A & J WATT LTD.

🌳Matureactive
SC248198 · ltd · incorporated 2003-04-23
Investment thesis
Well-run mature business — low negotiation leverage; premium likely.
Why interesting: Textbook target; clean filings, stable trading.
Why risky: No pressure on seller; any deal likely at full price.
Opportunity decay
approaching window · 12-months
Approaching a transaction window — refinance or sale event plausible in the next 12 months.
  • · Oldest live charge 22.1y old — refinance window within 12 months
🔒Estimated value
—
Upgrade to see
Turnover
—
year to Mar 2025
Net worth
£175.1k
book net assets
Opportunity
82/100
Exceptional
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What this business does
Primary activity: Retail sale of carpets, rugs, wall and floor coverings in specialised stores
Sector: Wholesale & retail
Investor take
Pursue
Active trading company with a 67-year-old founder — textbook succession opportunity.

Opportunity 82/100 (exceptional), bankability 80/100. Strong seller-intent signal (83/100, director aged 67). Share purchase looks the cleaner deal structure. Biggest value-creation lever: Discharge stale live charges. 3 live charge(s) created 15+ years ago — likely paid but undischarged. Clean register. Most likely exit: share sale to pe / searcher (65/100).

🏦

Refinance opportunity

3 live charges · oldest 22.1y

65/100
clean up first

Refinance viable after a tidy-up — address the highlighted items first.

  • · Oldest live charge is 22.1 years old — likely at or near maturity.
  • · Single lender — cleanest path to refinance.
  • · Legal-friction score 25/100 — workable, but lender will want more DD.

Data confidence

Overall: medium (76/100)

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
75
Lenders & charges
3 charges (3/3 with lender, 3/3 with type)
90
Directors & officers
5 officers (3 active, 5 linked, 2 with DOB)
78
Ownership & PSC
2 active PSC(s) of 2 total, 2 with control declared
90
Director network
Network not yet resolved
30
Filing history
68 filings on record
85
Gazette notices
No matching gazette notices (standard for active companies)
60
Opportunity Score
82/100Exceptional
PassWatchWorth a lookStrongExceptional 

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

Business quality
70
Active, clean filings, stable charge profile.
Acquirability
80
Strong succession / seller-readiness signals.
Risk profile
85
Few red flags.
Signal strength
100
Good data coverage for analysis.

Signals from accounts

Derived from iXBRL accounts · accounting standard not declared
Positive net assets
Net assets £175,071
Net assets shrinking
Down £7,892 YoY
Cash YoY
+18%
Year on year

Key financials

2 years extracted from filed iXBRL accounts
Cash
£44k
↑ 18% YoY
Net Worth
£175k
↓ 4.3% YoY
Current Assets
£75k
↓ 20% YoY
Current Liabilities
—
£0£37k£73k£110k£146k£183kMar 2024Mar 2025

Hover to see exact values · click legend to toggle series

Financials

Extracted from Companies House accounts · accounting standard unknown
Metric2025-03-312024-03-31
Total assets£185.1k£187.2k
Current assets£74.6k£93.3k
Cash£44.3k£37.5k
Debtors£16.3k£30.4k
Net assets£175.1k£183.0k

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
1
filing
  • • 1 confirmation-statement
Last 90 days
1
filing
  • • 1 confirmation-statement
Last 180 days
2
filings
  • • 1 confirmation-statement
  • • 1 accounts
Counts from Companies House filing history.
Corporate timeline (27 events)Click to expand
  1. 2026-01-29
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  2. 2024-12-31
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  3. 2023-12-18
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  4. 2023-04-24
    📄
    change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
    persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
  5. 2023-04-24
    📄
    change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
    persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
  6. 2023-02-28
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  7. 2021-12-31
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  8. 2021-02-04
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  9. 2019-12-31
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  10. 2018-12-21
    📄
    accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
    accounts · AA
  11. 2018-10-29
    📄
    change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
    persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
  12. 2018-10-29
    📄
    change-person-secretary-company-with-change-date
    officers · CH03
  13. 2018-10-29
    📄
    change-person-director-company-with-change-date
    officers · CH01
  14. 2018-10-29
    📄
    change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
    persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
  15. 2018-10-29
    📄
    change-person-director-company-with-change-date
    officers · CH01
  16. 2018-10-28
    📍
    change-registered-office-address-company-with-date-old-address-new-address
    address · AD01
  17. 2004-06-09
    🔒
    Charge registered #3
    Lender: The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC
  18. 2004-04-13
    🔒
    Charge registered #2
    Lender: The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC
  19. 2004-04-13
    🔒
    Charge registered #1
    Lender: The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC
  20. 2003-04-23
    🏢
    Company incorporated
    As A & J WATT LTD.
  21. 2003-04-23
    ➕
    WATT, Joey Lynne appointed
    secretary
  22. 2003-04-23
    ➕
    WATT, Alexander Findlay appointed
    director
  23. 2003-04-23
    ➕
    WATT, Joey Lynne appointed
    director
  24. 2003-04-23
    ➕
    BRIAN REID LTD. appointed
    corporate-nominee-secretary
  25. 2003-04-23
    ➖
    BRIAN REID LTD. resigned
    corporate-nominee-secretary
  26. 2003-04-23
    ➕
    STEPHEN MABBOTT LTD. appointed
    corporate-nominee-director
  27. 2003-04-23
    ➖
    STEPHEN MABBOTT LTD. resigned
    corporate-nominee-director

