Last week, we shared snaps of a Swindon building that once appeared in a James Bond film - but it wasn't the only one to have this claim to fame.

The old Renault building on Mead Way popped up on the big screen during Roger Moore's final franchise feature A View to A Kill, and a site specially built for Motorola near the A419 could be seen in the Pierce Brosnan-era entry The World is Not Enough.

Motorola came to Swindon in 1989, based in the Blagrove Industrial Estate, and plans were soon set out to construct a new building on the Groundwell Industrial Estate near Thamesdown Drive.

Swindon Advertiser: Dame Judi Dench and Pierce Brosnan at the Motorola building in 1999Dame Judi Dench and Pierce Brosnan at the Motorola building in 1999

It was originally planned to be the new European headquarters, encompassing all admin, manufacturing and distribution departments, but this plan was trimmed before work started, with the site being designated for manufacturing to meet the increased demand for its cellular network base stations.

The massive 66-acre £82m operation was opened on October 24, 1998, by Queen Elizabeth II. The week before her visit to the factory, the former mayor of Highworth, councillor Martin Kender, labelled the building as Swindon’s worst eyesore and a blot on the landscape.

However, after a guided tour of the building, the Queen told Motorola employees: “I would like to congratulate you on this remarkable building.”

Referring to Swindon’s pioneering past, she added: “I would like to think you are following in the footsteps of generations of scientists and engineers.

“I shall follow your progress with great interest.”

In 1999, film fans spotted a helicopter landing at the plant as famous faces including Pierce Brosnan and Dame Judi Dench arrived as part of the shoot for their next film.

The striking glass and steel structure doubled as a Turkish oil refinery, with help from some computer wizardry.

Motorola's workforce had soared from 65 to around 3,000 at six sites around the town by the turn of the millennium, but the business struggled in the years that followed and laid off 700 staff in the area.

By 2002, only two Motorola sites in Swindon remained open and manufacturing at the Groundwell plant had slowed down significantly.

In 2010, the business downsized to a Kembrey Park base with a 500-strong workforce and sold the Groundwell site to pharmaceutical firm Vygon UK Limited.

The Bath and North-East Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire Clinical Commissioning Group, as it was then known, set up offices in part of the building, which is now known as the Pierre Simonet Building.