Major Gloucestershire's employer and world-wide success story, Spirax Sarco, has confirmed a £139 million takeover deal has gone ahead.

Earlier this year the Cheltenham headquartered business said it was in the throws of taking over Thermocoax, subject to regulatory approvals in France, Germany and the United States of America.

Now that deal has gone through and sees formerly the French-owned Thermocoax under its wing for "a cash-free, debt-free consideration" of £139 million (€158 million).

Nicholas Anderson, group chief executive of Spirax Sarco Engineering plc, said: "The combination of Thermocoax and Chromalox will significantly strengthen our electrical thermal energy solutions presence in Europe while expanding our technology and product offering worldwide.

The news comes as the Gloucestershire business releases a trading statement which shows sales growth, despite what it calls an "expected" weakening of the global macro-economic environment.

Spirax Sarco had, said the statement, been a beneficiary of Brexit - at least so far - among other factors worthy of mention.

"Despite the softening macro‐economic environment, organic sales growth for the Group in the first four months of the year remained at similar levels to the second half of 2018.

"Growth in Asia Pacific has been particularly strong, aided by large one‐off projects and customer requests to pull forward sales ahead of the recent changes to VAT in China.

"In EMEA we have seen a modest benefit from customers building buffer stocks ahead of the UK's anticipated exit from the European Union on 29th March, while the Americas saw similar levels of growth to the prior year."

Looking ahead the firm remains positive and "focused on its rigorous strategies for growth".

Spirax Sarco employs more than 7,500 staff world-wide of whom over 1,600 are direct sales and service engineers.

The firm is featured in this month's Punchline business magazine Top 100 Biggest Employers in Gloucestershire edition.