TPi March 2016

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8 Tube ProducTs InTernaTIonal March 2016
newsbusiness & market
Liberty managing director
Sanjeev Gupta (left) at the
Oldbury plant
Targeting opportunities with further
Caparo acquisitions
The Gupta family, whose wider interests
include the international energy, metals,
industrial and trading groups SIMEC
and Liberty House, has acquired further
businesses from within the former
Caparo Industries plc, as it targets major
growth opportunities in the advanced
engineering sectors.
In an agreement with administrators
PwC, the family acquired parts of
Caparo’s advanced engineering
products and precision strip businesses
based at sites across the UK’s West
Midlands.
The engineering businesses – now
called Liberty Advanced Engineering
Products – have a high-profile customer
base, with products including anti-
vibration systems for naval vessels and
high performance braking systems for
NASCAR, London Taxis, US yellow
school buses, the upgraded Warrior
Land Rover, and the T1 Evolution hyper
car.
The move, which follows the Guptas’
purchase of businesses in Caparo’s
Tubular Solutions division – now
renamed Liberty Tubular Solutions
– marks a widening of the family’s
strategy to invest in the future of UK
manufacturing and engineering.
Liberty House Group managing
director Sanjeev Gupta said the latest
acquisitions represented a major
opportunity to preserve and develop
what he described as the cream of
British engineering expertise. “These
businesses contain some world-
leading knowledge and skill that
has the potential to contribute to a
significant engineering revival in the UK.
Despite current difficulties, advanced
engineering can create enormous value
for the UK economy and I’m convinced
that, based on the right business
model, operations like these have
strong growth potential in the UK and
across various markets internationally
where Liberty is present.”
Liberty recently restarted production of
hot rolled coil at its rollingmill in Newport,
South Wales, and hopes eventually to
recommence melting operations at the
same site, which has an arc furnace
already in place. The rolling mill has
current capacity to produce around 1mn
tonnes of coil a year.
Britain’s largest union, Unite, welcomed
the further sale of businesses from
the Caparo Industries Group to the
Gupta family. The latest sales mean
that more than 1,000 jobs have been
retained since the steel group called
in administrators PwC. Unite national
officer Harish Patel said, “This is further
welcome news. The Caparo workforce
is world class and it’s good to see that
the new owners recognise that retaining
and investing skills is crucial to the
business’s success.”
liberty House Group – UK