2023 Sponsors

Sponsors of Growth Business of the Year

Ashtons Legal is delighted to sponsor the Norfolk Business Awards and the Growth Business of the Year category.

Ashtons’ vision is to be ‘an exceptional professional service provider putting our clients at the centre of everything we do’. Whether a commercial client, or an individual, whatever the legal needs, Ashtons’ focus is on always delivering first class legal advice with exceptional service, helping our clients grow and achieve their aims.

With over 400 staff across six offices in Norwich, Diss, Ipswich, Bury St Edmunds, Cambridge and Leeds the firm are ideally placed to assist clients throughout East Anglia and beyond. We are a full service law firm, providing every type of commercial legal advice that businesses need. Ashtons also specialise in a number of niche legal areas such as French Property, road transport and regulatory law, franchising and injury services. 

Ashtons is delighted to sponsor the Growth Business of the Year award category and are hoping to see entries from a diverse number of organisations all involved in East Anglia’s thriving business community.

Sponsoring Rising Star of the Year

Birketts is a full service, UK Top 50 law firm. With a heritage spanning 160 years, we have more than 500 lawyers and legal professionals based in Cambridge, Chelmsford, Ipswich, London, Norwich and Sevenoaks. We advise businesses, government and public sector organisations and individuals in the UK and internationally. 

Our business is divided into four principal practice groups: property (including planning and environmental); corporate services (including banking and finance, corporate, commercial, data protection, employment, immigration, and tax); litigation and dispute resolution (including IP); and private client advisory (including family).  

Within these practice groups, we have deep sector expertise, spanning agriculture and landed estates, charities and social enterprise, construction, ecclesiastical, education, energy and utilities, family businesses, food, healthcare and care homes, housebuilding and social housing, leisure and tourism, natural capital, public sector, real estate investment, retail and automotive, shipping and international trade, technology and telecoms and transport and logistics. 

Our innovative delivery of the law is defined by our next level law proposition. Our legal advice is informed by a clear understanding of the specific needs of the sector and the regulatory and political backdrop. We work with our clients as a proactive partner, horizon scanning and thinking ahead to the changes, challenges or opportunities that they may face. 

We seek to innovate in all our practices; our focus is on investing in the right technology to deliver effective solutions to help our clients achieve their objectives. 

We enjoy a distinctively collegiate culture based on strong core values. Operating as one collaborative firm, we encourage all our people to be professional and client-focused; to act with transparency and integrity; to be enterprising, and to proactively look for innovative ways to support our clients; whilst taking pride in all that they do.

With our ambition to succeed, comes a strong desire to make a positive contribution to the communities we serve, and we are committed to delivering the objectives set out in our ESG strategy. Diversity plays an integral part in all that we do, with female partners comprising 40% of our partnership.

We maintain the highest professional and ethical standards and are accredited with the UK Law Society’s practice management quality standard, Lexcel and hold the Centre for Assessment Customer Service Excellence accreditation. We are also ISO accredited in the areas of quality management (9001), environmental management (14001) and information security (27001). 

birketts.co.uk

Sponsoring Large Business of the Year 

FRP is a leading national business advisory firm providing professional services from 26 offices around the UK (including Norwich, Cambridge and Brentwood), with 79 partners and over 570 team members (26 in the East of England).

FRP specialises in Corporate Finance, Forensic Services, Debt and Financial Advisory and Restructuring.

In 2020, FRP acquired the well-known East Anglian practices of JDC Corporate Finance and Walton Dodge Forensic.  Since the acquisition, the local FRP team has opened an office in Cambridge and made a number of further appointments.

The local team delivers strategic solutions to businesses across the East of England, of all sizes and in all sectors, throughout the business life cycle.

• the award-winning Corporate Finance team provides a bespoke transaction service to owner managed businesses; advising on full, partial or structured exits, retirement sales, MBOs and EOTs; as well acquisitions and Debt Advisory

• the Forensics team has a national reputation for its specialist work, centering around share and business valuation, commercial disputes, investigations and professional negligence

• the in-house Tax Advisory team provides invaluable support on Corporate Finance and Forensic Services projects as well as leading tax advisory engagements

• the Restructuring team provides support to businesses and owners in periods of underperformance and distress, advising on solvent restructuring, or helping distressed businesses find the right solution in insolvent situations

• the Financial Advisory team provides due diligence and company-side advisory services. The team has experience in providing hands-on support to management teams including cash management, project management and stakeholder management.

Sponsoring Customer Excellence Award

Greater Anglia is proud to be sponsoring this year’s Suffolk Business Awards. We are passionate about delivering excellent customer service and ensuring that the railways play their full part in helping our region to be both economically prosperous and a wonderful place to live. 

We are therefore committed to consistently raising customer service standards. We now have a fleet of brand-new trains, operating on our Suffolk routes, transforming the travelling environment, providing more comfortable journeys, increasing seating capacity and helping to deliver record-breaking performance, as part of a £1.4 billion investment programme. Every single carriage has been replaced in the largest ever investment in trains in East Anglia.  In Suffolk, all local routes are now operated with high quality, three or four carriage trains (not mostly one or two carriage trains, as before). They are air conditioned and more accessible, with plug and USB points and free wifi. 