Owner dependency

100/100
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
  • +Two-director setup: Only two active directors — typical of owner-managed SMEs but limits succession.
  • +Founder name in company name: Company name contains director surname "WATT" — strong identity link between founder and business.
  • +Long-tenure founder: Senior director has been in place 23 years — deep operational knowledge concentrated in one person.
  • +Founder age: Director aged approximately 67 — succession pressure is live.
  • +Family involvement: Multiple officers share a surname — likely family business, which concentrates governance.

Succession & seller-readiness

86/100
Likely off-market candidate

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

SIGNALS
  • primaryFounder aged 63+: Senior director is approximately 67. Approaching typical UK retirement age — succession thinking likely.
  • secondaryTwo-director governance: Small-team governance. Succession depth is thin but not absent.
  • primary20+ year tenure: Director in role 23 years. Very long tenure is a classic succession signal.
  • secondaryStable-but-static management: Company is 23 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

2 active beneficial owners
NameSharesVoting rightsNature of controlNotified
Mr Alexander Findlay Watt
Individual · British · DOB 02/1959 · age 67
25–50%
25–50%25-50% shares · 25-50% voting06/04/2016
Mrs Joey Lynne Watt
Individual · British · DOB 10/1964 · age 62
25–50%
25–50%25-50% shares · 25-50% voting06/04/2016

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

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——£37.8k—21y8360y
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——£30.5k—23y8382y
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Peers ranked by estimated value, then turnover, then opportunity score.See all →
🔒Tailored diligence questions

8 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.

See pricing →

Company details

Statusactive
Typeltd
Incorporated2003-04-23
Jurisdictionscotland
Primary SIC47530 — Retail sale of carpets, rugs, wall and floor coverings in specialised stores

Registered office

Woodside Of Memsie
Memsie
Fraserburgh
Aberdeenshire
AB43 7AS
Scotland

Filing status

Accounts
Next due: 2026-12-31
Last made up to: 2025-03-31
Confirmation statement
Next due: 2027-05-07
Last: 2026-04-23

Officers (3 active · 2 resigned)

WATT, Joey Lynne→
secretary · appointed 2003-04-23
View their other companies + combined net worth →
Active
WATT, Alexander Findlay→
director · ~67y · appointed 2003-04-23
View their other companies + combined net worth →
Active
WATT, Joey Lynne→
director · ~62y · appointed 2003-04-23
View their other companies + combined net worth →
Active
BRIAN REID LTD.→
corporate-nominee-secretary · appointed 2003-04-23 · resigned 2003-04-23
Resigned
STEPHEN MABBOTT LTD.→
corporate-nominee-director · appointed 2003-04-23 · resigned 2003-04-23
Resigned

Click a director name to see their full track record across all companies.

Mortgages & charges

3
Total charges
3
Outstanding
1
Active lenders
Status:Lender:3 of 3 shown
TypeProperties
outstanding
Lloyds Banking Group
The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC
Standard security1 property09/06/2004—
outstanding
Lloyds Banking Group
The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC
Bond & floating charge1 property13/04/2004—
outstanding
Lloyds Banking Group
The Royal Bank of Scotland PLC
Standard security1 property13/04/2004—
Click column headers to sort. Use filters above to narrow by status and lender.

Recent filings (68 total)

confirmation-statement-with-no-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2026-04-24
accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
accounts · AA
2026-01-29
confirmation-statement-with-no-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2025-04-23
accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
accounts · AA
2024-12-31
confirmation-statement-with-no-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2024-04-23
accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
accounts · AA
2023-12-18
confirmation-statement-with-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2023-04-24
change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
2023-04-24
change-to-a-person-with-significant-control
persons-with-significant-control · PSC04
2023-04-24
accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
accounts · AA
2023-02-28
confirmation-statement-with-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2022-04-28
accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
accounts · AA
2021-12-31
confirmation-statement-with-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2021-04-23
accounts-with-accounts-type-total-exemption-full
accounts · AA
2021-02-04
confirmation-statement-with-updates
confirmation-statement · CS01
2020-04-23