Leeds Manufacturers Invest £190k in Digital Tech

Get Baked, Pland Stainless and three other city firms tap government-backed Made Smarter grants to automate production and stay competitive

Five Leeds manufacturers are investing almost £190,000 in digital technology, from automated packaging to virtual-reality design, backed by £66,000 in grants from the Government’s Made Smarter programme. Get Baked, Involution, Pland Stainless, Cogent Mechatronic and Hue Interiors are among 19 firms across the wider region ploughing nearly £900,000 into automation and advanced machinery, a practical signal that local makers are choosing to modernise rather than stand still.

Why This Matters For Leeds

Smaller SME manufacturers rarely have spare cash or in-house expertise to automate and these are the exact firms most exposed if productivity stalls. When a bakery and a steelworks both find a route to modern kit, it signals that automation is becoming reachable for the city’s smaller makers, not just its big employers. Matched funding is significant to these firms and, if it keeps flowing, it could quietly reshape the city’s industrial base one grant at a time.

What the Made Smarter Grants Mean for Leeds Manufacturers

Each award is matched funding of up to £20,000, tied to a specific upgrade. Get Baked, the fast-growing bakery known right across the city, put £13,000 towards a £20,000 automated flow-wrapping machine to lift packaging speed as it scales. Cogent Mechatronic, which builds electric motors and actuators, secured £20,000 towards a £40,000 multi-sensor measurement system to sharpen quality control. Steel firm Pland Stainless added a Trumpf press brake to expand fabrication, workwear maker Involution brought printing and cutting in-house, and furniture business Hue Interiors adopted augmented and virtual reality to link design and production. The common thread is capacity: each investment lets a smaller firm take on greater, and more complex work, without adding overheads.

Never Miss a Leeds Business Event

Get our monthly events guide straight to your inbox — every networking meetup, conference, and showcase happening in Leeds.

“The support we received from the Made Smarter programme has been invaluable. As a fast-growing business, investing in automation is critical to improving efficiency, increasing capacity, and supporting sustainable growth.”

— Amy Myers, Managing Director, Get Baked

Closing the Region’s Digital Adoption Gap

The grants land against a theme Leeds Today has followed closely, smaller firms across the city have often been slower to embrace automation and digital tools than their larger peers. Since launching in 2021, Made Smarter Yorkshire, delivered by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority, has supported more than 1,250 manufacturers, awarded 112 grants worth £1.6 million and helped generate almost £5 million of investment. Manufacturing is still a major regional employer, and for many Leeds manufacturers the barrier to automation is cost and know-how rather than appetite. Matched funding lowers both and Programme Manager Jessica Armitage said grant support remains open to eligible firms, and encouraged more to register.