A research centre, now part of the University of Sheffield AMRC and based in Rotherham, that helps UK manufacturers work in the nuclear industry, including with automation and robots.
Nuclear AMRC is a research and engineering centre that helps UK manufacturers become good enough to work in the nuclear industry. AMRC stands for Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre. The nuclear team, part of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult network, works on machining, welding and joining, additive manufacturing (a form of 3D printing for metal), automation, controls and instruments, and testing. Its Fit For Nuclear programme helps firms get qualified for nuclear work, and more than 860 companies had completed its online assessment at the time the page was published. Robotics is part of its automation work; one example it describes, from 2022, is a project with Sheffield firm Magnomatics where a robot placed magnets about 60 times faster than before.
The centre's stated mission is to help UK manufacturers win work in nuclear and other high-value, low-carbon industries, by building their ability to compete on cost, quality and delivery, and by developing new techniques and technologies for the sector. In March 2025 the Nuclear Industry Association reported that the team's 42 staff would move on 1 April 2025 into the University of Sheffield AMRC to form a new nuclear manufacturing group, the AMRC's eighth, so that it could strengthen nuclear research and help secure the UK's place in nuclear. We therefore describe it as the Nuclear AMRC, now organised within the AMRC.
The head office is at the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Park, Brunel Way, Rotherham. The catapult listing also shows locations at Infinity Park in Derby and at Birchwood Park near Warrington. The University kept the Rotherham factory-scale facility, with more than £35 million of production equipment, and the nuclear team works with partners such as the UK Atomic Energy Authority, Rolls-Royce SMR (on prototype modules for small modular reactors), Sandvik and the Nuclear Transport Solutions group. UKAEA is already on the PURPOSE site.
The pages we found do not describe the staff culture. They do describe a working style: a team of industrial advisors and engineers who go out to companies of all sizes, and work alongside them on test parts and trials, with testimonials from firms such as Jacobs. The 2025 announcement describes staff as engineers and researchers with decades of combined experience, and says they were consulted in 2024 about the move.
This is a research centre, so jobs include manufacturing and robotics engineers, welding and materials specialists, digital and automation engineers, industrial advisors who help companies prepare for nuclear work, project managers, and technicians who run the machines. Subjects such as engineering, physics, materials, maths and computing are the usual backgrounds. We list it in the robotics sector because automation and robotics research is part of its work, but robots are one strand among many.
Website: www.amrc.co.uk
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