A NEW innovation centre to boost small hi-tech businesses in the Cotswolds has opened near Burford.

The venture, which has already attracted its first three businesses, is backed by Oxford Innovation, part of the Oxford Trust.

The Trust is a charitable foundation which encourages the study and application of science and technology.

The Cotswolds Innovation Centre, on a business park at Upper Rissington, owned by Country and Metropolitan Group which aims to develop the former RAF base into a new Cotswold village, is the latest in a series of innovation centres.

Others are based in Oxford, at Milton Park, near Abingdon, and at Upper Heyford, near Bicester, with another proposed for the Banbury area.

David Kingham, managing director of Oxford Innovation, said the Rissington centre, which has installed seven miles of hi-tech cabling, provided flexible space for fast-growth businesses, in areas such as software, information and medical technology.

He said: "We provide an advanced telecommunications infrastructure for the two-storey building and we expect a number of new Internet businesses to develop and grow in the building over the next few years.

"Many new companies in the centre will be started by people who currently have to travel to Cheltenham, Swindon, Gloucester or Oxford to work, but live locally to Rissington."

Stephen Wicks, managing director of Country and Metropolitan Group, said: "We are delighted that this project has now been launched after many months of preparation."

He added: "It will not only offer more jobs to local people who want to work close to home, but it adds to our goal of creating a new Cotswold village, with the maximum opportunity for people to live and work on the same site."

Story date: Monday 20 December

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