STEM Workshops in Warwick & Leamington Spa

Warwickshire sits at the crossroads of two powerful STEM stories. The first is automotive engineering. Aston Martin moved its global headquarters to Gaydon, about nine miles south of Warwick, in 2003, and the British Motor Museum at the same site houses the world's largest collection of historic British cars. The second is gaming. Leamington Spa is home to a nationally recognised video game development cluster, widely known as "Silicon Spa". The roots of this cluster stretch back to 1986, when the Darling brothers founded Codemasters nearby in Banbury, and 1990, when the Oliver twins established Blitz Games Studios in Leamington itself.

David and Richard Darling founded Codemasters in 1986, helping to seed Leamington's gaming ecosystem. David Darling received a CBE for services to the video games industry and later founded Kwalee, another games studio based in Leamington. Philip and Andrew Oliver, the Oliver twins, founded Blitz Games Studios in Leamington Spa in 1990 and went on to establish Radiant Worlds after Blitz closed in 2013. Professor Lord Bhattacharyya founded the Warwick Manufacturing Group at the University of Warwick in 1980, building one of the UK's most important research centres for advanced manufacturing and automotive technology.

Leamington Spa's Silicon Spa cluster is a hub for game studios. Playground Games, owned by Xbox Game Studios, develops the Forza Horizon series from its Leamington offices. Codemasters, now part of Electronic Arts, creates the official F1 racing games. Kwalee, Sega HARDlight and Rebellion all have Leamington studios. Aston Martin continues to engineer and manufacture sports cars at its Gaydon headquarters. Jaguar Land Rover's engineering centre at Whitley in Coventry and its manufacturing plant at Solihull are both within easy reach. The University of Warwick, closely linked to the area, is a top-ten UK university, with research in mathematics, computer science and engineering through WMG.

The gaming industry in Leamington Spa offers careers in programming, game design, 3D art, audio engineering and quality assurance, with studios actively recruiting graduates and apprentices. Aston Martin and Jaguar Land Rover both run competitive apprenticeship programmes in engineering, manufacturing and software development from nearby sites. WMG at the University of Warwick offers degree apprenticeships in digital technology, applied engineering and cybersecurity, done in partnership with major employers. Warwickshire College Group provides further education pathways in engineering, computing and digital skills from campuses in Leamington and Warwick.