In typical fashion, filters maker Porvair (PRV) has beaten full-year expectations - leading analysts at broker Peel Hunt to upgrade forecasts for the sixteenth time. Growth will be less spectacular in 2013, however - but the year has started well, with a healthy order book and structural drivers firmly in place.
Revenue at the microfiltration division jumped 15 per cent to £48.5m and operating profit grew 19 per cent to £6.7m. A first contribution from the POSCO contract in South Korea helped and orders from all the major aircraft manufacturers boosted aerospace revenue by a fifth. Expect sales from the Airbus 350 to ramp up later this year, too. Meanwhile, a UK government contract to supply ultra fine filters to trap nuclear material is worth £11.3m and will chip in over the next three years Elsewhere, sales of water quality testing kits are rising and the Chinese are getting increasingly fussy, so expect a flood of business there.