Manganese Bronze chairman resigns

The Chairman of Manganese Bronze, the maker of London's black cabs, yesterday resigned from his post after it emerged that he is behind a bid approach for the company.

Jamie Borwick, who has been chairman of Manganese for more than 20 years, made an approach to take the company private in December. He and the board decided on Thursday night that it was no longer viable for Mr Borwick to remain in his post while his bid remained under discussion.

Together with Rutland Investments, a Bahamian-registered trust owned by his family, Mr Borwick controls 40 per cent of Manganese. There is, as yet, no indication of what price Mr Borwick offered for the company, which has a market capitalisation of £13.9m. It is also unclear as to whether Mr Borwick has additional financial backing for his bid.

Mr Borwick, who resigned without compensation, said: "I leave the group at an interesting juncture in its development – there are opportunities to improve its position but there are clearly considerable risks that it faces as one of Britain's last motor manufacturing businesses."

Manganese has been struggling to revive flagging sales in the past few months as the economic downturn, particularly in the City, had put pressure on taxi driver earnings.

Ian Pickering, the company's chief executive, said large redundancies in London's financial district meant a fall off in fares for cabbies, who were then holding back from buying new taxis.

The group is also without a partner with which to produce its cars in China, where it plans substantial expansion, and a separate project to modify cabs so they can be sold in the US is yet to be completed.

The shares fell 3.7 per cent to 77.5p yesterday. Tim Melville-Ross, currently the senior non-executive director, has agreed to act as interim chairman until a replacement is found.