Overlooking the marina at the desirable Chatham Maritime, bosses at Icomera are still pinching themselves about their big office move.

The Swedish company, which installs wi-fi on trains and coaches, has taken over a floor at Victory House after its 50 employees outgrew its premises in Medway Innovation Centre, where it had grown over six years.

UK managing director Dave Palmer said: “The innovation centre did really well for us. It had lots of meeting rooms and was in a good location. It has a good atmosphere but we outgrew it.

“We launched our new office at Chatham Maritime because we didn’t want to move away from Medway, as we have good support here, our people live here and people want the lifestyle here, as opposed to London.”

Icomera is one of several success stories from the innovation centre – the starting place for a range of businesses in the Towns – which is found next to Rochester Airport.

The airfield, which is undergoing a £4 million redevelopment, is part of a bid to the government for Enterprise Zone status in north Kent.

If approved, the council aims to build another hub, this time for growing technology businesses, similar to the innovation centre.

It hopes it will be able to create 1,000 jobs by luring the best companies with the offer of business rate discounts of up to £55,000 a year for five years.

Decisions on each of the Enterprise Zone bids from across the country is expected later this year, potentially in the Autumn Statement next month.

Medway council’s director of regeneration, Richard Hicks, speaking at the Construction Expo at Kent Event Centre, said: “Without Enterprise Zone status building the hub is more problematic.”

He noted the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s announcements about business rates, which will allow councils to keep all business rates collected, but added: “We’re cautious that the devil may be in the detail.”

The enthusiasm to attract a variety of businesses to Medway comes from a dark place.

People in the Towns know only too well the potentially disastrous impact of hedging bets on one industry after the closure of the dockyard in 1984, with the loss of thousands of jobs.

The council set up the Medway Innovation Board this year to come up with a strategy to develop businesses in the region, chaired by Dovetail Games boss Paul Jackson, whose company also started in the Medway Innovation Centre.

Mr Hicks said: “We really like tech companies and innovation stuff. We are working to establish ways we can encourage those businesses to relocate and invest in Medway.”

The Rochester Airport Technology Park, as it will be known, is a small part of the Enterprise Zone bid, dubbed the North Kent Innovation Zone. It also includes Ebbsfleet garden city and Kent Medical Campus in Maidstone.

Another bid is for a Channel Tunnel Enterprise Zone, covering land adjacent to the M20 and sites in Shepway.

“We want to benefit from the positive momentum that Enterprise Zones bring to deliver new jobs to the garden city and to Medway and Maidstone and working together we believe we have a very strong bid...” - Robin Cooper, Ebbsfleet Development Corporation

The government is also considering whether to extend the Enterprise Zone around Discovery Park in Sandwich, the ex-Pfizer site which has become home to 125 companies, supporting 2,300 jobs.

“Enterprise Zones are a real success story,” said Robin Cooper, chief executive of Ebbsfleet Development Corporation.

“Since Pfizer closed their plant at Sandwich over 2,000 new jobs have been created in their Enterprise Zone and after the docks closed in Medway in the 1980s, 10,000 jobs have been created.

“We want to benefit from the positive momentum that Enterprise Zones bring to deliver new jobs to the garden city and to Medway and Maidstone and working together we believe we have a very strong bid.”

Rochester and Strood MP Kelly Tolhurst, who opened Icomera’s HQ at Chatham Maritime, said: “We need to look at developing more centres in Medway because they have a massive waiting list at the Innovation Centre.

"We want to encourage organisations to relocate here or stay when they grow. We need to be visionary about where we want Medway to be.”

It will be a big day for Medway – and other parts of Kent – when the results are revealed.