Contract boost for Siemens in Lincoln welcomed by Chancellor
Siemens in Lincoln has won a contract worth more than £30 million to deliver gas turbines to a major South American company.
All nine of the core engines for these turbines and six of the full packages will be manufactured in the Siemens plant in Lincoln and supplied to OCENSA, the main oil line pipeline operator responsible for 70% of the crude oil transported in Columbia.
The announcement, which helps secure jobs at the Lincoln site for the long-term, came as the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne visited the firm’s Lincoln base after he and the Prime Minister set out in two major speeches their six-point long term economic plan for the Midlands.
There, the pair announced that a key cornerstone of the long term plan is to make the Midlands an engine for growth by investing in skills and transport, and backing the area’s core strengths such as manufacturing and engineering and by doing so, creating 300,000 extra jobs locally over the next five years.
The latest Siemens contract win underlines the success of the company’s gas turbine business in Lincoln. Gas turbines have been manufactured in Lincoln for over 60 years and Siemens is one of the largest local employers with a workforce of around 1,500.
This announcement follows a positive year for the Lincoln base of the company, with work having also just begun on the extension to the Siemens Product Training School, based at the University of Lincoln, with the help of a further £500k contribution by Siemens.
By opening the training school, the university has been able to offer programmes of electrical engineering training, alongside its existing programmes of mechanical engineering. Work upon the award-winning facility is already well advanced, with a completion and handover date scheduled for December 2015.
Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne said:
As part of the long term economic plan we have set out today, we want to make the area an engine for growth. Our plan involves backing the core strengths of the local economy here in Lincoln, like advanced manufacturing and engineering. This new contract win, alongside the development of a new school for engineers, is a great boost for Lincoln and the workforce at Siemens which is going from strength to strength.
Neil Corner, Managing Director, Siemens Industrial Turbomachinery Ltd, said:
We are delighted to have secured this contract and it proves once again that by continuing to invest in our people, facilities and innovation, we have a world-class business here in Lincoln that is able to compete and win in the global market place.