ABINGDON: A TOWN THAT MOVES WITH THE TIMES

In 1974 Abingdon (which some claim is the oldest in the country) “moved” from Berkshire to Oxfordshire, where it is now part of the Vale of White Horse District Council.

Then in 2011 this contrary town decided that just being called Abingdon wasn’t enough and the following year it became double barrelled, renaming itself Abingdon-on-Thames.

A savvy move to celebrate its location on the River Thames, but there’s another reason why visitors might drop into Abingdon. Perhaps they come to enjoy the town’s ancient tradition of bun throwing.

Apparently, this wonderfully mad event is a cross between a ceremony and a bun-fight, but bun throwings only take place when the town council votes to hold one. The last occasion was November 10, 2018 to mark 100 years since the end of the First World War.

Located between the larger tech and science clusters of Harwell, Culham and Milton Park, Abingdon has a lot in its favour. There’s space for start-up businesses in an historic town with plenty to enjoy.

Abingdon’s proud motoring history makes way for science and tech

From 1929 to 1980 Abingdon was best known industrially as home to the MG car factory. All that now remains is the MG car club headquarters based on the former 50-acre factory site which is now Abingdon Business Park. It sits alongside other occupiers including upmarket domestic appliance manufacturer Smeg, internet service provider Gigaclear, tech company Oxford Nanosystems and Cellmark Forensics.

Abingdon’s Science Park, on the other side of town, which offers around 75,000 sq ft of office and laboratory accommodation, is home to companies such as cloud service and cyber security company Sophos, communications company Fishawack, data science company Tessella and leading cancer gene therapy PsiOxus.

Abingdon is UK’s third largest area for scale-up tech investment

The latest report from TechNation, published in May, revealed that Abingdon was the third largest town for tech investment in the UK between 2015-2018, coming immediately behind London and Cambridge.

The Tech Nation Report has been the UK’s “State-of-the -Nation” report on technology since 2015. Each year it monitors the growth of the sector and provides information on opportunities and challenges.

Oxford Nanosystems, which specialises in developing heat transfer coatings for the industrial, transport and electronic sectors, has had a busy year.

Last November it expanded from Harwell Campus to Abingdon Business Park. CEO Dr Alexander Reip, said: “As we begin our first major steps to commercialisation we are delighted to move into a purpose-fitted out facility which has room for future expansion and great road connections.”

Dr Reip has also been in the news himself. In June he was admitted as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and the previous month he won the Rising Star in Industry Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Oxford NanoSystems has developed nanoFLUX®, a coating technology that reduces the temperature a heating element needs to reach before the surrounding liquid boils. This reduction allows systems to be more efficient and reduces overall energy consumption.