In Vehicles to Vaccines I tell the story of how Britain went from exporting more vehicles than any other country in 1951 to having now a pharmaceutical industry that is up there with other world leaders. Between all this there are the tales of who came and who went. Who was bought and who withered on the vine. I have looked at each sector to highlight some of the major disposals to foreign buyers, since, in truth, there were many and we can question whether successive governments were right to allow them. Many excellent companies remain not least SMEs, but UK quoted manufacturers are vulnerable to takeover given their relatively lower market valuations. A post budget article explores the issues.

The image is of the Cadbury sports pavilion at Bournville in Birmingham as part of the Quaker family’s commitment to its workforce.

Energy

With the coming of North Sea oil and gas, Northern Engineering Industries (NEI) gathered together International Combustion, Clarke Chapman, John Thompson, Reyrolle and CA Parsons and was itself bought by Rolls-Royce plc in 1989. It was subsequently sold to Siemens.

The major manufacturer of Gas Turbines for the oil industry, Rustons, was bought by English Electric which merged into GEC which sold its energy business to the French Alstom. Rustons later also became part of Siemens.

Metal

Much of British steel was bought by the Indian Tata, with another Indian producer, Liberty Steel, buying largely electrically powered smelters. The Chinese own what is now British Steel at Scunthorpe.

The British aluminium industry is now owned by GFG, the owners of Liberty steel.

Stanton & Staveley, the manufacturer of spun pipes, was  sold to the French St Gobain.

Chemicals and Plastics

Fisons was bought by the French Rhone Poulenc in 1994 and Albright & Wilson became part of Rhone Poulenc in 1999. Laporte was bought by the German Degussa AG in 2000.

ICI demerged Zeneca to become Astra-Zeneca and sold heavy chemicals to the British private Ineos as did BP and Shell.

Machine Tools

British machine tool companies have always been factors as well as manufacturers; they are now preponderantly factors sourcing machines from all over the world. The rump of Alfred Herbert, the biggest of the UK makers, was bought by what became TI Herbert Churchill which in turn was bought by Smiths Industries.

WT Avery was bought by the American Weigh-Tronix on the break-up of GEC. In 2022, the 600 Group sold Colchester Lathe Company to the American Timesavers.

Engineering

Of the giants of British engineering, Vickers eventually became part of Rolls-Royce plc, GKN plc was bought by breakup investor Melrose plc, Hawker Siddeley was bought by BTR which merged with Siebe to become Invensys which, in 2014, it was bought by its French rival Schneider Electric. TI was bought by Smiths Industries. Davy and John Brown were bought by Trafalgar House which, in 1998, fell into the hands of the Norwegian shipbuilder and engineer, Kvaerner. Weir Group remains British but has most of its operations overseas having refocused from energy on to mining. There remains a vibrant SME engineering sector.

Electrical Engineers

British electrical engineering came together in GEC on the breakup of which energy businesses, as already mentioned, eventually became part of Siemens.

BICC cable business was sold to General Cable.

TV, Radio, Telecoms

British radio and television manufacturers disappeared with the onslaught from Hong Kong and Japan

The telecoms businesses of Plessey and GEC were combined in GPT which in 1990 merged with Siemens Communications. Racal was bought by the French Thomson CSF which changed their name to Thales. On the break-up of GEC Marconi, its remaining telecoms business was sold to Ericsson.

Computers and Semi-conductors

ICL, which had gathered essentially the whole British computer industry was bought by Fujitsu.

Semiconductor manufacturer, Dynex which can trace its history back to AEI, was bought by Chinese CRRC.

Newport Wafer Fab which was bought by Nexperia of the Netherlands in 2021. Nexperia traces its history back to Phillips and Mullard. An issue arose with the ownership of Nexperia, which is Chinese. Government made the acquisition conditional on Nexperia selling 86% to a third party. At the time of writing negotiations are taking place with Vishay of the USA.

Volume car production

Rootes was bought by Chrysler in the sixities. Thereafter it was a story of the indigenous industry withering on the vine with, as the final chapter, the rump of British Leyland being  bought by Chinese.

Volume car production continues and thrives with Nissan in Sunderland, Mini in Oxford. Ford are the stalwarts of UK volume car production. Vauxhall’s successor, Stellantis, has recommitted to the UK.

