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Unipart Group is a multinational logistics, supply chain, manufacturing and consultancy company head-quartered in Cowley, Oxfordshire, England. It has operations in Europe, North America, Australia and Japan and works across a variety of sectors that include automotive, rail, marine and leisure. Originally part of the state-owned conglomerate British Leyland (BL), Unipart was demerged from BL in 1987 and is now partially employee-owned and is one of the largest privately owned companies in the UK.〔("2014 Top Track 100" ). ''Sunday Times''. 24 June 2012〕 ==History== Unipart as it operates its business today was formed in 1974 by John Egan. State-controlled British Leyland put him in charge of their Unipart parts and service division, let him make it independent and brand it Unipart. The use of the Unipart brand to market service parts for British Leyland vehicles was similar in concept to Ford's Motorcraft brand. The next year British Leyland was nationalised. Egan left in 1976 to join Massey Ferguson. Then 29-year-old John Neill replaced Egan and he continued Egan's policy of providing the same logistical services to its parent's competitors as well as to British Leyland. In 1987, shortly after British Leyland had been re-privatised as the Rover Group, Neill led a management buyout of Unipart, in part financed by a wider employee buy-in. Unipart is now 70% owned by its workforce and pension fund, the other 30% is held by sympathetic institutions. Unipart's traditional promotion of its services was by motorsports sponsorship, from 1978 with the Triumph Dolomite Formula 3 team, and from 1980 in Formula One, first with Ensign and then with McLaren until 1983. Once Unipart were completely independent they returned to Formula One sponsorship, with Tyrrell and later with Jordan Grand Prix. For the past 30 years, Unipart has been making products and sourcing product under the Unipart brand for sale to Britain’s car owners. In 1999, Unipart purchased the Partco network which consisted of branches largely located on industrial estates providing parts into the automotive aftermarket. Partco was re-named Unipart Automotive. Over the years, Unipart Group rapidly expanded out of its original core business into wider logistics markets such as rail and the health service. In 2011 51% of the Unipart Automotive parts business was sold to H2 Equity Partners. The remaining 49% of Unipart Automotive was retained by Unipart Group. A condition of the sale was that Unipart Group exercised no control over the business. H2 previously purchased a controlling stake in another European automotive aftermarket parts distribution company called Sator Holdings, the market leader in Benelux and Northern France. It was hoped that H2's controlling interest in Sator would eventually boost the number of parts offered by Unipart Automoitive in the UK from 90,000 to 160,000. Under its new ownership, Unipart Automotive was granted a restricted license by Unipart Group to use the Unipart brand on a limited range of wholesale outlets and a tightly controlled range of automotive car parts in the UK. In April 2013, H2 sold Sator Holding to Unipart Automotive’s main rival Euro Car parts for £176 million. In July 2014 Unipart Automotive entered into administration with the loss of more than 1200 jobs. Some branches and 361 staff were sold to Andrew Page and the Parts Alliance. Andrew Page, which has 93 branches and more than £170 million in turnover, is a member of The Parts Alliance, a buying and distribution group. Unipart Group is now working with Andrew Page and the UK Parts Alliance to ensure that British used car owners are still getting Unipart products. Unipart Car Care Centres, which are based in towns across the UK, will continue to be supported and will continue to deliver the same high standard of service to their customers. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Unipart」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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