Huddersfield Unlimited
A town at the heart of the northern powerhouse is reinventing itself, boosted by a visionary university, a massive regeneration project that’s well underway and incentives for businesses to move there.
Huddersfield now has land available for companies to relocate to a part of the country that’s close to the M62 and M1 yet is set in some of the UK’s most stunning countryside complete with affordable homes.
The town is in the West Yorkshire Health Innovation and Digital Tech Investment Zone which has £160 million in funding over 10 years for innovation infrastructure and development programmes.
The town’s skyline has been transformed in recent years with several new landmark University of Huddersfield buildings packed with the latest high technology equipment – ranging from engineering to textiles – that businesses can use for research and development or to enhance their manufacturing.
The university is forging a national reputation with its new National Health Innovation Campus which uses state-of-the-art equipment for its midwifery, nursing, occupational therapy, paramedic science, physiotherapy, podiatry and speech and language therapy courses.
By the end of this year it will have new purpose-built radiography centre including a community diagnostic hub run by the local NHS trust to provide tests for patients, including MRI and CT scanners.
Huddersfield Unlimited, the organisation that champions Huddersfield’s businesses, investors and communities, says the amount of work now going on in the town – especially the half-mile stretch from Huddersfield Railway Station to the Accu Stadium where Huddersfield Town Football Club’s American owner Kevin Nagle has plans for a major entertainment complex - means it’s the best time to invest in the town in living memory.
Huddersfield Unlimited chair Sir John Harman said: “In my 40-plus years of promoting Huddersfield there has never been a better time to invest here. The town has a rich engineering and textile heritage and, with the new National Health Innovation Campus being a huge bonus for health-related companies to move here too, now is the time for all these kinds of businesses and many more to make that move to a town that will welcome them with open arms.”
Huddersfield is already well on with a huge regeneration project called Cultural Heart which is completely remodelling a large part of the town centre to provide a stunning Grade II listed food hall, open spaces, entertainment venues, an art gallery, museum and library.
Sir John added: “As an organisation standing up for the businesses of Huddersfield we know that for the town to prosper in the future new investment is needed from the private sector and with over £1billion of public money currently underpinning developments around the town, the time for that investment is ripe.
“Good quality sites are at a premium here and the repurposing of industrial land along the Leeds Road corridor from the station to the stadium and beyond is the key to growth. The manufacturing or digital businesses of the future are the ones we need to attract.”
This has already started with the announcement that world-renowned Paxman Coolers, a global pioneer in scalp cooling to help prevent hair loss during chemotherapy, has plans to move to a purpose-built health innovation research and digital manufacturing centre close to the National Health Innovation Campus.
Paxman chief executive Richard Paxman said: “The fact we are surrounded by some of the best higher education institutions in the north means we have outstanding opportunities for research and development, business growth, skills development and job creation.”
Sir John says the key to those investments is the availability of land in these areas near to Huddersfield town centre and there is plenty of choice at the moment.
This includes 20-acres of land at agrichemical giant Syngenta for advanced manufacturing at its Leeds Road site and seven acres of flat industrial land at Gasworks Street near the Accu stadium along with other sites along the neighbouring Old Leeds Road and St Andrews Road.
The massive Transpennine Route Upgrade to electrify the line from Manchester to York via Huddersfield and Leeds and vastly improve Huddersfield Railway Station is expected to increase footfall through the town’s station to 7 million people by 2029 and significantly shorten journeys to the nearby cities of Leeds and Manchester.
Sir John added: “Huddersfield is moving forward. There are cranes on the skyline, there are committed plans for new developments all around the town so we would urge businesses to come and talk to us about how they can be an important part of Huddersfield’s future.”
The countryside surrounding Huddersfield has dozens of villages including Slaithwaite which was named the best place to live in the north by The Sunday Times in 2022.
Huddersfield Unlimited and architects AHR have just made a stunning fly-through video of the station to the stadium corridor and Huddersfield town centre which shows where all the developments will be.
To watch it go to https://youtu.be/DXeTkRXBL-s
To find out more about relocating a business to Huddersfield contact Sir John via Huddersfield Unlimited at info@huddersfieldunlimited.co.uk