Discovery Park in Sandwich is enticing large and small businesses to fill vacant office space

by business editor Trevor Sturgess

Financial incentives and a £200,000 promotional campaign have sparked a steep rise in inquiries from firms interested in creating jobs in east Kent.

For the first time, the area is matching Thames Gateway as the Kent location with most business interest, according to Locate in Kent, the county's inward investment agency.

By the end of December, nearly half - 147 - of all the projects registered with LiK concerned Canterbury, Dover or Thanet.

The Thames Gateway - which includes Dartford, Gravesend, Medway and Swale - received 149 inquiries. Between them, Shepway, Ashford and Maidstone received 143 inquiries, with west Kent the target of 90 expressions of interest.

Kent County Council's £200,000 Grow for It in east Kent campaign, involving posters, bus banners and catchy slogans across London created by the Seven Hills agency, is thought to be partly responsible for the upsurge.

This has been coupled with high-speed trains and financial incentives for growing enterprises flowing from Enterprise Zone status and Expansion East Kent, which distributes interest-free loans from £35 million of regional growth funding.

Discovery Park, the former Pfizer site at Sandwich, is proving an attractive business location with its world-class facilities for life science and knowledge-based investors.

LiK chief executive Paul Wookey, pictured right, said: "There's been a marked increase in interest in east Kent, which has seen it rise from a third of enquiries (32%) in October 2011, and it suggests that business is increasingly viewing the area as being as attractive as the Thames Gateway."

He added: "We anticipate that East Kent will continue to welcome greater levels of investment, in particular from those businesses involved in life sciences, creative and digital media, low carbon technologies and the tourism industry."

So far, Expansion East Kent has distributed nearly £6m to 21 businesses planning to create more than 500 jobs, with a further £10m and an estimated 800 jobs in the pipeline. It aims to create 5,000 new jobs, and unlock a further £300m of private sector investment over the next few years.