On the firm's 21st birthday, Dyson is heralding the first phase of its £250m expansion of its research and development laboratories in Malmesbury, which could create 3,000 jobs.

Dyson said today it is trying to fill 400 places this year to fill both graduate positions and highly specialised engineering roles and could soon be spending £4m a year filing and securing patents.

The firs phase of its new research and development facility is due to open in early 2016, provided planning permission is granted. 

Malmesbury town councillors have already backed the idea despite reservations about parking and traffic as the site expands.

The firm's research and development 'master plan' will enable Dyson to increase its partnerships with leading British universities and create 3,000 science and engineering jobs.

Its laboratories will be home to new engineers and scientists with research space  allowing Dyson engineers to broaden a material science programme; expand world leading motor electronic research projects; and increase experimentation into noise cancelling acoustic technologies.

Laboratories in the facility will be set aside for robotics projects and the development of Dyson vision systems.

Prototyping space and test labs will lead to the development of new categories of Dyson technology, beyond the vacuum cleaners, fans and hand dryers it is known for, eventually having a 'pipeline of new technology'.

'Ideas spaces' will allow Dyson to generate more patentable technology than ever before as Dyson plans to spend over £4m a year filing and securing patents.

Sir James said: “We are ambitious – and it’s through research and development that developments in technology come about.

"We’ll be looking for 3,000 engineers to deliver Dyson’s pipeline of technology, but we need four hundred of Britain’s brightest right away – our ideas simply can’t wait!”

Dyson's vacancies include posts for software and electronics engineers to work on Dyson’s robotic technology, motor engineers who will develop the world’s smallest, fastest digital motors, and mechanical engineers to continually improve its core technologies.

Last year, Dyson said it added 250 engineers to its Malmesbury HQ while Dyson engineers also work with more than a dozen UK universities – including Cambridge, Imperial and Newcastle.

Dyson said it invests £3m in research and development every week and in 2012 filed the highest number of patents in the UK – intellectual property developed in the UK and exported around the world in the form of new machines.

• Dyson plans to hire 1,000 extra engineers and supporting roles over the next three years to fill its new high technology R&D facility.

• Alongside the new technology campus will be a multi-sports facility. It will include a sports pitch, showers, changing facilities and an area for bicycle parking to encourage Dyson employees to cycle to work.

• The expanded Dyson facility will include a new café for Dyson engineers. Food will be locally sourced where possible, as is already the case at Dyson’s premises. Dyson’s head chef is the former head chef at Marco Pierre White’s L’Escargot restaurant in Soho.

• The new R&D facility will be highly secure, allowing Dyson engineers to work confidentially on technologies many years from launch. All staff will be required to provide biometric scan to enter the building.

• A new car park will be built with space for nearly 600 vehicles. It will be heavily landscaped and planted, in order to screen it from the local environment. An extensive wildlife habitat and outside space for Dyson employees will be fostered.

• The new facility will be designed by Wilkinson Eyre, the same architects behind Dyson’s existing R&D facility that features a wavy rooftop design.

• Long term investment in Dyson’s digital motors, and new cordless vacuum technology fuelled sales.

• Turnover was £1.2bn in 2012 with the US being Dyson’s largest market, followed by Japan.

A spokesman said that before the new jobs were created an expansion to its new overflow car park will help alleviate the parking situation, with 200 extra car parking spaces now available.

A new shuttle bus is being trialled, taking staff from Chippenham to Malmesbury and reducing the number of cars on the road. This was as well as Dyson’s existing commitment to car lift-share schemes and encouraging cycling to work through bicycle parking facilities on-site.