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Britain at CERN

Geneva, 20 October 1998. Thirty years ago British industry held the first ever trade fair at CERN1 and industrial links between Britain and the Laboratory have never looked back. Speaking at the opening of the 1998 "Britain at CERN" exhibition on 20 October, H.E. Mr Christopher Hulse, British Ambassador to Switzerland, underlined the value of CERN contracts to British industry saying that "The prize is well worth going for, I understand that contracts worth £1.5bn will be awarded over the next six years".

Britain at CERN offers UK companies an "office at CERN for a week", said Ambassador Hulse, giving them the opportunity to present their products and services to the scientists, engineers, and technicians who will be awarding those contracts over the coming years. But the reach offered by a trade exhibition at CERN is much wider. As the Laboratory's Director General, Chris Llewellyn Smith, underlined, CERN now plays host to nearly 8000 research scientists from all over the world. It has become a global enterprise. Moreover, surveys in the 1970s and 1980s have demonstrated that a contract with CERN generates on average an increase in turnover amounting to three times the value of the contract.

Turning to pure science, the Laboratory's raison d'être, the Director General stressed the full role that British scientists and industry play at CERN. They are involved in all scientific programmes and have taken part in most of the Laboratory's major discoveries. Three of the four experiments at CERN's flagship Large Electron Positron Collider (LEP) have British scientists as spokesmen, and British science also plays an active role in the next generation of experiments being prepared for CERN's future accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). At the LHC, protons will collide creating tiny pockets of pure energy which will recreate conditions that existed just a million millionth of a second after the birth of our Universe, the Big Bang.

CERN is the world's leading particle physics research laboratory where scientists study the fundamental nature of matter and the Universe. To do so, they build unique machines at the limits of technology. CERN's complex needs act as a catalyst for industrial progress in Europe. The "Britain at CERN" exhibition allows British industry to join CERN's voyage of discovery, and to benefit from the Laboratory's expertise at the frontiers of technology.

The range of products on display covers a wide range, from cryogenics and vacuum technologies to electric power and power electronics. A list of exhibitors is attached below. The exhibition is organised by BEAMA, the Federation of British Electrotechnical and Allied Manufacturers' Associations.

List of exhibitors

  1. Advanced Ceramics Corporation
  2. A S Scientific Products
  3. Albacom Ltd
  4. BICC Cables Ltd
  5. Bird Precision Bellows Ltd
  6. BOC Edwards Vacuum Technology
  7. Crowcon Detection Instruments Ltd
  8. DRS Hadland Ltd
  9. EEV Ltd
  10. Flexible Technology Ltd
  11. Goodfellow Cambridge Ltd
  12. High Voltage Technology
  13. Hilger Crystals Ltd
  14. Lancashire Fittings Ltd
  15. Leda-Mass Ltd
  16. Micron Semiconductor Ltd
  17. NNC Ltd
  18. NTE (Poole) Ltd
  19. Oxford Instruments (UK) Ltd
  20. Polaron CVT Ltd
  21. Prosser Scientific Instruments Ltd
  22. Science Systems (Space) Ltd
  23. Serco Europe Ltd
  24. Start Spellman Ltd
  25. TMD (Thorn Microwave Devices Ltd)
  26. TWI
  27. UKAEA Fusion
  28. Vacuum Generators Ltd
  29. Vacuum Systems Ltd
  30. Westcode Semiconductors Ltd
  31. WS Atkins Science & Technology

Exhibition organizer

BEAMA Westminster Tower
3, Albert Embankment
GB-London SE1 7SL

Contact : Mrs. J. Fillingham
Tel.: +44-171-793-3025
Fax: +44-171-793-3054

Information

CERN: L. Abel / Division SPL / Tel. +41-22-767-9561

1. CERN, the European Laboratory for Particle Physics, has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Israel, Japan, the Russian Federation,the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and Unesco have observer status.