Chemring has reported that it has hit record order intake for the year to 31 October, following increased demand for its countermeasures and sensors.

The aerospace and defence group, which is headquartered in Romsey, Hampshire, has recorded £756m of orders in the year to the end of October, with its highest closing book order in a decade, coming in at £922m.

Revenue at the firm increased by 18% year-on-year to £472.6m, with underlying profit before tax rising by 17% to £67.9m.

As part of the statement, the firm announced a £120m capacity expansion plan to 2026, which is designed to capitalise on growing demand in the energetics market, which is expected to delivered £85m in additional revenue by 2026/27.

Group chief executive at Chemring, Michael Ord, said: "2023 was another year of strong Group performance; and in an environment of increasing global uncertainty demand continues to grow for our mission-critical products and services. With record order intake and an order book at the highest level in over a decade the Group is well placed for continued delivery of sustainable performance and growth.

"Trading since the start of the current financial year has been in-line with plans, and with 79% of expected revenue covered by the order book the Board's expectations for 2024 performance are unchanged."

Ord added that the outlook for global defence markets is "increasingly robust", stating that continued growth is expected over the next decade.

Furthermore, Chemring announced that its group staff pension scheme had completed a £65m full buy-in with Pension Insurance Corporation (PIC), securing the pensions of 328 deferred and 485 pensioner scheme members.

Chair of trustees and Chemring Group group legal director and company secretary, Sarah Ellard, said: "We are delighted to have completed this buy-in with PIC, who were flexible in helping us achieve our aims and I want to thank them and the scheme’s advisers, Barnett Waddingham as lead transaction adviser and scheme actuary and Burges Salmon as legal adviser, for their hard work in successfully delivering this transaction.

"The buy-in removes future risk associated with funding of the scheme from our balance sheet, while ensuring the security of benefits for the scheme members."

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