UK BUSINESS SECTORS | IN FOCUS
finance, IT and telecommunications. But the story is a lot more complex than that. The UK has moved into areas that make
HOW BUSINESS
HAS FLOURISHED OVER 50 YEARS
UK BUSINESS SECTORS
greater use of high skill levels, the latest technology and sophisticated manufacturing operations. Analysis by the Department of Business, Industry and Skills shows how relatively higher technology-based industries have grown in size while relatively low-tech ones have declined. While traditional sectors such as leather
products, clothing, textiles and basic products all shrank by at least 40 per cent between 1994 and 2009, hi-tech industries such as medical and precision instruments; chemicals, pharmaceuticals and bioscience; and aircraft, rail, marine and motorcycles saw rises of 10 to 50 per cent. Manufacturing has changed too. While it still
The past five decades have witnessed a revolution in the make-up of British business. Some sectors have vanished but new players have emerged, while the whole structure of business in the UK has undergone a dramatic transformation.
A bowler-hatted stockbroker leafing through the share prices of the companies in the FT30 equity index in his copy of the Financial Times in 1965 would have found a portfolio very redolent of the make-up of British industry of that era. At the time, around two-thirds of the FT30
came from the industrial sector – one third retailers, one-third from the food and drink sector – but none from finance and energy. No one had heard of information technology. Fifty years ago the UK business scene was dominated by a small number of large companies concentrated on traditional activities such as manufacturing and heavy industry. Blue chip companies such as Leyland Motors,
Dunlop Rubber, machinist Alfred Herbert and paint manufacturer Pinchin Johnson & Associates have disappeared. Some, such as ICI and Harrods, have been bought by foreign companies. Only two are in today’s FT30 – steelmaker turned aerospace manufacturer GKN, and Tate & Lyle – while the
The FT from the year the CBI came into being (opposite) featured an FT30 dominated by heavy industry (right)
drinks company Distillers remains as part of Diageo and Glaxo has become GSK. Today’s FT30 includes seven financial services companies, three energy firms, two telecoms providers, an advertising giant, an IT firm and a property group.
ADDING VALUE The startling change in the top-flight index highlights one of the most dramatic transformations of the UK over the last five decades: the decline of manufacturing and industry and the rise of sectors such as
includes established industries such as food and drink and automotive, new industries are based around emerging technologies. These include low carbon and green technologies, biotechnology, nanotechnology, and digital and advanced materials such as composites.
SERVICES REVOLUTION But what about services? They make up almost four-fifths of today’s economy and include activities from hairdressing to horticulture with whole swathes of financial services in between. Britain has seen a faster growth in services employment than its international peers. »
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