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Robyn and Laurence discuss a strong year for dairy giant Arla, a senior appointment at PwC and the green light for a Belfast hospital investment.

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00:00A strong year for dairy giant Arla, a senior appointment at PwC and the green

00:05light for a Belfast Hospital investment. That's all coming up in today's business

00:09briefing.

00:14My name is Lawrence Kilgannon and I'm Robin Hewson. Well, morning Robin. Morning

00:20Lawrence. Well, big appointments sort of stock in trade for us and you've got

00:24news of a really big one in PwC. Yeah, so it's a big appointment for PwC in

00:28Manchester. They've hired qualified lawyer Laura Nadel and she's going to be

00:34their market senior partner for Manchester. So Laura's been with the

00:37firm for a decade, became a partner in 2021 and is now stepping up again. She

00:43replaces Adam Waller who's retired from PwC at the end of December and she's

00:48going to lead collaboration across PwC services and 1,900 colleagues who are

00:52based in Harbourn Square. So yeah, quite a big undertaking. That really is a massive

00:56operation isn't it? Because it's grown up significantly over the last so

01:01many years I suppose. And a lawyer as well, so that's interesting because they're

01:05accountants essentially. But best of luck to Laura. And sticking with

01:10professional services, we've got results for Bradmers, a commercial law firm

01:17based in Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and Lancashire, so a northern base there. Long

01:24established, in fact established in 1815 Robin. Can you think of any

01:28historical landmarks from there? Oh gosh, you put me on the spot there. I don't think so.

01:33I think, actually I'm unsure now, but I think it was the Battle of Waterloo, so remarkable. I

01:38watched the film recently and I watched maybe too many history podcasts as well,

01:42listened to too many history podcasts. But anyhow, Bradmers, they've pushed

01:45turnover past £50 million for the first time, so a great year for them.

01:50Profits have also gone up, so a successful year round for them.

01:56So okay, well we've got some results for Arla too. Yeah absolutely, so great news

02:01for Arla, they've had a really strong year. So the dairy giant has reported

02:05results that have enabled the highest dividend payout to farmer

02:09owners in the company's history. So in 2024 they've achieved total revenue of

02:14£13.8 billion and also a net profit of £401 million. So a fantastic year and also

02:20really nice for the farmers that they work with to be able to give that to

02:24them as well. Yeah, absolutely, because we've mostly been covering farmers

02:28protesting about inheritance tax and things like that, so it's good to have a

02:32positive note. Yeah, exactly that. And they've reported a return to branded

02:36volume growth with popular brands that people know, like Lerpac leading the

02:40way in kind of helping them increase their profits. I do wonder if it's

02:44kind of the return to office and everyone getting their city centre

02:47Starbucks. Yeah, perhaps, and also of course milk. Someone needs milk, although not so

02:52often here it seems at the moment. I'm never going to make my brews. Yeah, we never have any in the office.

02:56Yeah, so they've had a fantastic year and they've also invested more than £1 billion

03:02into projects to support their future operations. So a strong year

03:06and it seems like more strong years ahead for Arla. Okay, great stuff and

03:10we'll finish with news of a new hospital investment that's going ahead in

03:13Belfast. They've got the formal go-ahead for an investment of £671 million, so

03:19obviously these massive infrastructure schemes create a lot of jobs for

03:22construction suppliers and supply chain etc. And that's going to be in

03:28Belfast's Royal Victoria Hospital, a children's hospital with up to 155 beds,

03:3310 theatres, and apparently capacity for emergency services of about 45,000

03:38children a year. So it's going to be a real big investment I imagine that'll be

03:42going on for the next so many years. So yeah, to find out more about the stories

03:47we've discussed today go to insidermedia.com. There you can subscribe

03:51to our newsletters, you can subscribe to our magazines, and you can also find out

03:56about upcoming events. That's all from us, see you next time.

Watch: Insider's Business Briefing - 20th February 2025

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