Alfred Gooding OBE (died 29 January 2018[1]) was a Welsh entrepreneur. Over a fifty-year period, he founded companies in the construction and electronics sectors.[2]
Gooding was born in Risca, South Wales, the son of a miner.[2] In the 1950s he started Modern Building Wales Limited which built 7,000 houses across Wales.[3] His most famous venture is Catnic, the company credited with developing the steel lintel for the building industry.[4] In 1982, the company was involved in a House of Lords case, Catnic Components Ltd v Hill & Smith Ltd. Gooding sold it the following year, making a personal profit of £9 million. Another company, Race Electronics, was founded in the 1980s in partnership with Japanese business interests.[2]
Gooding was chairman of CBI Wales. He was awarded with a fellowship from the University of Wales, Newport, in 2010.[5]
In 2007, Gooding organised a bid to buy the troubled bank Northern Rock.[6]
In 2014, the house in Rhiwderin, near Newport, where Gooding, then 82, lived with his wife Lavinia was destroyed by fire; the couple escaped unharmed.[7]
References
edit- ^ "Alfred Joseph GOODING : Obituary". Western Mail. Retrieved 7 February 2018.
- ^ a b c Christopher Blackhurst (1 May 1992). "UK: My best deal - A little wizardry in Wales - PROFILE OF RACE ELECTRONICS' ALF GOODING". Management Today. Retrieved 7 February 2018.
- ^ "Alfred Gooding leads line-up of the best in Welsh business". The Free Library. Retrieved 11 June 2011.
- ^ "About Catnic". Catnic. Archived from the original on 6 February 2015. Retrieved 11 June 2011.
- ^ "Newport's University Awards Fellowships". University of Wales, Newport. Archived from the original on 21 July 2011. Retrieved 11 June 2011.
- ^ "Welsh tycoon aiming to run Northern Rock". WalesOnline. Retrieved 3 November 2011.
- ^ Alan Selby (1 June 2014). "Newport house fire: More than 50 firefighters battle blaze at business magnate Alfred Gooding's home". WalesOnline. Retrieved 7 February 2018.