Billington chairman joins radio show line-up

Jul 2 2008 by Alex Turner, Liverpool Daily Post

THE chairman of one of Liverpool’s oldest companies, Edward Billington and Son, will be on this weekend’s LDP Business Week radio show to talk about the firm’s 150 years in business.

Lloyd Whiteley will be talking with Daily Post business editor Bill Gleeson about the firm, which was founded in 1858 as a sugar and coffee importer but is now a group of food and agriculture companies.

Based in the Cunard Building, it remains a family-owned company and today has a turnover of more than £200m with more than 800 employees.

Mr Whiteley, one of the fifth generation of the family to lead the company, said: “We have a fascinating history but, more importantly, the business is in great shape and we will report record profits this year. We are very optimistic about the future growth and development of the company.”

Also coming under the spotlight in this week’s show is the Advanced Internet Methods and Emergent Systems (AIMES) Centre, part of the University of Liverpool, which is pioneering the transfer of e-science to e-business, and which enables small companies to access computing resources that only larger companies could usually afford.

Also on the show will be Northwestern Shiprepairers owner John Syvret, who will be speaking about a major new contract from the Ministry of Defence that should secure the future of the Birkenhead shipyard firm.

The LDP BusinessWeek show is broadcast on CityTalk105.9fm each Sunday morning at 11am.