VT Group plc is a British defence and services company formerly known as Vosper Thornycroft. Founded by a merger between Vosper and Thornycroft in 1966, its original business was shipbuilding. It has since diversified into various engineering and support services.
As of 2007 it had a turnover of £1,004.6 million and employed approximately 13,000 people. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. VT Group is now involved in many areas of provision through five main operating groups: VT Communications, VT Education and Skills, VT Services Inc, VT Support Services and Shipbuilding.
Vosper Thornycroft has flourished even during lean times for warship building, mainly through successful sales efforts in exports and diversification outside of the core shipbuilding business into training and support. In 2001, in their most ambitious diversification project to date, VT started work on the US$55million superyacht Mirabella V for former Avis Car Hire boss Joe Vittoria. At the time of its completion in 2004, Mirabella V was the world's largest single-masted sailing vessel with an overall length of 75 metres and a mast height of approximately 87 metres. They have also made many other large sailing yachts.
The overall business has been known as VT Group plc since 2002.
Organisation
As of 2008 VT Group manages its subsidiaries through five main divisions:
VT Communcations is split between two business units; Broadcast and Defence & Security. The former provides broadcast infrastructure and services.
VT Education and Skills
VT Education and Skills provides various services to schools such as consultancy and facilites management. It also provides training services to commercial companies. VT Education and Skills also includes the former Flagship Training joint venture with BAE Systems which provides training for Royal Navy personnel and other customers.
VT Services Inc.
VT Services Inc. is the company's United States subsidiary and has three business units; VT Aepco, VT Griffin and VT Milcom.
VT Support Services
VT Support Services operates in defence, emergency service and commercial markets. Its business units are VT Aerospace, VT Critical Services, VT Land, VT Naval Support, VT Nuclear Services and VT Environmental Engineering.
For many years, the company had a shipbuilding yard in Southampton, Hampshire but in 2003 relocated its shipbuilding operations to new facilities in the famous HMNB Portsmouth Naval Dockyard under the name VT Shipbuilding. With effect from 1 July 2008, VT Shipbuilding was merged with BAE Systems' Surface Fleet Solutions subsidiary to form BVT Surface Fleet.[2] VT Group owns 45% of the joint venture but has equal voting rights with BAE.[3]
