A.B. METSON & SON LIMITED

🌳Matureactive

00756015 · ltd · incorporated 1963-04-02

Investment thesis

Established operating company — standard diligence applies, no dominant angle.

Why interesting: Live, filing, normal profile.

Why risky: No standout signals in either direction.

Opportunity decay

approaching window · 12-months

Approaching a transaction window — refinance or sale event plausible in the next 12 months.

· Oldest live charge 63.0y old — refinance window within 12 months

🔒Estimated value

—

Upgrade to see

Turnover

—

year to Apr 2025

Net worth

—

book net assets

Opportunity

82/100

Exceptional

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What this business does

Primary activity: Growing of cereals (except rice), leguminous crops and oil seeds

Sector: Agriculture, forestry & fishing

Investor take

Pursue

Active trading company with a 90-year-old founder — textbook succession opportunity.

Opportunity 82/100 (exceptional), bankability 85/100. Strong seller-intent signal (63/100, director aged 90). Share purchase looks the cleaner deal structure. Most likely exit: share sale to pe / searcher (65/100).

🏦

Refinance opportunity

1 live charge · oldest 63.0y

85/100

ready

Refinance conversation should be productive — structure clean and timing right.

· Oldest live charge is 63.0 years old — likely at or near maturity.
· Single lender — cleanest path to refinance.
· Legal-friction score 15/100 — clean.

Data confidence

Overall: medium (77/100)

Adequate coverage. AI outputs are reliable for the sections scored high; verify the rest in diligence.

Company profile

address, 1 SIC codes, incorporation date

100

Financials

2 years of iXBRL accounts extracted (YoY deltas available) + narrative notes parsed

Lenders & charges

1 charges (1/1 with lender, 1/1 with type)

Directors & officers

7 officers (5 active, 7 linked, 5 with DOB)

Ownership & PSC

4 active PSC(s) of 4 total, 4 with control declared

Director network

Network not yet resolved

Filing history

115 filings on record

Gazette notices

No matching gazette notices (standard for active companies)

Opportunity Score

82/100Exceptional

PassWatchWorth a lookStrongExceptional

Strong composite across quality, acquirability, and risk. High-priority target — progress to serious diligence.

Business quality

Active, clean filings, stable charge profile.

Acquirability

Strong succession / seller-readiness signals.

Risk profile

Few red flags.

Signal strength

100

Good data coverage for analysis.

Key financials

2 years extracted from filed iXBRL accounts

Cash

—

Net Worth

—

Current Assets

—

Current Liabilities

—

Hover to see exact values · click legend to toggle series

Financials

Extracted from Companies House accounts · accounting standard unknown

Metric	2025-04-05	2024-04-05
Average employees	4	400

Amounts extracted automatically from iXBRL. Fields left blank were not reported or not mapped. Values in GBP unless stated.

🔒Filing-note intelligence

1 signal detected in this company's narrative notes — going-concern language, audit opinion, contingent liabilities, related-party transactions.

Available from the Pro tier upwards.

See pricing →

Recent activity

Last 30 days

filings

Last 90 days

filings

Last 180 days

filing

• 1 accounts

Counts from Companies House filing history.

