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Smart Outdoor, which provides digital advertising screens, has moved into new premises to provide opportunity for growth.

Hive, an employee feedback platform, has agreed a lease on an office in Newcastle city centre. The lease is for ten years, for an office suite on the fourth floor of Broadacre House, owned by Taras Properties.

Crusoe’s, a Tynemouth seafront restaurant, is making multiple changes: a new extension, a new consultant, and a new menu. The restaurant is owned by the Wilson family, who also own The View on Longsands and The Lock at the Royal Quays Marina in North Shields. The extension and resulting new kitchen will enable the restaurant to produce a new ‘street food’ concept including chicken skewers, fish tacos, flat breads and salads.

Electek Solutions, an engineering project design & management consultancy based in County Durham, has secured a £50,000 investment from the North East Small Loan Fund. This money has enabled the company to create new jobs and move into larger premises. They design and install renewable energy-based systems for businesses, including LED lighting, solar and wind power systems, as well as giving advice on energy-saving initiatives.

A roofing and cladding specialist, Just Hard Metals, has lodged plans with Sunderland City Council to develop a site in Sunderland which has been described as an eyesore.

Returnable Packaging Services (RPS), a pallet management and pallet recovery specialist, intends to build an industrial facility at the Durham Lane Industrial Park in Teesside.

Waterstons, an IT consultancy founded in 1994, has moved its headquarters to a brand new office Aykley Heads Business Park in Durham.

Bernicia, a North East housing association with 50 years of experience, is investing £1m into its repairs and maintenance division, creating 31 new jobs.

The former Npower base in Team Valley Trading Estate, Gateshead, has received planning approval for two new industrial buildings. These two Eighth Avenue sites, which are known as Eighth Avenue East and Eighth Avenue West and total almost five acres of land, will be developed by UK Land Estates and will support a "significant number" of jobs upon completion. Talks with potential tenants are currently underway, and planning consent for both sites has been granted by Gateshead Council. Tim

Advantex, an IT services company based at Follingsby Park in Gateshead, has won two million pounds’ worth of contracts over the last few months, which will create ten new jobs. This is expected to produce a 27% increase in revenue as well as create engineer and account manager vacancies to deal with the increase workload. The new contracts achieved are: • Hitachi Rail: to provide network infrastructure for nationwide train depots •

The Inn Collection Group, a leading pub company based in Northumberland, has purchased a hotel in Ambleside in the Lakes District, as part of its plan to expand into more “pubs with rooms”. It is their third acquisition in the past twelve months.

BGL Group, a financial services company in charge of many well-known brands, will soon launch a £3m technology hub in Sunderland. This will create 40 jobs. Currently there are more than 700 people employed at BGL in Sunderland. The company is responsible for such well-known brands as comparethemarket.com.