The official launch of The AMRICC Centre in February marked the end of an eight-year collaboration across the Midlands to bring the £10 million research facility together.

Positioning the Midlands at the centre of the multi-billion pound global advanced ceramics sector, collaboration and teamwork from across business and academia have been at the heart of its development. It’s a world first, brought to Staffordshire with the support of team members and the wider community.

The AMRICC Centre operates under an open-access format, translating materials, processes, and technologies into real-world products and solutions by enabling product and process development to be carried out at an industrially relevant scale.

The development is the physical outcome of the Midlands Industrial Ceramics Group’s £18.27 million four-year research programme, funded by Government under UK Research and Innovation’s flagship Strength in Places Fund in 2021.

By providing open-access to technology that would not normally be available to industry, organisations are able to trial new products at commercial pilot scale, so helping to de-risk the use of new technologies much more quickly.

The Centre also provides a superbly equipped environment to train the next generation of material scientists, enabling them to develop new skills in an industrial setting, in conjunction with key university partners.

Businesses and universities in the region’s advanced materials sector can have the support they need to help develop, prove and deploy concepts from an initial idea into commercialisation much faster and more effectively to meet changing market needs and achieve results.

Lucideon hosts and manages The AMRICC Centre on behalf of the sector, realising its primary purpose: to enable companies to take innovative ideas and place them on the fast-track into commercial product.

The AMRICC Centre includes an equipment suite with more than 350 pieces of high-value technology, collectively offering unique capabilities for users.

Access to The AMRICC Centre and its entire range of cutting-edge kit capabilities is open to all on a pay-as-you-go basis.

This gives the opportunity for those using the open access centre to not only benefit from the equipment but to build on the strengths of scientists, engineers, data scientists, computational modellers and other experts who operate within the facility, who can help turn innovative ideas into market-ready technologies for users.

Dr Cathryn Hickey, CEO of The AMRICC Centre, said: “Recent forecasts for the value of advanced ceramics industry place it at £143 billion, and The AMRICC Centre strongly positions the Midlands region, an area long associated with ceramics, to play a key role in this highly valued sector.”

The AMRICC Centre has entered the Team of the Year category of the Staffordshire University Business Awards.