Volvo flies the flag for UK-made components
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VOLVO is the leading foreign buyer of UK-manufactured automotive components, with about £125m worth of items sourced here in 1980, and other important customers include Renault (about (E60m), Opel and Fiat (145m each) and Scania and Volkswagen at £25m each.
Figures published in the latest report from the Economist Intelligence Unit — The Changing Face of the UK Automotive Components Industry also identify 60 companies as having annual sales of components valued at £10m or over ranging from Dunlop at number one (£950m) to Dowty at number 60 (£10m).
In 1977, when the EIU pub lished an earlier report on the industry, of the top 60 companies, 44 were British-owned, 14 had North American parentage, with one each controlled by Sweden and France.
The position now is that only 40 are British-owned, 15 are North American, two each are German and French, and one is Swedish.