The British Consulate was profiled on the front page of today’s Boston Globe for its presence amid the ‘hub of innovation’ in Cambridge, MA and its status as a ‘leading-edge outpost,’ with its focus on science, technology, trade, and investment. Read the full article by The Globe's Jim Smith here (excerpts below).

Boston has long been one of a handful of American cities with a significant foreign consular corps, hosting full-time and honorary consuls general from 55 countries. Now, thanks to its combination of globally renowned technology companies and universities, Boston has also become a magnet for new approaches to cross-border linkages, with the Swiss and British consulates leading the quiet transformation of diplomacy.

Don’t even think about coming to most of these leading-edge outposts for visas or passports. Much of that work - long the backbone of traditional duties for consulates, which are essentially diplomatic branch offices - has been centralized in embassies in Washington. Only one of the British consulate’s 25 staffers works on issues related to services for British citizens, and only three do conventional political and cultural work. Two-thirds of the professional staff focuses on science, technology, trade, and investment.

The British consulate general moved from downtown Boston across the river to the Kendall Square biotech hub in 2000, prodded by Gordon Brown, then-chancellor of the exchequer and now prime minister, after a Massachusetts vacation awakened him to the value of strengthening ties with the region’s leading technology institution. Brown soon fostered two projects, said Boston Consul General Phil Budden: the Cambridge-MIT Initiative, linking the University of Cambridge with MIT, and Britain’s Global Science and Innovation Network, which added science and technology offices to many consulates - starting with Boston.

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