Melrose pockets another £520m

TURNAROUND specialist Melrose Industries is offloading its ergonomic desks business for £520m.

It has agreed to sell ergotron to private equity firm The Sterling Group, in a deal expected to complete in October.

ergotron makes products including desks and computer and office accessories.

It is the last business picked up as part of Melrose’s 2016 takeover of heating and air conditioning maker Nortek for £2.2bn. It sold the air management business last April for £2.6bn and smart home technology arm Nortek Control in September for £227m.

Melrose shares rose 3.3pc, or 4.4p, to 137.8p. Chief executive Simon Peckham said: ‘We will have more than doubled shareholders’ equity investment in Nortek and have transformed the businesses.’

Melrose can now focus on engineering giant GKN, which it bought for £8bn in 2018. It plans to list drivetrain maker GKN Automotive and GKN Aerospace on the stock market.