Bridon Ropes, also known as Bridon International Ltd is a manufacturing company in
Doncaster
Doncaster (, ) is a city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, it is the administrative centre of the larger City of Doncaster. It is the second largest settlement in South Yorkshire after Sheffield. Doncaster is situated in ...
in
South Yorkshire
South Yorkshire is a ceremonial and metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. The county has four council areas which are the cities of Doncaster and Sheffield as well as the boroughs of Barnsley and Rotherham.
In N ...
that makes
wire rope
Steel wire rope (right hand lang lay)
Wire rope is several strands of metal wire twisted into a helix forming a composite
''rope'', in a pattern known as ''laid rope''. Larger diameter wire rope consists of multiple strands of such laid rope in a ...
. It is now part of the
Belgium
Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...
-based
Bekaert
N.V. Bekaert S.A. (Euronext Brussels: BEKB) is a global company with headquarters in Belgium, employing 28,000 people worldwide. Its primary business is steel wire transformation and coatings. Operating in 45 countries, Bekaert generated combined ...
company. The name Bridon originates from the concatenation or contraction of the words British and Doncaster; it is not a family name.
History
The company can trace its history in Doncaster back to 1789.
It was formed in 1924 as
British Ropes British Ropes was a company established on 6 June 1924 through the merger of eight companies.
The companies were:
Gateshead
* Haggie Brothers, Gateshead
* Tyne Wire Drawing Co (a subsidiary of the above)
Liverpool:
* R. S. Newall and Son
London: ...
Limited. British Ropes Ltd was headquartered at 32
Cavendish Square
Cavendish Square is a public garden square in Marylebone in the West End of London. It has a double-helix underground commercial car park. Its northern road forms ends of four streets: of Wigmore Street that runs to Portman Square in the much lar ...
. British Ropes was state-owned. From the 1960s to 1980s, British Ropes headquarters was at Warmsworth Hall at
Warmsworth
Warmsworth is a village, Civil parish and suburb of Doncaster in the City of Doncaster district in South Yorkshire, England. Its population was estimated at 3,908 in 2019. The village lies along the A1(M) Doncaster Bypass and the A630. The Riv ...
, off the
A630
The A630 is an A road in the United Kingdom. It runs between Sheffield city centre and junction 4 of the M18 motorway passing through Rotherham and Doncaster on the way. The road is entirely in South Yorkshire.
Route
The road starts at th ...
near the B6376 junction.
In 1974 it became known as Bridon; Bridon was the name of one of their brands of wire rope. In 1976 the company was turning over £243 million. In 1978 the company was registered on the Stock Exchange. Bridon and
British Steel jointly owned the large
Templeborough
Templeborough (historically Templebrough) is a suburb of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England. The suburb falls within the Brinsworth and Catcliffe ward of Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council. The area takes its name from the remains of the ...
Rolling Mills; this is now the
Magna Science Adventure Centre
Magna Science Adventure Centre is an educational visitor attraction, appealing primarily to children, located in Rotherham's former Templeborough steelworks.
Location
The site used to be home to the Steel, Peech and Tozer steel works (also ...
; 40% of Templeborough's production went to Bridon.
In 1991 its workforce was 5,400 which dropped to 4,000 at the end of 1993, and produced in 20 countries with 76 service centres; it was the world's biggest supplier of wire rope. In April 1993 it won a
Queen's Award for Technological Achievement Queens is a borough of New York City.
Queens or Queen's may also refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* Queens (group), a Polish musical group
* "Queens" (Saara Aalto song), 2018
* ''Queens'' (novel), by Stephen Pickles, 1984
* "Queens", a song by C ...
for its Brifen fencing.
Prince Andrew, Duke of York
Prince Andrew, Duke of York, (Andrew Albert Christian Edward; born 19 February 1960) is a member of the British royal family. He is the younger brother of King Charles III and the third child and second son of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince ...
visited the site on 20 October 2011.
Ownership
In 1997 it was bought by
FKI, who were bought by
Melrose Industries
Melrose Industries plc is a British manufacturing company based in London. It specialises in buying, investing in, and divesting engineering companies. Its shares are listed on the London Stock Exchange as a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. Me ...
in 2008. In 2014 it was bought by the
Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan
The Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Board (french: Régime de retraite des enseignantes et des enseignants de l'Ontario) is an independent organization responsible for administering defined-benefit pensions for school teachers of the Canadian pr ...
for £365 million. In December 2015 it merged with the Belgium wire rope company
NV Bekaert SA.
Structure
It is headquartered in the south-west of Doncaster. It makes wire rope at four sites in the UK, and in Germany and the USA.
Products
It makes wire rope for bridges, cranes, elevators and mine shafts. It claims to be the only company in the world that makes wire rope from
hot rolled steel. A brand of its wire rope is called Dyform; Dyform was introduced in the late 1960s as a seven-wire tendon for prestressed concrete construction.
Their wire rope has been made widespread for
prestressed concrete
Prestressed concrete is a form of concrete used in construction. It is substantially "prestressed" ( compressed) during production, in a manner that strengthens it against tensile forces which will exist when in service. Post-tensioned concreted i ...
bridges; the BRIDON brand is found on many prestressed concrete bridges around the world.
See also
*
British Insulated Callender's Cables
British Insulated Callender's Cables (BICC) was a 20th-century British cable manufacturer and construction company, now renamed after its former subsidiary Balfour Beatty. It was formed from the merger of two long established cable firms, Callen ...
*
Prysmian Group
Prysmian S.p.A. is an Italian company with headquarters in Milan, specialising in the production of electrical cable for use in the energy and telecom sectors and for optical fibres. Prysmian is present in North America with 23 plants, 48 in Eur ...
*
British Ropes F.C.
*
Bridon Ropes F.C.
References
External links
Bridon*
{{Authority control
British companies established in 1924
Cable manufacture in London
Companies based in Doncaster
Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange
Engineering companies of England
Manufacturing companies established in 1924
Ropes
Steel companies of the United Kingdom
Wire and cable manufacturers