City briefs; Solid State, FireAngel, Paragon Bank
Solid State the specialist value added component supplier and design-in manufacturer of computing, power, and communications products has reported revenues of £85m, a 28.2% increase from the previous year.
The Redditch-based firm has recently integrated two acquisitions; Willow Technologies Group and Active Silicon Group and is set to complete the proposed deal of Custom Power for £45m in August.
Gary Marsh, Chief Executive said: “”The Group has a record open order book which, combined with our inventory management plan, positions Solid State to proactively manage the well-publicised electronics supply chain issues with our customers. Despite these ongoing challenges, the Group has been able to make considerable strides in delivering its growth strategy in the current year.
“The opportunities for significant growth across both Divisions are very exciting and the acquisition of Custom Power is expected to be an important catalyst enabling Solid State to deliver on its five year ambition of matching or exceeding the performance achieved over the preceding five years.”
FireAngel, the developer and supplier of home safety products based in Coventry said it’s performed strongly and anticipates sales of £25.6m in H1, which his 15% above the same period last year.
The underlying loss before tax is expected to be materially better than the board’s internal budget at £1.6m,
Supply chain disruptions eased during this period and in Q2 2022, the company sold around 1.4m units, against a supply-constrained total of 1m in Q1 2022, with 581k products sold in June 2022 alone.
Furthermore, in Q1 2022, all standard freight from Asia was booked for the balance of the year offering greater certainty of supply.
John Conoley, Executive Chairman of FireAngel said: “Despite all challenges so far, management action has preserved Company progress in the half, and we are still on track to meet our full year market expectations. The Board continues to expect a materially positive EBITDA performance for FY2022, along with a cash generative second half, thanks to strong product demand driven in part by continued regulation”.
Solihull’s Paragon Bank has said its delivered ‘another strong performance’ in Q3 as the group’s deposit balance exceeded £10bn for the first time in June.
The firm had completed 55% of the £75m 2022 share buy-back by the quarter end, leaving a further £33.8m to be acquired during the remainder of the year.
Nigel Terrington, Chief Executive said: “Paragon has delivered another strong performance, with continued momentum in new business flows and improving margins driving robust revenue growth, whilst maintaining a tight cost focus.
“With strong levels of capital and an exemplary credit performance, we are well positioned to deal with any economic weakness that emerges. We continue to deliver against our strategy to the benefit of all our stakeholders and are particularly excited about the benefits our digitalisation programme will create.”
