GKN has announced pre-tax profits for 2002 up 8.9 per cent at £267m ( 2001 = £245m) – on a cash inflow from operating activities of £367m (2001= £452m).

Chairman Sir David Lees says: “To have delivered results at the top end of market expectations and well ahead of what both we and the market expected at the start of last year is a creditable achievement.”

The company had demerged its Industrial Services business in August 2001.

“For the first time for at least three decades, GKN's business now entirely comprises engineering activities and, given its international spread, the description of GKN as a global engineering company is exactly correct,” says Lees.