One of the UK’s leading training providers has unveiled plans to significantly increase the number of gas and air source heat pump engineers undergoing training after completing a notable acquisition.

Realise Training Group – which operates in other regulated markets including Early Years, Health and Social Care and Transport as well as Business Skills and Adult Skills – has acquired Smart Gas Training and Assessment Centre in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, for an undisclosed seven figure sum.

Smart Gas was formed in 2016 by departing directors Patrick O’Sullivan and John Grocott and offers air source heat pump, gas, plumbing and heating training, including the Level 3 Gas Engineering Operative Apprenticeship course and ACS GAS accreditations.

Realise has now taken over ownership of the training centre and is planning to use its resources as a major training provider to help grow the Smart Gas offering to new and current engineers in multiple locations across the East Midlands and, in the long term, England.

The move comes after the government announced a £600 million investment into training up to 60,000 skilled construction workers.

Gregg Scott, CEO of Realise Training Group, said: “We are delighted to be in a position to provide support for gas and green engineers at what is a vitally important period for the industry as we look to play our small part in the country meeting the government’s net zero and house building targets.

“The ageing demographic of gas engineers is very stark and, with the green revolution and rise of air source heat pumps in full flow, there are both challenges and opportunities facing the industry and the people working in it.

“We are truly focused on the opportunities and building on the great work that Patrick and John have overseen in both the apprenticeship and the commercial offerings and setting engineers up for a long career in the industry.

We are “planning a sizeable investment in the business – from new systems to a new website and an expansion to the current Ashbourne site – and our medium-term plan is to take this offering further around the East Midlands and provide opportunities for new and existing engineers to upskill and train in multiple geographical locations.

“As well as the acquisition, we have also announced the launch of the Realise Training Group this week and that signals our intent for long-term growth and being a one-stop-shop for all training solutions in the sectors in which we operate.”

Since launching in 2016, Smart Gas has trained more than 1,500 engineers, including nearly 300 apprentices after becoming an approved apprenticeship training centre in 2020. Learners have come from Staffordshire, Nottinghamshire and Cheshire, as well as the local area.

Amongst the other training programmes and assessments traditionally carried out by Smart Gas have been ACS Domestic Gas Training & Assessment, Unvented Hot Water Training, Water Regulations Training and LPG Training.

Patrick, who alongside John was construction manager in the further education sector before launching Smart Gas, said: “We’ve had a brilliant eight years and had the privilege of our team training hundreds of fantastic gas engineers, but the time is right to move on.

“We’ve been talking with Gregg for some time and got to know a lot about the culture of Realise and it’s perfectly aligned to the business we have tried to create.

“Realise is committed to offering outstanding, innovative and dynamic training which puts the learner at the heart of everything, so we know the business we have worked hard to build up is in very safe hands.

“There are ambitious expansion plans for Smart Gas and we couldn’t have delivered that on the scale Realise will be able to.

“Gregg and the Realise team have been a real pleasure to deal with and we wouldn’t hesitate to recommend talking to Gregg if, like us, you are the owner of a gas training provider looking to exit your business.”

All 10 employees at Smart Gas will remain with the business following the acquisition.

Realise provides training solutions to more than 16,500 learners across England every year.