SDI reveals key trade and investment results

Date Created: 30 June 2011

Scottish Development International’s international trade and investment activity has directly helped to generate over £600 million of planned inward investment for Scotland, creating and safeguarding over 9,300 planned jobs, and has helped 950 Scottish companies to export during the last year, results announced today reveal.

Scottish Development International (SDI), which plays a key role in supporting Scottish Enterprise's strategy to increase Scotland’s competitiveness in the global economy, has announced its key results from the last financial year:

More than 9,300 planned jobs were created or safeguarded, including over 2,000 planned high-value jobs – those in research design and development and/or earning in excess of £31,000 a year
950 Scottish high-potential companies were assisted to target new international markets
136 international projects – special projects with the potential to achieve additional international growth of £1 million within 3 years – were achieved with a value of £405 million projected sales over the next 3 years
Scottish companies are generating a projected £313 million in sales from taking part in exhibitions, trade missions and ‘learning journeys’ supported by SDI
500 Scottish company delegates attended SDI international market awareness events in Scotland
Almost 1,500 Scottish company delegates have benefited from Smart Exporter events, products and services since the launch of the initiative in September 2010
There have been over 16,000 new registrations for TalentScotland, following the launch of a new TalentScotland.com website

Scotland outperforms Europe

SDI’s overseas promotion of Scotland as the ideal location to do business has helped to ensure Scotland’s status as among the top ten destinations for investment.

During the last year, Scotland was the top region for attracting R&D projects into the UK (Ernst & Young's European Investment Monitor 2011) and the most successful region in the UK for overall number of jobs attracted through foreign direct investment (Ernst & Young 2011 UK Attractiveness Survey).

Commenting, Anne MacColl, Chief Executive of SDI, said:

“2010 was an excellent year for SDI, both in terms of inward and outward results, and we’re immensely proud of these achievements. They illustrate not only that there is growing international confidence in Scotland as a location to invest but also that our home-grown companies are becoming ever more internationally ambitious.

“This is due in no small part to the work of our colleagues at Scottish Enterprise and HIE for really pushing international trade as a growth opportunity, and with some of these companies now projecting strong international sales as a result of SDI support, we want even more Scottish companies to be inspired to broaden their horizons.

“We also have an exciting year ahead in terms of further developing the international trade and investment agenda for Scotland. We're focusing on the delivery of our recently-published trade and investment strategy, and will be working closely with our SE, HIE and Scottish Government colleagues as part of the Team Scotland approach to take this forward.”

More major players choose Scotland

Enterprise Minister Fergus Ewing added:

"From its Scottish headquarters and network of overseas trade and investment offices, Scottish Development International (SDI) works tirelessly to promote Scotland as an attractive, competitive destination for inward investment.

"SDI is a modern Scottish success story. SDI played a pivotal role in ensuring leading international companies, such as Amazon, Mitsubishi Power Systems, Barclays, Blackrock and Gamesa chose Scotland to expand their operations.

"These results illustrate why Scotland was the most successful region in the UK in terms of the overall number of jobs attracted through foreign direct investment last year."

Last year, an independent evaluation report was published showing that SDI contributes £325 million GVA a year to the Scottish economy through its inward investment and export activities.

The evaluation findings suggest that for every £1 spent by SDI on attracting inward investment to Scotland, a further £11 is generated for the Scottish economy, while export activity generates an additional £13 for every £1 invested by SDI.