In this edition our newest Patron, Babcock International, sets out its ambitious future plans and shares details of the many opportunities to join them on a journey as they connect with the wider community and restore pride in one of Plymouth’s oldest and most recognised landmarks
Babcock is an international aerospace, defence and security company, with a leading naval business, providing value add services across a range of countries, helping customers in the UK and around the world to improve the capability, reliability and availability of their most critical assets.
One of the largest sites that it owns and operates is Devonport Royal Dockyard (DRD) – one of Plymouth’s oldest and most iconic landmarks with a rich heritage and history dating back 300 years, which is co-located with Her Majesty’s Naval Base Devonport to form the largest naval support site in Western Europe.
Working in partnership with the Ministry of Defence at Devonport, Babcock provides through-life support for submarines, surface ships and associated systems and equipment as part of its continuing commitment to support our nation’s naval capability.
As one of the region’s largest employers, Babcock is a strong investor in people and proud to be a Cornerstone Employer. Over the next decade, there will be more than 1,000 early careers job opportunities as well as a variety of other marine and nuclear related roles on offer.
Having a strong pipeline of work in the years ahead provides Babcock with an excellent opportunity to proactively plan and prioritise. One of its primary areas of focus is sustainability, with a view to working much more collaboratively with local businesses by building on existing foundations and increasing local supply chain spend by many millions of pounds.
Its strong links with the local community has resulted in tens of thousands of pounds donated to a wide range of charitable organisations in the area and the continued delivery of innovative STEM programmes in many schools and colleges across the city to encourage and inspire our engineers of the future.
Babcock proudly supports events such as the city’s annual Armed Forces Day, as well as cultural attractions, including its sponsorship of The Box. One of the company’s priorities, as described in our Spring edition, is to contribute directly to the growth of the region’s economy by doing even more to support local enterprise, as well as increase visibility in the city. Babcock supports Plymouth’s Freeport Bid and is inviting local businesses to work with them in the years ahead to enable the delivery of more sustainable practices as part of the company’s strong ESG agenda.
Paul Foster, the Managing Director at Devonport Royal Dockyard, has ambitious plans for the site. He said: “There has never been a better time to come on board with Babcock – we’re taking on hundreds of apprentices and graduates each year across a wide range of disciplines, and with significant investment being made across the site over the next 15 years to further modernise many of our assets to support ships and submarines of the future, now is the time to join us on our journey.
“The dockyard site has a rich heritage and we are fortunate, particularly in the current economic climate, to have an exciting future driven by innovation and digitalisation. With an established pipeline of work we can map opportunities and positively embrace the changes needed to evolve our business and support our customers.
“We cannot do that alone, and as only around 10% of our business is uniquely defence related, there are many opportunities for local SMEs to work with us in the years ahead, so if you’re interested and have a partnership proposition we’d love to hear from you. This is a time of positive change and you can be a part of it.”
Building on the success of the prospective supplier event held in March of this year in conjunction with the Plymouth and Devon Chamber, another session is planned for the Autumn and all prospective partnering proposals are welcome.
Inside the walls of the dockyard so much positive and innovative work is being delivered and during such a productive and exciting time for Babcock we look forward to hearing more about its plans for investment, innovation and transformation.
