The Advanced Machinery & Productivity Initiative will enable invention, realise innovation, and adoption of new machinery and robotics through UK equipment manufacturers. The programme enables economic prosperity through the design, development and manufacture of intelligent machinery, robotic and cooperative systems demanded by existing and emerging industrial sectors. Centred around existing capabilities and research excellence across the North of England, AMPI will be a partnership between industry, local government, higher education institutions and the UK's National Physical Laboratory. It will provide a secure space, technical resources and skills pipeline needed for advanced machinery innovation to flourish, delivering a sustainable impact on its own local economy and that of UK industry export. The partnership will deliver an outcome of progressive and exploitable technologies that are needed for the UK to realise its ambitions for economic growth, a resilient supply chain and technologies needed to deliver targets such as net zero carbon emissions. It will provide businesses with access to cutting-edge R&D, expertise and facilities to help solve innovation challenges. The North of England has an active and high concentration of industrial expertise in the design, development and manufacture of complex machinery. The machinery is used in a wide range of industries to manufacture products such as pharmaceuticals, food and drink, and automotive components. The North of England has some of the world's leading academics in industrial research, including robotics, automation, metrology and artificial intelligence. The UK Machinery sector has formed a collaborative working group to develop a coherent position to deliver a lasting mechanism to innovate and cooperate, while developing the next generation of skills needed for sustained economic growth. In the longer term AMPI will stimulate and support rapid growth the UK's machinery manufacturing sector as it transitions to highly integrated digital solutions with sophisticated automated and autonomous robotic systems. It is expected to grow the UK capability to a £4bn UK export capacity within 10 years establishing over 30,000 high value manufacturing sector jobs.

"Jaguar Land Rover is leading an exciting research project to investigate and develop strategies and capability to convert internal combustion engine manufacturing facilities to also make electric drive units for hybrid and electric vehicles. The company's engineers will work with industrial partners, Mapal, JW Froehlich, Fives Landis and Horizon and with the Manufacturing Technology Centre, the High-speed Sustainable Manufacturing Institute and Birmingham City University to ensure that its state-of-the-art manufacturing machinery, systems and processes are flexible enough to manufacture both internal combustion engine and electric drive units efficiently along the same production line. This ambitious and highly innovative project will deliver manufacturing flexibility at a time when the exact speed of the changeover to electric motoring remains uncertain. If car buyers want more electric cars than expected, Jaguar Land Rover will be able to ramp up supply quicker than some of its rivals. If demand for diesel and petrol persists for longer, there will be no expensive electric drive factory sitting idle. The project will also ensure that the company builds on its existing manufacturing capability, rather than having electric drives built separately. The project therefore helps protect Jaguar Land Rover facilities and the staff during the switch-over to electric. The Government is supporting the project through its Advanced Propulsion Centre because the technology involved is both innovative and has the potential to benefit a range of UK businesses. The project will help ensure that the UK becomes a major centre for the production of electric drive units, encouraging suppliers of electric car components to invest and develop their businesses in this country."