The future of 160 workers at Witham-based English Electric Valve (EEV) have been secured in a multi-billion pound deal.

For months the future of EEV - part of the GEC-Marconi group - hung in the balance and it was feared the component and device plant in Freebournes Road would close.

But on Tuesday GEC bosses clinched a £7.7 billion deal with British Aerospace safeguarding the future of EEV.

GEC's Marconi Electronics arm - including EEV - will be sold to British Aerospace making it the world's third biggest aerospace company and the largest avionics operation in Europe.

As a precursor to the merger the different aerospace businesses within Marconi - including EEV - were grouped into one company called Marconi Avionics Group which employs 11,000 people and has a turnover of £950 million.

It is this that has been signed over to British Aerospace.

Press manager at Marconi Avionics Group Ian Bustin said EEV would remain in its present form and no jobs would be lost.

"This really will be an opportunity for EEV and other companies in the group to grow within the framework of British Aerospace and it is quite a powerful thing to be a part of."

"When we sat down to think about it, there is not one thing British Aerospace and ourselves make that is similar.

"In them we had our biggest customer and by moving into British Aerospace companies like EEV will have access to making more components than ever before."

He cited the current Eurofighter, Tornado and Jaguar projects as examples of the type of work the firm would be involved in.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.