MOSCOW (MRC) -- Chemicals group Ineos has been named as Britain’s biggest private company according to The Sunday Times Top Track 100 report, said Cityam.
Ineos was founded in 1998 by Jim Ratcliffe, a Lancastrian industrialist turned billionaire who built the business from scratch via a decade-long acquisition spree, snapping up unwanted operations from the likes of BP, Bayer and Amoco.
It is now a sprawling USD54bn (GBP35bn) turnover giant with over 17,000 staff and 15 different businesses producing chemicals used to make everyday products such as car parts, textiles, food packaging and mobile phones.
Ratcliffe said: "It’s great to be named Britain’s biggest private company by the Sunday Times Top Track 100 report. We are now investing over ?1bn to make our business even stronger and better than before".
Ineos, which is headquartered in Switzerland for tax reasons, announced plans last year to invest GBP640m in shale gas exploration in the UK.
It wants to use the gas to help run its sites, including Grangemouth in Stirlingshire rather than relying on costly imports of shale gas from the US.
Ineos Group Limited is a privately owned multinational chemicals company consisting of 15 standalone business units, headquartered in Rolle, Switzerland and with its registered office in Lyndhurst, United Kingdom. It is the fourth largest chemicals company in the world measured by revenues (after BASF, Dow Chemical and LyondellBasell) and the largest privately owned company in the United Kingdom.
MRC