Businesses looking to take advantage of high speed broadband at Skylon Park can now access a new package of support.
Financial assistance for superfast broadband is on offer as well as expert advice and business support via the Fastershire project which is working with partners to deliver high speed in the region.
Businesses at Skylon Park, the Hereford Enterprise Zone site at Rotherwas, were given a first look at some of the new technology, equipment and services enabled through high speed broadband at the support package launch.
Guests were invited to see the CREATE:Lab, a mobile unit which will visit sites across Herefordshire and has some of the latest equipment on board such as a 3D printer and scanner, tablets and mobile devices to showcase how effective services like the Cloud can be to businesses.
The free expert advice is provided via the European Union funded CREATE project. It sees local advisors on hand to visit businesses across Herefordshire at their premises to understand how they operate and what opportunities there are for growth.
The session will result in a tailored action plan designed by Skylon Park-based web company ‘Design by Soap’ to help businesses implement the advice.
While the Fastershire project continues to deliver superfast broadband, further financial support is now available for businesses in Rotherwas who find superfast speeds are just not enough.
They can now go ultrafast through a match funded ERDF grant enabling them to buy their own ultrafast service, giving minimum speeds of 100Mbps download and 20Mbps upload.
Bill Jackson, chairman of the Enterprise Zone at Skylon Park, said: “Many businesses investing in the Enterprise Zone and those already based here need to be able to compete on a global playing field. This is why being able to access superfast and ultrafast broadband upload and downloads speeds is so important.
“The grant support will allow businesses to go ultrafast at a lower cost thanks to the available grants and I’d urge businesses to take advantage of the support on offer from Fastershire.”
The grant is part of Herefordshire Council’s Passport 2 Fastershire which will ensure that no business which needs NGA will be left without it. The scheme uses a mixture of council and European funding and is allocated on a needs basis.
Any businesses interested in applying for grant funding can visitwww.passport2fastershire.com or for business support www.create-nwe.eu