The UK’s National Composites Centre (NCC, Bristol; www.nationalcompositescentre.co.uk) was formally opened by the Secretary of State for the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills, Vince Cable on 24 November 2011. The event, attended by more than 200 guests, incorporated a display assembled by NCC members highlighting the capabilities of composites technology across a range of industries. Included were an electric car with a composite body, tidal turbine blades and aircraft wing components.

The NCC is a GBP 25m (EUR 29m) investment hosted and owned by the University of Bristol that is designed to provide industrial-scale manufacturing facilities capable of building prototypes to validate design concepts and rapid manufacturing processes. State-of-the-art machinery includes a world-leading GBP 2.5m (EUR 2.9m) robotic, automatic fibre placement unit. The investment for the 8,500 m² NCC facility was supported by the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (GBP 12m), the South West Regional Development Agency (GBP 4m) and the European Regional Development Fund (GBP 9m) – see Plasteurope.com of 16.09.2010. It will be run by a steering board comprising the university and Tier 1 members Augusta Westland, Airbus, Rolls-Royce, GKN, Umeco and Vesta, who have committed almost GBP 5.5m (EUR 6.4m) over three years.

The NCC will work with universities and international businesses to develop and commercialise new technologies. It already has commitments from large and medium-sized enterprises involved in renewable energy, aerospace, automotive, defence, marine and rail, according to Jim Godman, chair of the NCC’s steering board. He added: “We have mechanisms in place for engaging more small and medium-sized enterprises, because the centre is generating significant interest from all sectors of UK-based businesses.”

NCC is located on Bristol & Bath Science Park, close to three of GKN Aerospace’s (Worcs / UK; www.gknaerospace.com) composite manufacturing operations. It has already based a 15-member composites research team at the centre working on new programmes to develop composite technologies to extend the performance and lower the emissions of future aircraft. Referring to the new facility, Marcus Bryson, GKN Aerospace CEO, said: “It will be a key resource for us at GKN Aerospace as we and our team of suppliers work to maximise the UK’s involvement in the growing global aerospace market over the next 30 to 40 years.”

Coinciding with the opening of the National Composites Centre, two new senior executive appointments have been made. Tom Hitchings, formerly business director at Tods Aerospace (Crewkerne / UK; www.tods.co.uk), has been named NCC´s business development director and Rob Ludford, previously managing director of Beagle Aerospace (Christchurch / UK; www.beagletechnologygroup.com), its operations director.

There are around 1,500 companies currently in the UK composites sector, with 85% of business accounted for by the largest 38 companies. These generate over GBP 1.1 bn (EUR 1.3 bn) annually, with around half the business destined for export. The UK composites market is expected to grow by around 8% a year to 2020.