Reading: Thales opens new UK headquarters at Green Park

Thales UK’s new headquarters in Green Park, Reading, was officially opened during a visit by prime minister Theresa May and Alok Sharma MP. The new facility represents a £23 million investment and builds on the company's long-term commitment to the UK.

Hosted by Victor Chavez, chief executive of Thales in the UK, and Pierre Eric Pommellet, chief operating officer of Thales Group, the visitors were taken on a tour of the research and technology centre.

The prime minister was shown a number of key projects for Thales in the UK including the European Aviation Network, which will provide 4G connectivity on flights across Europe and some of the lifesaving capabilities developed for our armed forces.

There was also an opportunity to meet a number of the 350 graduates and apprentices Thales employs in the UK. To hear about how the company participates in activities to promote STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) to address the UK’s engineering shortage and increase diversity.

The opening of the state-of-the-art facility in Green Park, Reading, reaffirms Thales as a major contributor to the UK economy. The new site is bringing 500 highly-skilled jobs to the area – including 300 specialised engineers – with capacity to accommodate a further 100 jobs as Thales grows in the region. This is a significant part of Thales’s overall contribution to UK prosperity, employing 6,500 people with annual revenues of £1.3 billion.

The new site promotes Thales’s emphasis on fostering innovation, being one of the company’s five global centres specifically designed to focus on research and technology –spending around £70m annually in the UK on research and technology. Further to this, the site will serve as Thales in the UK's centre of excellence for secure radio communications, network and infrastructure systems and Cyber Security consultancy.

Chavez said: “The move to Green Park represents a strategic step forward for Thales, bringing together some of our key businesses with our Research team to ensure we remain on the cutting edge of customer-focused, technology and business model innovation.

“This new world-class workspace sets the benchmark for future working environments across Thales in the UK; designed to enable collaboration with customers, partners and suppliers as well as supporting our move to smart working.”