Bruntwood SciTech injects further £2.4m to transform Birmingham city centre workspace

Bruntwood SciTech, the UK’s largest dedicated property provider to the innovation economy, has today announced investing a further £2.4 million into Birmingham as part of an ambitious plan to transform its Mclaren innovation hub. The project, located less than 5 minutes’ walk from the future HS2 Curzon Street Station, will see the building undergo a full refurbishment to expand its workspace offering to meet a growing occupier demand from innovation-led businesses for serviced space and flexible office sizes, while also introducing new health and wellbeing-focused amenities. A new name for the building will also be announced when the transformation is completed in Spring next year in line with its new vision and elevated workspace.

Working with interior design company Axi Studios, Bruntwood SciTech - a partnership between Bruntwood, Legal & General and Greater Manchester Pension Fund - will transform the currently unused basement into a new state-of-the-art gym, with spacious changing rooms and shower facilities. Alongside this, there will also be a new contemplation room for people to use for private meditation or reflection, as well as a secure bike store to encourage greener, active travel.

The work will also enhance Mclaren’s workspace offering for startup and scale up businesses with the addition of new serviced offices, ranging from two to 30 desks, adding to the leased space that was previously on offer. The reception and lounge spaces, with accompanying breakout space will be completely redesigned to provide a seamless transition through to these new workspaces and give the building a brighter and more open feel.

The redevelopment marks the latest milestone in Bruntwood SciTech’s efforts to support the creation of a city-wide innovation ecosystem with high-quality workspaces for this sector that make customer wellbeing a priority and inspire collaboration, connectivity and innovation. So far this year it has already invested £50m and has completed works to enhance wellbeing and customer experience at Cornerblock in the Colmore Business District, commenced works on a full refurbishment project of Centre City next to New Street Station, and has continued construction on the first phase of Birmingham Health Innovation Campus - the Midlands’ first dedicated life science campus. 

Located alongside the city’s ‘Knowledge Quarter’ in Eastside, which is currently undergoing major redevelopment as part of Birmingham’s Big City Plan, and a mere 5 minute walk from Moor Street station, Mclaren will offer 112,000 sq ft of workspace across 20 floors, with its upper floors enjoying impressive panoramic views of the entire city. Based near both Aston and Birmingham City universities, it is a growing hub for creative and innovative businesses. Mclaren is currently home to sustainable energy solutions firm Energy Saving Group, customer contact solutions provider Sigma, and infrastructure services provider Kier Highways, among others.

As part of Bruntwood SciTech’s commitment to sustainability, the communal and serviced office spaces of the building will be powered by 100% renewable energy delivered through Bruntwood’s £9.7m investment in Kirk Hill Wind Farm in Ayrshire, Scotland. The project provides clean energy across the business’ portfolio as Bruntwood SciTech works to ensure that all operations under its direct control will be net zero by 2030. 

Meanwhile the office spaces in Mclaren will use air source heat pumps and heat recovery ventilation with smart metering throughout, helping to improve the building’s energy efficiency.

Businesses locating to Mclaren will benefit from being part of Bruntwood SciTech’s 100-strong ecosystem of like-minded businesses in Birmingham across six innovation hubs, including the award winning Enterprise Wharf at Innovation Birmingham - the West Midlands’ largest single site digital and tech community. 

They will also be a part of Bruntwood SciTech’s UK-wide community of 1,100 innovative start-ups, scale-ups and global businesses and have access to their specialist business support including direct access to highly skilled talent, funding opportunities, research connections at universities across the UK, the NHS, mentorship and extensive collaboration opportunities.

Mohamed Ali, Associate Director for Bruntwood SciTech in Birmingham, said: “We want Mclaren to be a place where creative and innovative businesses can grow and succeed, and this investment will help us to achieve that by not only improving the calibre of workspaces and amenities available to them, but offering access to both our Birmingham and UK wide business support services too.  Having already worked with Axi on our transformation of Bond in Manchester, we know first hand the quality they deliver and look forward to offering a space for businesses and their employees that promotes wellbeing and a healthy work-life balance. 

“This is just the latest exciting development that we are underway with in Birmingham, as we look to make good on our pledge to continue investing into the city and building a city-wide ecosystem of like-minded innovative businesses. We are seeing a growing demand for serviced spaces in the city as businesses look for more flexibility, and this redevelopment will allow Mclaren to support meeting this need.”

JLL and Knight Frank are the acting agents on Mclaren; Estilo are supporting on the design and build; while CubicWorks are managing the heating, ventilation and air conditioning.

For further information and to enquire about space in Mclaren click here.