Speciality motor cars and commercial vehicles

Jaguar and Land Rover were bought by Tata, Rolls-Royce Motors by BMW and Bentley by VW.

Lotus is owned by the Chinese Geeley. Aston Martin is based in the UK but with Mercedes Benz holding 20% alongside international shareholders. BSA and Royal Enfield found new homes in India from where they launched back into the UK market.  

Leyland became part of DAF now owned by the American PACCAR. Dennis are owned by the Canadian NFI Group

Motor Components

Lucas was sold to the American Varity and Dunlop to the Japanese Sumitomo.. Pilkington including Triplex was bought by Nippon glass.

Aircraft

Essentially all airframe manufacturers became part of BAE Systems which then sold its holding in Airbus

Dowty was bought by TI which in turn was bought by Smith Industries. In 2021, Meggit was bought by Parker Hannifin Corporation. Westland is now part of the Italian Leonardo.

Rolls-Royce plc stands alone as a major player, along with GKN Aerospace and the smaller recently re-shored, Britten Norman.

Shipbuilding

Closure and lack of success in North Sea Oil led to the collapse of most UK shipbuilding. Trafalgar House, which worked in north sea oil, was sold to Norwegan Kvaerner.

Babcock successfully entered via ship repair and prospers with military work. BAE Systems builds both submarines and surface ships. Harland & Wolff continues in Belfast and elsewhere.

Railways

British Rail Engineering was sold to Bombardier and then to the French Alstom which also bought Metro-Cammell. In 2013 Siemens bought the rail related businesses including Westinghouse Signal and Westinghouse Brake.

Defence

Ferranti merged with International Signal and Control but the new company was hit by fraud and collapsed and its defence computer operations went to the French Thompson CSF

Most UK defence manufacturing was brought together in BAE Systems which sold part to Leonardo of Italy.

Construction

In building supplies, Redland was sold to the French Lafarge and British Gypsum to the French St Gobain; Pilkington was bought by Nippon Glass; and RMC which owned Rugby Portland sold to the Mexican CEMEX, Blue Circle to the Irish CHR-owned Tarmac, and Hanson Cement to the German Heidelberg Group. Manufacturers of heating boilers can be traced through ownership by TI and then Hepworth Ceramic to the German Vaillant. In terms of electrical fittings, MK is part of the American Honeywell and Crabtree, Wylex, Volex Accessories and Appleby are owned by Siemens.

The main UK lifts manufacturers were bought by the American OTIS.

Consumer Products

Garden machinery manufacturer Atco-Qualcast was formed in 1991 and was bought by Bosch in 1995. Mountfield became part of the Italian Stiga Group in 2000.

Irish Glen-Dimplex bought Roberts Radio and Dimplex.

Finnish Fiskars Group bought Wedgewood, Royal Doulton and Waterford Glass

In 2013, the jewellery business of Cookson became part of the German Heimerle + Meule Group, which also now owns the other major Birmingham jeweller Weston Beamor.

Textiles

In America, Courtaulds achieved great success with their subsidiary, American Viscose but this was lost as part of the post war settlement with the USA. Courtaulds bought up much of the British textile industry. Its non-textile businesses developed to such an extent that in 1990 the company split into Courtaulds plc and Courtaulds Textiles which later become part of the American Sarah Lee. Courtaulds plc split into aerospace activity which was bought by the American PPG Industries with the remainder merging with the Dutch Azko-Nobel. A much smaller textile industry remains often with offshore production.

Food and drink

Cadbury was bought by Kraft Foods, Rowntree by Nestle and United Biscuits by the Turkish family food business Yildiz.. Schweppes was bought by Dr Pepper. The Dutch Refresco now owns Carters Soft Drinks. Walkers crisps were bought by Pepsico in 1989. Weetabix is now owned by Post Holdings of the USA.

In terms of packaging, Metal Box was bought by the American Crown Cork and Seal and Bowater by the American Ball Corporation.

Pharmaceuticals

Boots pharmaceuticals was sold to BASF in 1994. Nuclear medicine manufacturer Amersham International was bought by GE Healthcare in 2003.

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