Oakdene Hollins, a research and consulting company that specialises in sustainability and the circular economy, is to move its base to Ireland in the wake of the vote to leave the European Union.
The company, founded in 1994, is currently based in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, and also has an office in Brussels. It works with businesses within both the UK and Europe to embed sustainable practices that improve environmental and business efficiency and campaigned for the UK to remain in the build-up to last week’s referendum.
However, in a statement released this week, Managing Director David Fitzsimons said that the Brexit vote meant that to ensure the company’s relationships with European clients were not affected, it would be transferring its headquarters to Ireland.
Fitzsimons said: “In the past few weeks, [European Business Development Manager] Edward Sims and I campaigned for StrongerIn alongside Europe Minister David Lidington, and we are grateful to our colleagues who covered our work responsibilities whilst we were doing this.
“The result of the referendum was, however, very disappointing. I will be spending time in Brussels over the coming weeks to reassure clients and friends that we remain committed to working with them, and that Edward and I are personally committed to a union of European member states. The political processes in the UK are continuing, so we do not yet know what relationship the EU will want with the UK.
“To mitigate the risks of this relationship changing, we are preparing to domicile Oakdene Hollins in Ireland and to expand our office in Brussels.
“As political decisions are made on this issue we will respond accordingly.”
More information about how the industry reacted to the referendum result is available in Resource’s previous article, and information about the potential legal ramifications for the industry is available in an exclusive comment piece for Resource.
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