Craigavon diesel generator manufacturer AJ Power has recorded one of its strongest ever financial years after posting a 63% uplift in revenue.
Ashley Pigott’s company said an increased worldwide demand for its generating sets drove sales from £31 million to £50m in the year to June 30 2023.
It left the Co Armagh company with a seven-fold increase in its profit-before-tax, which rose from £480,000 to £3.6m.
The latest accounts for AJ Power Limited state that the performance enabled the firm to settle all outstanding long-term loans, leaving the group debt free.
The new accounts state AJ Power has now started work on a new manufacturing facility.
The company secured planning approval for the industrial unit in November 2023.
The new component manufacturing facility is expected to be operational later this year.
Despite the strong performance in 2023, Mr Pigott’s review of the business, published alongside the accounts, said he expects turnover will return to “normal levels” in 2024 “as economic growth slows causing reduced demand across the globe”.
The business, which employs 131 people, exports its products into more than 80 countries.
AJ Power also has subsidiaries in Sweden and South Africa, and a branch office in Dubai.
The financial year covered by the accounts partly overlaps with a period where Ashley Pigott came to prominence when he spoke out over the cost implications of the protocol for his business.
Speaking to The Newsletter in June 2022, he called for the post-Brexit deal to be scrapped.
Revealing it had added a six-figure sum to his annual overheads, the business owner said most of the 15,000 components used by his engineering firm were sourced from Britain.
The comments came two months after AJ Power hosted a DUP manifesto launch at its Craigavon factory.
Former DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson later highlighted Mr Pigott’s comments and claimed it reflected the “kind of real business experiences that you will not hear Manufacturing NI refer to”.
Using his now deleted Twitter account, the Lagan Valley MP claimed to have been contacted by dozens of businesses with similar issues “all the time”.
Mr Pigott also highlighted his concerns over the protocol in front of the House of Lords sub-committee on the Irish Sea controls during October 2022.
He appeared alongside Lyle Pyper, managing director of hardware wholesaler EA Martin and Son.
Mr Pyper sold his Kilrea business seven months later to the Exeter headquartered engineering distributor Troy UK.
