Rolls-Royce SMR has confirmed it will open its first manufacturing development centre - Pioneer Works - in Derby, England, in the fourth quarter of 2026. The GBP12 million facility will develop and validate the build processes, precision assembly and testing needed to industrialise the company's 470 MWe small modular reactor fleet across the UK, Czechia and Sweden.
What Pioneer Works will do
The site is non-nuclear but will underpin the highest integrity components of Rolls-Royce SMR's power plant. It will validate primary-circuit welding, precision assembly and advanced testing, and support the company's factory-built modular reactor model. Around 40 skilled, long-term roles are expected as the facility ramps up, spanning welding, testing, advanced engineering and manufacturing development.
Timing lines up with UK and European orders
The facility opens as Rolls-Royce SMR moves into delivery. In April the company signed a contract with Great British Energy - Nuclear to begin site-specific design and delivery activities for the UK's first small modular reactors at Wylfa. That was followed by an early-works agreement with CEZ in Czechia, and Rolls-Royce SMR was recently selected by Vattenfall for deployment at Ringhals in Sweden.
The wider SMR race
Pioneer Works joins Rolls-Royce SMR's existing "EXPERI" facility at the University of Sheffield's Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre. The company has also lined up partnerships with Skoda JS and Doosan Enerbility for reactor pressure vessels, and its Ringhals win was announced in a deal with Vattenfall. The Derby announcement lands the same week the SGE consortium filed plans for 14 BWRX-300 SMRs in the UK.
Ruth Todd on skills and delivery
Rolls-Royce SMR operations and supply chain director Ruth Todd said Pioneer Works will "act as our first training centre to create a future workforce which will help build Rolls-Royce SMR's factory-built nuclear power plants around the world," calling it central to the company's ambition to transform how nuclear projects are delivered.
Reporting based on coverage from Rolls-Royce SMR, World Nuclear News and The Manufacturer.