It will be a red letter day in Okehampton on April 12 when a business centre promising jobs and training in Okehampton is officially opened by mayor of West Devon borough Cllr Caroline Mott.

The A30 Business Centre – A30BC for short – is the brainchild of charity the Okehampton Skills and Sports Trust.

The first building has now been completed, while a further building – to include facilities for NVQ training for young people – is in the pipeline.

The centre is a stone’s throw from where it is hoped that the Okehampton Parkway railway station will be built, to serve the eastern side of the town.

As well as light industrial units for sale on the ground floor of the building, there are separate offices for rent of varying sizes on the first floor, with the aim of both encouraging start ups and providing flexibility for businesses to expand. The aim is to encourage both homegrown talent and attract new employers to the town.

A central area of the first floor, under a large glass atrium, provides a breakout and networking space with admin support, refreshment facilities and bookable areas for small meetings and hot-desking, to allow fledgling and established businesses to come together and bounce ideas off each other.

All are welcome to come along to the official ceremony on Tuesday, April 12 when town estate agents James Stevens will be giving guided tours of the building.

He said that some tenants had already moved in.

The project is being run by the Okehampton Skills and Sports Trust, a charity in Okehampton spearheaded by local hotelier Simon Essex to help fledgling businesses get off the ground and progress.

Mr Stevens said: ‘The Skills and Sports Trust has built the building and we have got people occupying part of the building, which is great. There are industrial units downstairs and offices upstairs and the idea is to increase employment in Okehampton.’

He explained the new units aimed to welcome start up businessses and allow them to grow.

‘The money that we generate from the building will go back into the trust to fund further projects so it is a continuous benefit to the community,’ he said.

‘Upstairs, what we have got is a huge networking area, it is really modern, quite funky, a bit different from Okehampton, more like Exeter, a city feel. There are units of all sizes, from 250 square feet to 1,000 square feet, so it really caters for all size of business.’

The opening ceremony on April 12, from 11am to 1pm, will also be an opportunity to show off the green credentials fo the new building.

It features ten 400ft deep bore holes for ground source heating as well as solar panels to create electricity for the building and heat exchangers for space heating and space cooling. There are also plans for electric charging of vehicles.

The tour will also offer the chance to hear more about the next stage of the A30 Business Centre, a second building which will house educational and training facilities, to be run with Okehampton College, offering NVQs and apprenticeships with businesses within the centre.