If a company makes a product that needs testing and it cannot or doesn’t want to do it itself, there’s a reasonable chance that it will turn to Intertek. This FTSE 100 company is one of three world leaders in the provision of testing, inspection, certification and assurance services, carrying out checks on pretty much every type of material that needs to go through quality control, from toys and clothes to fruit and vegetables, from masonry and metals to industrial petrochemicals. In short, it is one of those British success stories that quietly gets on with it, and rather well. That is no automatic reason to go out and buy the shares, of course.
Intertek’s history dates back to 1885, when Caleb Brett established a