The Top 6000 Public Limited Companies in The United Kingdom

by John D Blackburn (Editor)

Overview

This study looks at all public limited companies (PLC) registered in the United Kingdom.

The aim of this study is to provide an overview of the key movers and shakers of PLCs.
Only key data has been isolated, particularly the company's net worth and total assets, but
also their full name, date incorporated, registered office, activities, shareholders, directors
(with date of birth, occupation and nationality) and number of employees.

Two indicators of size are used: net worth and total assets. These are preferable to
turnover which is influenced by profit margins and whether the companies are capital or
labour intensive.

A short summary of the PLCs in the United Kingdom:

A PLC can be either an unlisted or listed company on the stock exchange. Companies
must include the words 'public limited company', 'PLC' or 'plc' as part of its name. Welsh
companies may choose 'cwmni cyfyngedig cyhoeddus', 'CCC' or 'ccc'.

The PLC form was introduced in the Companies Act 1980; prior to this, all limited
companies had the suffix 'Limited' or 'Ltd'.

A PLC must have a minimum allotted share capital of £50,000, a quarter of which, £12,500,
to be paid up.

The main advantage of a PLC is the ability to raise capital by issuing public shares.

The main disadvantages are more regulation, higher accounting transparency and
vulnerability to takeovers.

The Unlisted Securities Market (USM), which ran from 1980 to 1996, was a stock exchange
set up by the London Stock Exchange to cater for companies too small to qualify for a full
listing. The USM allowed companies to be traded which did not have the full three year
trading history required by the main market, or which wished to float less than 25% of their
share capital.

The Alternative Investment Market (AIM) was set up in June 1995 and USM companies
could move their quotation to AIM or delist. Since 1995, over 3,000 companies have joined
AIM raising more than £60 billion in new and further capital.

JP Jenkins provides a matched bargain dealing facility for unlisted companies such as
Millwall Holdings PLC and Rangers International Football Club PLC.

The London Stock Exchange (LSE) has 1,450 companies listed and AIM 1,150 companies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781912736034
Publisher:	Dellam Publishing Limited
Publication date:	10/26/2018
Series:	Business and Finance
Edition description:	Winter 2018 ed.
Pages:	838
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 11.00(h) x 1.66(d)

About the Author

Born in Cullercoats, a graduate of the London School of Economics, he was a research assistant at the University of Essex, assistant at the ECPR Summer
School, stipendiat at the Institut für Höhere Studien, Vienna, and was a research fellow at the University of Birmingham. As director at Faxtel International Inc, he published over 30 studies on British industry, the data sections of some are in the
British Library. Married with two grown up children, he has now spent some 40
years in corporate research.

He has varied interests, from the bagpipes to the works of the artist Robert
Jobling; a keen radio amateur, his call sign being G7JDB, and the proud owner of a
1972 Volkswagen Kombi, registered 8VW, which has travelled throughout Europe,
from the Tatra mountains of southern Poland to the northernmost tip of Norway.

Table of Contents

1 Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... . . . . . . . iv

2 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v

3 Total Assets League Table . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ......... . . . 1

As a measure of size, total assets is preferable to turnover which is influenced

by profit margins and whether companies are capital or labour intensive.

4 Company Profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..... . . . . 33

Full company name, date incorporated, net worth, total assets, registered

office, activities, shareholders and parent company, directors (with date of birth,

nationality and occupation) and number of employees (if available).

5 Index of Directorships . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...... . . 531

Alphabetical list of directors showing their directorships. If several directors have

identical names then their date of birth is shown.

6 Standard Industrial Classification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .......... . . . . . . 805

These codes are used to classify businesses by the type of economic activity in

which they are engaged.

7 finis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 830