We start this Newsletter with a news update on the merger of the North and Midlands geographic regions into one business unit.  The newly merged North and Midlands combines the valuation expertise and market knowledge of the two regions to provide an enhanced service offering to our clients across both regions.  The new area will be led by Patrick Ditcham and Michael Booth, both of whom are RICS Registered Valuers with over 50 years’ experience between them.

Restructuring and Insolvency

The third and fourth quarters of 2020 have provided challenges as well as opportunities across the Midlands and North regions, with near historic low levels of insolvency appointments contrasting with record business problems in high street retail and throughout the leisure sector. 

The teams have however continued to be kept busy with a diverse range of instructions ranging from valuations of international hotel brands, rail construction plant, agricultural equipment, biogas facilities and traditional engineering machinery. 

With assets disposals ranging from agricultural holdings, CNC machining centres, warehousing & handling equipment, to the entire contents of the company who invented the DVD case as we know it today.  Here are a few examples:

Dubois Limited t/a Amaray – Plastic Injection moulding(s) 

A valuation and disposal for the owners of Amaray of their entire production plant, being the largest DVD case manufacturer in the UK.  An online auction was organized, with global marketing being undertaken, which resulted in all assets selling in line with expectations to parties from as far afield as Hong Kong, USA and Pakistan as well as mainland and eastern Europe and buyers throughout the UK.

Cool Data Centres (Lincoln) Ltd – In Administration: Data Storage

We carried out the valuation and assisted with the sale of assets of a data centre based in Lincoln which utilised cutting edge technology to cool the server racks. Rather than using traditional air conditioning systems to provide a chilled room within which the server racks are stored this company used in rack cooling and submersed servers. This had the benefit of allowing the rack rooms to operate at a far higher ambient temperature and thus reduce operating costs. 

Andrew Fraser Pumps: Precision Engineering

The valuation and subsequent disposal of surplus CNC machining centres and machine tools. Disposal through an online auction, with strong demand from the UK market, providing realisations were in ahead of expectations.  A complex site clearance was also delivered for the client, allowing continued operations throughout.  

Very Group : Logistics, Warehousing and Handling. 

Sports Turf & Ground care contractor

Valuation for restructuring purposes of sports turf maintenance and ground care equipment including specialist turf maintenance equipment used in the elite sports environment. 

Bredbury Hall Hotel: Chattel Assets  

MCT

Anaerobic Digestion Plant

Asset Valuation

We have conducted an extensive range of asset finance valuation projects, covering a wide spectrum of asset classes, from mobile cranes, ROV, printing & packaging, renewable energy, waste recycling through a private portfolio of £25m marque modern & vintage racing cars. This diverse portfolio of asset valuations demonstrates the breadth and technical expertise that our team has.   
The majority of our valuation work, by its very nature, is the subject confidentiality agreements but it demonstrates the breadth of asset classes being valued by our team.  A number of those which we can share are detailed below, obviously only being a small sample of the work undertaken.  This diverse portfolio of asset valuations demonstrates the breadth and technical expertise that our Asset Finance Valuation team have.  

Rail Maintenance & Civil Engineering  

Fleet of mobile cranes