk regeneration development in
Durham city, the family-run business has
fabricated and erected 550 tonnes of steel on
the former Vaux site in Sunderland, for main
contractor Carillion.
The £20m, state-of-the-art development
should be completed by June 2018 and
kick-start what is being lined up as a 20-year
project.
The five-storey building, the first of many
planned for the city centre site, will be a
60,000 sq ft office block which could also
house a bar, cafe and restaurant on the
ground floor.
The regeneration work is being delivered
by Siglion, a joint venture set up between
Carillion and Sunderland City Council.
Carillion awarded the steel element of the
project to Finley Structures, which earlier this
year completed an 1,100-tonne project at the
£30m Riverwalk development in Durham.
As well as fabricating and erecting 550
tonnes of steel at the former Vaux site, Finley
also installed six floors of PC concrete floor
planks, three PC stairs and a PC lift-shaft,
and completed their scope of works in the
summer.
The firm’s operations manager Jim Graham
said: “This was a particularly pleasing project
for us, not least because of the economic
importance of the project to Sunderland as
a city, but also because of the many added-
value items within it that we completed
for Carillion, including off-site intumescent
painting.
“It has supported local jobs in its
construction from within our own company,
while we’ve also used local labour to erect the
steel, and it was delivered on an extremely
tight programme, so all-in-all it’s been a win-
win project.”
The former brewery site in Sunderland
closed down in 1999 and has stood derelict
ever since.
Tesco bought the land in 2001, two years
after it became available, but failed to build
a supermarket there, and the site was then
bought by Sunderland City Council in 2011.
Hitachi Rail in bidding for £2.75bn HS2 contract
Newton Aycliffe train builders Hitachi Rail
have been shortlisted to the final five bidders
for HS2.
The government that four manufacturers
have been whittled down to deliver Britain’s
next generation of state-of-the-art high speed
trains, which will carry tens of thousands of
people every day across the UK’s new high
speed network and beyond.
Operating at speeds of up to 225mph
(360kph), the new fleet will deliver
unparalleled levels of reliability, speed and
comfort as well as providing much-needed
extra capacity between the UK’s major cities
and giving a boost to high tech skills and
expertise in the UK.
Hitachi will go head-to-head with rivals
Alstom Transport, Bombardier, Patentes Talgo
and Siemens for the lucrative government
deal.
They will all be invited to tender for the
contracts in spring 2018, which will cover the
design, build and maintenance of at least 54
trains coming into service from 2026, and
the winning tender will be revealed in 2019.
Hitachi Rail managing director Karen
Boswell said: “We’re delighted to have been
selected for the next stage of the rolling
stock procurement process for HS2.
“We look forward to further developing
our proposals for this hugely exciting
and important project, which will deliver
enormous benefits for the whole of the UK.”
Whenever organisations invest
in tangible assets, this could be
anything from office equipment to
manufacturing plants, from cars to
combine harvesters, they usually
need an affordable, secure means of
finance.
In fact, asset finance is the third
most common source of finance for
businesses, after bank overdrafts
and loans, and it is also of growing
importance in the public sector.
Asset finance is a flexible alternative
to a traditional bank loan, providing
significant cash flow and tax benefits
for businesses looking to purchase a
new piece of equipment, a vehicle or
other fixed assets.
Asset finance accounts for the
majority of debt-financed business
investment.
Around one in three small
businesses that have any external
borrowing use asset finance.
Amongst these, the use of asset
finance is particularly high in the
North East (46%) with agricultural
and manufacturing making the most
of leased equipment.
Although most banks offer a range
of assets finance products, there are
dozens of specialist lenders providing
bespoke solutions. Several of these
lenders are very competitive in
specific sectors such as trucks and
also renewables.
Asset finance can also be used to
release much needed cash. It is a
simple, speedy solution without the
need for complex legal intervention.
The options and choices are endless
so always seek advice from a
commercial finance expert, they
could provide you with the asset
solution you’ve been looking for.
Mike Coates
Commercial Expert
commercialexpert.co.uk