Avon Rubber upsets rival

Gas masks maker Avon Rubber snared a five-year contract with the US military in December worth $176m (£111m), and was to have delivered $2.5m of spare filters straight away. However, a losing bidder has raised a contractual protest with the US Department of Defense (DoD), which will likely shift those sales into the second half.

That’s unwelcome, and uncertainty as to when orders from non-DoD markets will come through doesn’t help the Protection & Defence (P&D) business either. Still, the smaller but faster growing dairy division had better news on first quarter trade. Its new milking device now has 10 per cent of the lucrative North American market and is expected to keep growing.

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