Latest Video

Anne MacColl, chief executive of Scottish Development International.

Scottish Development International helps boost exports and save jobs

Posted: 21st June 2012

Over 1,000 high potential companies were helped to target new global markets by a Scottish agency in the last financial year.

And at the same time Scottish Development International's overseas trade and investment activity created or safeguarded over 7,000 jobs north of the border.

The agency also worked with 190 companies on international projects which have a projected growth of £733m in sales over the next three years – almost double what was previously achieved.

A joint venture between Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and the Scottish government, SDI works closely with Scottish companies to help them grow their operations in the global market place and to bring inward investment to Scotland.

Other key results include: 

• Over 1800 of the 7,000 planned jobs created or safeguarded in 2011/12 were high-value jobs
• Over 1,380 Scottish companies were supported through a range of trade and investment activities, such as workshops, trade missions and in-market support. This included support to 1,055 firms with strong business growth potential.
• Almost £22m of Regional Selective Assistance (RSA) support for projects with a planned expenditure of almost £163m was offered to over 30 inward investors to locate or grow their operations in Scotland. This included an award of £1.5m of RSA to world-leading wind energy company Gamesa to create over 130 jobs at its offshore wind technology R&D centre in Lanarkshire.
• Over 2,200 Scottish company delegates benefited from Smart Exporter events, products and services since it was launched in 2010. 
• There were over 17,800 new registrations for TalentScotland in the past year, following the launch of the TalentScotland.com website, which aims to attract new highly skilled people to work in Scotland.
• GlobalScot had its most successful year-to-date generating over 450 requests for assistance from Scottish companies to members of the GlobalScot network 
• Fifty GlobalScot events were held in Scotland and overseas, with 430 attendees and 140 one-on-one meetings between companies and GlobalScots. There were 65 new members to the GlobalScot network, bringing the total number of members to 778.

Commenting on the results, Anne MacColl, chief executive of Scottish Development International, said: "We know that a strong international strategy can completely transform a business by helping it to increase productivity, improve innovation performance and diversify its customer base.

"Equally important, is building on Scotland’s success as a global location. We know that Scotland has an outstanding international reputation and investments last year alone from global companies such Avaloq, Samsung Heavy Industries and Gamesa are testament to this."