MALVERN: A JEWEL HIDDEN UNDER THE HILLS

Beneath the glorious hills it’s named after, Malvern also overlooks the busy Three Counties showground, which brings thousands to the town every year.

This beautiful town has inspired some of Britain’s most well-known musicians. Home for some years to the incomparable violinist Nigel Kennedy, and most English of composers,

Malvern Hills Science Park Expands

Malvern Hills Science Park is home to around 400 people, many working for science, technology and cyber businesses, including the National Cyber Skills Centre.

Companies include international businesses such as UTC Aerospace, which occupies around 30,000 sq ft of space, and smaller companies such as D-Risq and Borwell.

Worcestershire’s Local Enterprise Partnership, the county’s tech accelerator, Betaden and Worcestershire’s 5G Testbed are also based at the park.

Development of Phase Five of the science park was completed in April, and the first tenant, Textlocal, has moved in. The 17,500 sq ft building houses six units of grow-on space for small companies seeking to expand.

Sir Edward Elgar, this summer its celebrated Malvern Theatres were awarded £1 million to undergo their first major redevelopment in more than two decades.

Writers have also been drawn here. CS Lewis lived in the town, attending the still-thriving independent school of Malvern College.

But perhaps the most intriguing part of Malvern’s history is the role it played in the Second World War.

The government chose to locate its Telecommunications and Radar Establishment (TRE) in Malvern as being sufficiently remote that German bombers wouldn’t think to look that far.

Two thousand scientists and their families had to be accommodated in the town virtually overnight.

According to Malvern’s Museum of local history, most of the TRE scientists were fit, young, clever men and women. None wore uniform or seemed to want to join up or help the war effort at all.

Not surprisingly, they weren’t immediately welcomed by the locals, most of whom had family fighting overseas or were engaged in other war work.

As the scientists’ work was top secret, they had to remain silent about their critical role in the war effort.

But after the war, many had come to love the area so much, despite their tepid welcome, they didn’t want to leave.

As a result, over the decades the town became home to one of the most concentrated cyber clusters in the UK.

A major employer is QinetiQ, formed when the Ministry of Defence split its Defence Evaluation and Research Agency.

The smaller portion was rebranded Dstl (Defence Science & Technology Laboratory). The larger part, including most of the non-nuclear testing and evaluation establishments, was renamed QinetiQ.

In 2003, QinetiQ signed a 25-year long term partnering agreement to provide UK MOD with test and evaluation of military and civil platforms, systems, weapons and components on land, at sea and in the air. Three years later, QinetiQ successfully floated on the London Stock Exchange.