History
BTR started in 1924, when the B.F.Goodrich Company of the USA formed a UK subsidiary British Goodrich Rubber Co. Ltd. In 1934 Goodrich sold most of its shares in the company, which changed its name to the British Tyre & Rubber Co. Ltd. In 1956 the company changed its name to BTR Limited, when it ceased production of tyres.
The Company was dominated by Sir Owen Green from 1967 to 1993 first as Managing Director (until 1986) and then as Chairman. By 1982 BTR had acquired a large number of companies in the United Kingdom, the USA, Canada, Australia, South Africa and Germany. In 1985 BTR acquired Dunlop Holdings plc. The Dunlop road tyre business was immediately sold to Sumitomo Rubber Industries. In late 1985, BTR launched a hostile take-over bid for Pilkington, a leading manufacturer of high quality glass, with operations worldwide. After a successful defensive campaign by Pilkington, BTR was forced to withdraw its offer in early 1986.
In 1992, Hawker Siddeley Group Plc was acquired by BTR plc for £1.5bn.
BTR also had an industrial products operation in Australia known as Nylex which it secured complete control of in 1995.
Between 1996 and 1998, BTR sold the remaining Dunlop companies.
In 1999 BTR merged with Siebe to form BTR Siebe plc, which was renamed Invensys plc.
Read more about this topic: BTR Plc
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Considered in its entirety, psychoanalysis won’t do. It’s an end product, moreover, like a dinosaur or a zeppelin; no better theory can ever be erected on its ruins, which will remain for ever one of the saddest and strangest of all landmarks in the history of twentieth-century thought.”
—Peter B. Medawar (1915–1987)
“A poet’s object is not to tell what actually happened but what could or would happen either probably or inevitably.... For this reason poetry is something more scientific and serious than history, because poetry tends to give general truths while history gives particular facts.”
—Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)
“In front of these sinister facts, the first lesson of history is the good of evil. Good is a good doctor, but Bad is sometimes a better.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)