Member: David Sheridan - Europa Components

For David Sheridan of Europa Components, it’s been an incredibly interesting 10-year journey on board the Chamber.

David is a fine example of a long-standing member of the business community, with a handle on the needs of young, aspiring engineers, and other growing businesses.

Europa Components are a B2B electrical component wholesale supplier, selling industrial control gear components nationally to electrical wholesale suppliers. When it moved to Luton, they had 17 employees, today it is 60 and rising. Introducing only 4 years ago, an assembly facility as well, Europa is definitely ahead of the trend line for its industry. Next year it plans further expansion with a warehouse in the North of England.

Aspiring to be a good corporate citizen with access to local knowledge - and as a high growth company - they joined the Chamber when they moved base to Luton in 2009.

Today, Veruth Holdings (which owns Europa) is an equity investor in SMEs. Veruth is the holding company to Europa Components and genuinely wishes to build companies long term. As a high growth scale up, they aim to bolster SMEs in any way they can whether that be through funding, knowledge sharing, or facilitating others to scale up and grow, as “One of the leading scale-ups in the country.”

David is an example of a Chamber member who gives back and has been backing an education bursary that is open to any resident sixth former from Luton for the last 9 years. The aim is to encourage more young adults to pursue engineering careers while giving opportunities to those from less privileged or non-academic backgrounds.

The bursary isn’t dependent on grades or academic ability; it is simply judged on passion. The bursary requires the applicants to write an essay on why they wish to become an engineer, and David believes that talent can be identified through written word alone. Passion is the key to a strong engineer, believes David. The programme awards the chosen applicant with a bursary of £5,000 per year for each year of university. The education bursary has, coincidentally, been awarded to 4 females and 5 males over the course of its 9-year reign, by no design other than they were able to demonstrate that it is in their blood to become an engineer. We also hope that this is revolutionising the way young women view engineering as a career and hopefully encourages more females to enter.