Airbus supplier’s shares dip over battle on board

A POWER struggle has broken out at Airbus supplier Velocity

Composites as founder and former boss Jon Bridges demands to be reinstated on the board.

Bridges was bumped down from his position as chief executive to chief technical officer in September following the company’s third profit warning this year. He later left the board.

But the 43-year-old, along with his co-founders Gerard Johnson and Christopher Banks, is demanding that he be returned to the ranks of top brass along with former director Peter Turner, who resigned in August.

The founders have written a letter to chairman Mark Mills, who was taking on the chief executive’s responsibilities until a replacement is found.

They called for a number of unspecified board members, believed to include Mills himself, to resign by 5pm yesterday.

Mills is understood to have no plans to stand down, but Bridges and his partners – who together own 43pc of the company – have threatened to call a general meeting if no one voluntarily leaves. This would mean the board’s roles – and the reinstatement of Bridges and Turner – would be put to a shareholder vote.

Velocity has called the proposed shake-up ‘damaging’, and not in the interest of all shareholders.

Mills and two other non-executive directors claimed they would resign if Bridges and Turner returned to the company.

Shares in Velocity, which also makes parts for Typhoon fighter jets, have slumped 74.1pc over the past year, wiping £29.5m off the AIM-listed company. Yesterday they fell 1.7pc, or 0.5p, to 29.5p.

After Chancellor Philip Hammond announced in last week’s Budget that the national living wage would rise next year, Canaccord Genuity Wealth Management has revealed that some of the FTSE’s best-known names will be hit worst by the move.

The 4.9pc rise in minimum pay, from £7.83 to £8.21, will benefit around 2.4m workers, but it will be less welcome for firms with large payrolls compared to sales, as they will see the biggest percentage decline in their gross profit as the living wage rises.

Bakery Greggs (down 0.7pc, or 8p, to 1182p) will suffer most, closely followed by Wagamama’s new owner The Restaurant Group (down 2.1pc, or 5.4p, to 252.8p),

Wetherspoons pubs (down 0.3pc, or 4p, to 1290p), Halfords (down 3.5pc, or 11.4p, to 312.8p), and sausage casing company Devro (up 0.6pc, or 1p, to 165p), according to Canaccord.

Pub groups Mitchells & Butlers (up 0.4pc, or 1p, to 265p) and

Fuller Smith & Turner (up 1.5pc, or 14p, to 934p) were also in the top ten, as were Pets At Home (down 0.6pc, or 0.7p, to 116.1p),

Hotel Chocolat (up 2.3pc, or 6.5p, to 291.5p) and scandal-hit Patisserie Valerie (flat at 429.5p). The FTSE 100 ended the day up 0.1pc, or 9.7 points, at 7103.84 as Russian metals company Evraz was boosted by higher steel prices in China. Its shares climbed 4pc, or 22p, to 569.8p – giving Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich, the firm’s largest shareholder, an extra £96.9m.

On the FTSE 250, insurer Hiscox took a dive as it said growth in insurance premiums – or the cost of an insurance policy – could even out. The firm, part of the Lloyd’s of London insurance market, also reported an uptick in claims and warned that ‘ongoing economic and global political tensions’ would give rise to subdued fullyear returns. Its shares dipped 5.7pc, or 94p, to 1552p.

Back on London’s junior market, shares in major venture capital firm Draper Esprit climbed 3.8pc, or 20p, to 550p as it announced strong results for the six months to September.