In January, M-Sparc launched ‘Dewch yn Ol’ – a campaign that encouraged the return of talent to North Wales. ‘Dewch yn Ol’ targeted talent who’d left Wales for work or education but wanted to come back.

Pryderi ap Rhisiart, Managing Director of M-Sparc sat down with us at Business News Wales to discuss how the campaign went.

You can catch the full interview with Pryderi here:

Pryderi described ‘Dewch yn Ol’ as a“reaction to research [that M-Sparc conducted] to understand who’s working [at M-Sparc] and what impact they are having.”

He talks about how they noticed that M-Sparc was failing in two areas. Firstly, how the company did not employ enough females and secondly, the lack of Welsh-speakers in comparison to the average in Anglesey, Gwynedd and Conwy.

Dewch yn Ol’s message was to return to the region to live, work or set up a business, showing that North Wales is an area that offers well-paid work and plenty of support for startups.

Run by M-SParc in partnership with the North Wales Economic Ambition Board, Llwyddo’n Lleol, Bangor University, Darogan Talent, Gwynedd and Anglesey County Councils and others, the campaign has started to produce results.

Many people across the UK with links to North Wales responded to the campaign and expressed their interest in returning to return.

One of those who responded, Pryderi describes, was Catrin Owen who had already decided that she wanted to return home one day, and detailed how excited she was to see the offer from M-SParc.

Pryderi says that there is a “huge lack of skills and talent in North Wales, especially in digital but in all the stem areas, there’s a lack of talent.” He talks in detail, in the interview about how the Pandemic has had a severe impact on this too.

“Getting skills and people to work in North Wales is very important to us and anything we can do to plug that gap, we’ve done through Dewch yn Ol”