Over the last year we have been taking advantage of the benefits offered by the new trains, as we achieved the highest-ever annual punctuality levels seen across our network.  Our teams have also been doing an excellent job of keeping our trains clean and safe. We’re looking forward to welcoming more and more customers back on our trains as we recover from the pandemic and support the sustainable economic development of our region in line with decarbonisation targets. So excellent customer service really is at the heart of our plans to transform our region’s train services.     

Sponsors of Medium Business of the Year

Howden is an international insurance group made up of talented experts with the freedom and support to do what we do best. We are united by a shared passion and no-limits mindset, and we collaborate to create a powerful international team that can rise to any challenge. Together, we are working to change the insurance narrative – supporting our clients while using insurance as a tool to increase resilience for individuals, businesses and communities. 

Howden is a group of insurance experts, with the experience to deliver for our clients and the motivation to help them thrive. As an employee-owned company, our clients’ success is our success, too. So to us it’s more than just a job. We care about every client, large and small, because we’re working for the long-term – to build a business to be proud of. 

We do insurance differently – and we’re determined to do it better, too. We know the market inside-out, and we’re using that expertise to turn insurance into a tool for social good. From insuring the development of the COVID vaccine, to de-risking the carbon market, to helping the vulnerable communities build resilience against climate change, we’re pushing the boundaries of what insurance can doo and turning it into the powerful force for good that we know it can be. 

Sponsors of Employer of the Year

We are an independent, award-winning energy consultancy based in the heart of Norwich that places integrity over profit. We are here to help businesses make quick, easy, and well-informed decisions about their energy. From finding the right supplier, to checking and negotiating contracts, we are here to help businesses be more energy aware. Our ethos has always been to have an honest and open approach. Our mission is to educate employees, customers and business connections on ways to become more sustainable and work towards Net Zero. 

We work hard to nurture a safe, happy environment for our Swans where they love being part of our company journey. Putting happiness first leads to happy swans, which in-turn leads to happy customers and successful business. 

We are very proud that, despite COVID and the energy crisis, we have continued to grow our people, presence and profitability. We are grateful to receive national and regional recognition for how we act, not only as an energy consultancy, but also as a business. We are proud to have been recognised at the Norfolk Business Awards as a two-time SME Business of the Year and at the Investors in People Awards this year, as a Gold standard employer with additional recognition for our people leadership. Most recently we have been awarded the title of ‘Most Trusted Energy Consultancy – SME’ at the 2022 Energy Live News Consultancy Awards (TELCA), and at the upcoming 2023 awards we are finalists in 11 categories including ‘Best Company To Work For’.

Sponsoring Environmental and Sustainabilty Award

 Norse Group is one of the largest employers in Norfolk. Wholly owned by Norfolk Council, the group comprises:

• Norse Commercial Services – environmental, highways and FM services

• Norse Consulting Group – professional property services, including architecture, design and estate management

• NorseCare – Residential and specialist dementia care homes throughout Norfolk

The group exports services to other parts of the UK, and has twenty-one joint venture partnerships with local authorities from Devon to Leeds. With a turnover of around £350 million, we provide employment for almost 9,500 people. Our head office in Norwich supports over 400 jobs, and overall we contribute over £200 million to the Norfolk economy.

Although the group is a highly commercial enterprise, our ownership means that we have a deeply-ingrained public service ethos, and social value is of paramount importance to us. Our mantra is “improving people’s lives”, and we pride ourselves on looking beyond the bottom line to doing all we can for our employees, suppliers, clients and the wider community.

Norse is committed to net zero, and our in-house team of specialist environmental consultants is drawing up a long-term strategy to help us – and our clients - achieve this. 

Encompassing energy efficiency, moving our 2,000-strong fleet to green technology, and embracing the latest advances in waste reduction, we are proud to be playing our part in protecting the environment and achieving sustainability.

Sponsoring Positive Impact in the Community 

One of Europe’s largest producers and retailers of electricity and heat, is building the Norfolk Offshore Wind Zone that will generate low-cost green electricity for 4.6m UK homes.

By 2030, Vattenfall’s wind farms could power 4.5 million UK homes, creating thousands of skilled UK jobs, making wind the backbone of a reliable, affordable and fossil free energy system.

Construction starts on the Norfolk Zone in September 2023 with first power expected in 2027. It will support 1000 jobs in every year of construction. More than 100 skilled permanent jobs will be created at its operations and maintenance base, with many more across the East Anglian supply chain.

As well as boosting the regional economy with jobs, skills and supply chain opportunities, the Norfolk Offshore Wind Zone will contribute to the region as a powerhouse of renewable energy, using new generation powerful turbines and world-leading design, including a coordinated grid connection.

Enabling a skilled diverse Norfolk workforce is a priority and behind Vattenfall’s £1 million pledge in its Norfolk Skills and Employment strategy.

Its £15 million Community Benefit Fund will support communities and organisations in Norfolk to develop climate-smart projects and live greener lives.

Vattenfall has worked with schools, colleges and universities for seven years creating pathways into renewable energy careers by education and skills training to continue through its three-decade lifecycle.

It’s work in the UK is on track to help save 8 million tonnes of CO2 a year by 2030, equivalent to taking 4 million cars off the road.