A new Higher Apprenticeship in Research & Development is to be launched at Prodrive in Banbury on 1st May 2013. The qualification has been developed by the UK’s leading provider of manufacturing apprenticeships, Pera Training, Excellence Achievement & Learning (EAL) and the Oxfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership, in partnership with a number of local employers from the engineering and manufacturing sectors. Giles English, co-founder of the award-winning Henley chronometers Bremont, will highlight the pivotal role of research and development in bringing their luxury watch vision from the drawing-board to reality, and the importance of a qualification of this kind for companies creating technical products.

R&D Higher Apprenticeship Project Manager Steve Gledhill from Pera, said, “On a daily basis, manufacturing companies are developing new products. They are also coming up with new processes or making improvements to existing processes. The process from concept through design and into manufacture impacts on cost. Reducing leadtimes, understanding innovation, new product development and the supply chain are key elements of this new Higher Apprenticeship. Understanding these principles and putting them into practice will enable competitive advantage, enabling individuals and organisations with these skills to develop new and better products for the future”

This follows findings in a recent study from ICM Research that employers in England regarded qualified Higher Apprentices as the most desirable recruits, rating this group 25% more employable than those who took an alternative route to work. Higher Apprenticeships are the newest expansion to the apprenticeship family, having only been in development since 2011 but they are transforming the way in which businesses are acquiring and developing the skills they need. A Higher Apprenticeship gives businesses a different route to training new recruits to degree-equivalent levels or providing progressive skills training for existing employees.

Sir Tony Baldry, MP for North Oxfordshire, praised the new qualification saying that it was a clear route to “higher class skills that will enable individual companies and the UK collectively to compete with the rest of the world”. He particularly welcomed news that the launch was taking place in Banbury saying “Banbury has a number of world-class engineering and manufacturing firms – Prodrive, Norbar Torque, Crompton Technology, and many others, all offering quality apprenticeships. I hope that the development of Higher Apprenticeships will encourage other companies to come forward and offer this route.”