Scotland’s manufacturing sector received a significant boost today as Scottish Enterprise announced it had helped support the sector generate over £21 million of productivity benefits in 2010/11.

Scottish Enterprise highlighted that the benefits were generated by its Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service (SMAS), which completed 214 intensive business improvement projects with Scottish manufacturing companies last year – an increase of 56% compared to the previous year.

SMAS advisors also dealt with 1,498 enquiries from Scottish companies in 2010/11 (up 36% from 2009/10) and undertook 393 free one-day manufacturing reviews.

Over the past year, the Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service has also had a key role in supporting Scotland’s key sectors to respond to specific issues.

SMAS has completed 89 manufacturing reviews and 56 intensive projects with food and drink companies, for example, helping to drive much needed productivity improvements within the sector and increase its competitiveness with international competitors.

Similarly, Scotland’s heritage and reputation in engineering and excellence is set to continue, after SMAS completed 52 improvement projects, generating £5.7 million of productivity gains for engineering companies.

Details of the achievements come as Scottish Enterprise also confirms the appointment of Nick Shields as the new director of the SMAS.

Nick will lead the 30-strong team of experts, who collectively have more than 500 years manufacturing experience, and help Scotland’s manufacturing sector emerge from the recession stronger than ever.

All this follows recent announcements of successful results around RSA and research & development funding.

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