DEVELOPMENT at The Oxford Science Park (TOSP) is set to plough on after its majority owner, Magdalen College, sold 40 per cent of the park for an undisclosed fee.

TOSP, created in 1991 and based near the Kassam Stadium, is regarded as a UK leader for science and technology companies, and is home to 2,700 employees and more than 130 businesses.

Now, Magdalen College has entered into a ‘strategic partnership to accelerate the development of The Oxford Science Park’ with GIC, a Singaporean global investment firm.

GIC will be taking a 40 per cent stake in TOSP for an undisclosed fee.

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The new partnership has pushed forward plans for a multi-building development at the park.

Several facilities are planned at the park’s 23 gross acres of development land, with the capacity to add at least a further 500,000 sq ft.

Construction on the first of these is expected to start before the end of the year, with further details to be released in due course.

Rory Maw, chief executive of the park and bursar at Magdalen College, said: “We are delighted to welcome GIC as a partner in The Oxford Science Park, and look forward to working together to enhance TOSP’s position as the science park of choice for leading science and technology companies.

“As well as being an enormous demonstration of confidence in the UK – and Oxford in particular – as a leading location for international life science and technology, this is a transformational investment for The Oxford Science Park.”