Operator of the Sci-Tech Daresbury the Liverpool city region science and innovation campus, Langtree, has shown resilience during the pandemic. Tony McDonough reports

Property owner and manager Langtree has seen pre-tax profits rise 35% to £2.3m for 2020/21 as it demonstrated resilience in the pandemic.

Warrington-based Langtree now has more than than 3m sq ft of space under ownership or management, covering more than 600 tenants. Its estate enjoys 92% occupancy and in the 12 months to March 31, 2021, generated rental income of £22m.

Warrington-based Langtree runs the Sci-Tech Daresbury, the Liverpool city region science and innovation campus, in a joint venture with Halton Council the Science & Technology Facilities Council.

Last week it secured planning consent for a multi-million pound 180,000 sq ft office and laboratory complex called Ultraviolet. It will be located next to Project Violet, a £17.8m three-building speculative office development which itself is still under construction.

In the financial year, the business saw an 81% increase in net asset value to £11.4m. 

In November, Parkside Regeneration, a joint venture between property firm Langtree and St Helens Council, was given the go-ahead from Secretary of State Michael Gove to press ahead with the £100m transformation of former Parkside Colliery into a logistics complex.

During the financial year Langtree assumed the management of a large, multi-let industrial portfolio in the South West which added more than £100m to the capital value of its managed portfolio along with more than 130 new tenants.

Its residential portfolio increased by £50m in value after assuming responsibility for a ground lease portfolio with more than 85 sites nationwide. Group chief executive John Downes said that a number of major projects were moving into either construction or lettings phases and says that the coming year will be ‘pivotal’ to the firm’s longer-term growth.

“Parkside colliery goes on site shortly and we have already begun planning for Phase 2 of the scheme,” said Mr Downes. “The 1m square foot first phase, along with a new link road to the M6, received consent from the Secretary of State in November and are described as ‘game-changers’ for the St Helens economy.

Langtree’s joint venture with Warrington Council, known as Wire Regeneration, will also take ‘a big step forward’ in January, says Downes, with the relocation of the bus station at Wilderspool Causeway to a site north of the town centre.

“This is significant in that it frees up the largest single site in the Southern Gateway regeneration zone and will allow us to push on with our wider ambitions to transform the area,” said Mr Downes.