Heywood Williams: Sale of Bristolpipe
UK building plastics group Heywood Williams is to sell its US pipe extrusion business Bristolpipe to Westlake Chemical Corp for US$33m. The group also announced that five senior managers had left the company as “certain head office functions have been rationalised”. Chief executive Robert Barr said: “My aim is to establish a smaller, more operationally focused executive team.” Bristolpipe extrudes PVC and ABS pipe products at three manufacturing facilities in Indiana, Pennsylvania and Georgia. It has a turnover of US$114m and approximately 200 employees. HW said the business was highly cyclical and was up against strong competition from vertically-integrated operators. The sale, subject to shareholder approval, will leave HW virtually debt-free.