Stenoak Services, the largest UK retailer of industrial fencing and vehicle safety barriers, has bought highway maintenance operation, Associated Holdings, for £8.5 million.

The firm, with a history of nearly forty years' trading in Sussex, has acquired Associated Holdings' highway infrastructure maintenance business and bought 20 per cent of Associated's facilities business.

Associated's contracts in 1999 included resurfacing the Mall outside Buckingham Palace and work on major A roads across the South East.

Associated had net assets of £2.8 million at the end of December 1999 and had generated a profit before tax of £1.4 million.

Executive chairman of Stenoak Services, Adrian Drewe, said: "We have become a £100 million company instead of a £25 million company. We intend to grow, both organically and by acquisition, and we should look for more companies in the same sector."

The firm has a keen interest in widening its range of products and services in order to grasp opportunities arising from Government investment of an additional £280 million in the road network and public transport system.

The purchase of Associated Holdings is the third acquisition by the Stenoak Services since it floated last June - confirming Mr Drewe's commitment to expansion.

Stenoak Services acquired Associated Akam, producers of road safety barriers, for £3.5 million in November 1999. In March, it bought Brifen, makers of wire rope road barriers, for £4.4 million.

The value of Stenoak Services shares has now nearly doubled from £1.20 at the time of flotation.

The firm was founded in 1961 by Mr Drewe's father and was based in Uckfield until a recent move to Lamberhurst, near the Sussex/Kent border.

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