Manchester industrial chain and power transmission firm Renold resumed dividend payments as it reported “record trading performance, significant earnings growth and strong cash generation” for the year to March 31, 2024.

Profit before tax rose 32.4% to £22.9 million.

Renold said revenue for the year was £241.4 million, a year on year increase of 0.9% at constant exchange rates, or a 2.3% reduction “when currency headwinds are taken into account.”

A full year dividend of 0.5p per share is proposed, the first dividend announced since 2005.

Renold chair David Landless said: “The completion of several major strategic restructuring initiatives in prior years, together with the reducing debt levels and strong balance sheet puts the group in a strong position to capitalise on accretive acquisitions that augment our existing market position.

“This will allow us to accelerate growth in revenue, including for our existing products, in adjacent sectors and by entry into under-represented applications and geographies.

“Most importantly, the group will also benefit from significant production synergies by integrating acquired businesses.

“The continuing review of our capabilities throughout the group is identifying opportunities for the upgrade and development of existing manufacturing processes across our international locations to create higher specification, higher performance products.

“This review will also facilitate standardisation across more product lines which, in turn, will enable us to benefit more comprehensively from our geographic footprint and economies of scale.

“In addition, flexibility between manufacturing locations will support increasing customer expectations for supply chain diversification, for risk mitigation and a changing tariff environment, improving even further our value proposition.”