Located just under a two-hour drive from London Piccadilly, the Thames Valley has been a popular base for international companies. The excellent transport links make the region accessible for all, including international visitors who'll fly into London Heathrow Airport, which is just a 16-minute drive from tech-towns Slough and Uxbridge and a six-minute drive from Stockley Park.
Known as the Silicon Valley of the UK, the Thames Valley is home to the HQ's of many well-known companies, from different sectors, including advanced engineering, life sciences and healthcare and digital technology. Find out more about why you should move your business to the Thames Valley.
Take a look behind the scenes of some of the thriving businesses that have set up in Thames Valley region...
Slough
O2 have offices all over the UK including Glasgow, Leeds and Manchester as well as over 400 retail stores, however, chose Slough to house their headquarters. In 2010, O2 began the relocation and refurbishment, named OurSpace. This project was the refurbishment of their former Slough office, the expansion of a new building next door and the connection by a new entrance named 'the Link'. With the vision of a greener workplace, O2 HQ has enough desks to achieve 'hot-desking', reducing desk numbers by 548 and saving an estimated £7,000 per desk.
HTC was founded in Tawain in 1997 and after creating the first smartphone in 2002, opened a small office in Slough, home to just 5 employees. Since then they have created the first Microsoft 3G phone, released their own device named the HTC Touch and launched the first Android phone, known as the G1 after partnering with T-Mobile and Google. In 2011, HTC relocated its 15,000 employees to a larger site in Slough.
Uxbridge
In 2016, Coca Cola European Partners (CCPE) was established and began trading as the world's largest Coca-Cola bottler from their head office in Uxbridge. This new company became responsible for 25,000 employees across Europe, making, distributing and selling products to Coca-Cola's 300 million customers across 13 international markets. Being only a 16-minute drive from London Heathrow Airport, the Uxbridge office is ideally located for meetings with their international offices and any other international meetings.
Lavazza Coffee UK ltd announced they were making Uxbridge the new home of their head office in 2016. It's no coincidence that Lavazza Coffee relocated the same year as Coca Cola since they moved into the former Uxbridge office of the bottling company. Of course, they had to put their own spin on the place and opened up a cafe in the atrium of the building, available to employees, visitors and the public.
Stockley Park
Canon announced in the Summer of 2019 that their UK and Ireland office will be relocated to join their existing Europe, Middle East and Africa HQ in Stockley Park where they currently employee 750 staff. The UK and Ireland's MD explained that "having a joint location will enable the company to look for more opportunities and share current resources".
World Vision opened its office for global operations in Stockley Park in 2010. In an article about the move, World Vision explains that they chose the Stockley Park area due to its close proximity to London Heathrow Airport giving them air access to programmes around the world.
Interested in joining these thriving businesses? Explore Orega's serviced offices in The Thames Valley by downloading our brochure below.
Header Image Source: Orega