Corporate timeline (26 events)Click to expand

2025-12-19
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2025-07-21
📄
notification-of-a-person-with-significant-control
persons-with-significant-control · PSC01
2024-12-20
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2023-12-15
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2023-07-25
📄
notification-of-a-person-with-significant-control
persons-with-significant-control · PSC01
2023-07-25
📄
change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
2022-10-28
📄
appoint-person-director-company-with-name-date
officers · AP01
2022-10-28
📄
appoint-person-director-company-with-name-date
officers · AP01
2022-10-24
➕
METSON, John appointed
director
2022-10-24
➕
METSON, Robert appointed
director
2022-10-18
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2021-11-30
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2020-12-21
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2019-10-24
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2018-12-12
📄
accounts-with-accounts-type-micro-entity
accounts · AA
2018-07-24
📄
change-person-director-company-with-change-date
officers · CH01
2018-07-24
📄
change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
2018-07-24
📄
change-person-director-company-with-change-date
officers · CH01
2018-07-24
📄
change-person-director-company-with-change-date
officers · CH01
2006-02-03
🔓
Charge satisfied #1
2000-06-06
➕
METSON, Eva appointed
secretary
2000-06-06
➕
METSON, Eva appointed
director
2000-06-06
➖
METSON, Daisy May resigned
secretary
2000-06-06
➖
METSON, Daisy May resigned
director
1963-05-01
🔒
Charge registered #1
Lender: Lloyds Bank LTD
1963-04-02
🏢
Company incorporated
As A.B. METSON & SON LIMITED

Owner dependency

88/100

Critical — business is the founder

The business appears inseparable from the founder. Acquisition without a serious earn-out or meaningful transition period would likely destroy value.

FACTORS

-4 active directors: Broader management team in place — suggests transferable governance.
+Founder name in company name: Company name contains director surname "METSON" — strong identity link between founder and business.
+Long-tenure founder: Senior director has been in place 26 years — deep operational knowledge concentrated in one person.
+Founder age: Director aged approximately 90 — succession pressure is live.
+Family involvement: Multiple officers share a surname — likely family business, which concentrates governance.

Succession & seller-readiness

90/100

Likely off-market candidate

Strong acquirability signals converging. Worth approaching directly — this is how off-market deals start.

SIGNALS

primaryFounder aged 70+: Senior director is approximately 90 years old. Natural succession window is now.
primary20+ year tenure: Director in role 26 years. Very long tenure is a classic succession signal.
secondaryStable-but-static management: Company is 63 years old and no new directors in the last 3 years — succession not yet being planned internally.
supportingClean filings + long tenure: Disciplined long-tenure operator — classic lifestyle-business pattern that often sells quietly.

Red flags

clean

No red flags detected from available public data. (This is not a clean bill of health — detailed accounts review still recommended.)

Shareholders & ownership

4 active beneficial owners · fragmented

Name	Shares	Voting rights	Nature of control	Notified
Mrs Eva Metson Individual · British · DOB 09/1937 · age 89	25–50%	—	25-50% shares	26/11/2024
Mr Robert Metson Individual · British · DOB 07/1964 · age 62	25–50%	25–50%	25-50% shares · 25-50% voting	17/07/2023
Mr Alfred William Keith Metson Individual · British · DOB 01/1936 · age 90	25–50%	25–50%	25-50% shares · 25-50% voting	01/07/2016
Mr John Metson Individual · British · DOB 09/1962 · age 64	25–50%	25–50%	25-50% shares · 25-50% voting	01/07/2016

From Companies House Persons with Significant Control filings. Share ranges are banded per the public PSC regime.

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Peers ranked by estimated value, then turnover, then opportunity score.See all →

🔒Tailored diligence questions

7 specific questions generated from this company's actual signals — liquidity, leverage, director age, charge count, red flags, age-of-company.

Available from the Pro tier upwards.

See pricing →

🔒Advanced scoring suite

Exit-route ranking, improvement thesis, quiet-distress detector, covenant-pressure proxy, extraction monitor, approaching triggers, ownership drift, local cluster, value trap, debt capacity, archetype classification — 48+ scoring modules.

Available from the Pro tier upwards.

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Company details

Statusactive

Typeltd

Incorporated1963-04-02

Jurisdictionengland-wales

Primary SIC01110 — Growing of cereals (except rice), leguminous crops and oil seeds

Registered office

Ruses Farm

Calford Green

Haverhill

Suffolk

CB9 7UN

United Kingdom

Filing status

Accounts

Next due: 2027-01-05

Last made up to: 2025-04-05

Confirmation statement

Next due: 2026-07-31

Last: 2025-07-17