How Business Durham has helped companies thrive and grow in 2021
Meeting the
challenge
For Business Durham 2021 has been a really busy year . As the business support service for Durham County Council , our main focus has been to help businesses to recover from the impact of Covid through our ongoing business engagement and range of business support programmes .
County Durham businesses have displayed significant resilience in rising to the challenges . Many of them have demonstrated tremendous agility and innovation , which has enabled them to adapt how they work or diversify to survive .
It has been crucial throughout that businesses have been able to get the right support , which is where Business Durham has been able to help .
From early in the pandemic businesses were being bombarded by information from government and many other sources .
One of the first things we did was to use our existing links with businesses to direct them to the information they needed to know and the support available .
In January Durham County Council launched the Durham Business Recovery Grant , designed and delivered by the team at Business Durham .
The grant scheme has supported 339 businesses across County Durham to overcome the challenges caused by the pandemic and helped safeguard over 3,500 jobs .
As companies applying for the grant had to put together a clear and credible recovery plan , the grant was able to offer something extra to businesses to move forward , enabling them to adapt and thrive while securing jobs .
County Durham is an exciting place to be right now with so much investment taking place across the county , driven by both the private sector and Durham County Council .
In September we were delighted to secure approval from Durham County Council for a £ 50m investment to expand the North East Technology Park ( NETPark ) at Sedgefield with the ambition to create more than 1,200 jobs .
NETPark is one of the UK ’ s premier science , engineering and technology parks and is a hugely important innovation asset for County Durham and the North-East .
The park provides world-class infrastructure , facilities and support to enable companies engaged in science and R & D to be able to compete with the best in the world .
We are seeing a real demand for the specialist facilities on-site from companies that want to grow , scale-up and commercialise their operations .
The expansion will enable us to accommodate the growing demand , both from businesses already established in the park and from companies looking to be part of the collaborative innovation community at NETPark .
The next phase of growth will bring more well paid , highly skilled jobs in our region , help to retain graduate talent , increase research and
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