£2m Gripple Automation factory set to open in Sheffield in summer

Despite challenging weather conditions, bosses expect staff to move in to the facility on Foley Street, Attercliffe, early in the second half of this year.

It will be the wire joining device company's fourth in the city.

Drawings with the planning application show a building that combines the Gripple’s red brick heritage - like its headquarters in the Old West Gun Works, Savile Street East - and cutting-edge features including a green energy plant and living green external wall.

Gripple Automation was set up five years ago to make machines that can assemble 60 Gripples in a minute with one operator. It was soon building mini production lines for other firms and expanded to 25 staff, outgrowing the premises on Hawk Street it shares with sister company Loadhog.

Last year, Gordon Macrae, special projects manager, said they wanted a flagship building worthy of the firm’s reputation.

He added: “It’s on the river Don makes it great and in a part of Sheffield that’s not been regenerated. We want it to be up there with the best you can see.”

Gripple Automation will have nine ‘build bays’ where bespoke machines are assembled over a period of between two months and a year.They develop from an initial idea to a computer design, to a prototype, to a finished item, bringing together design, software and hardware.

Some £200,000 is due to be spent on new kit.