Booth Welsh, the ambitious Ayrshire-based engineering services business, has reported a 54% increase in profits to just under £1 million in its first year following a management buyout.

Sales were constant at £13.6m but profits jumped from £637,000 to £969,000 as the company targeted higher-end engineering and design and hiked exports from £100,000 to £1.3m.

The firm's advanced control engineering is used across a range of industrial processes, from distilleries in the Highlands to water plants in Saudi Arabia.

Martin Welsh, who led the buyout of the group from his parents in 2011, said the results reflected a diversification away from large construction-type projects to more profitable high-technical design activities, providing a broader spread of customers, industries served, and geographies.

He said: "There was nothing wrong with the direction we were going in. We looked at changing the strategy and tweaked it a bit.

"It has been particularly pleasing to add new overseas clients in Europe and the Middle East, which is a strong validation that our services are competitive on a global stage."

Booth Welsh's key clients in the UK include Diageo, GSK, EDF Energy, Veolia, DSM and Doosan Babcock, while international contracts have been won in offshore Angola, offshore Brazil, Monaco, the US and Italy.

Mr Welsh said the group had now landed a significant new oil and gas contract in Liberia with a UK national company, and hoped to use that as a platform, as it had in Saudi Arabia with work for Weir Westgarth, to bid for other work in the country.

He said the company, which employs 200 at Stevenston, had continued to innovate.

He added: "We intend to reinvest heavily in further development of our service offerings, staff recruitment and training over the next three to five years while also looking at potential acquisitions."

Booth Welsh is now collaborating with Glasgow Caledonian University to develop a wireless monitoring system for industrial processes.

Mr Welsh commented: "You have to keep your eye on the ball, technology is moving very quickly, and you can imagine that wireless is something people will be interested in putting into industrial premises."

The company has a £1.16m facility from the Scottish Loan Fund and Mr Welsh said much of that was still available as "a treasure chest to fund other projects".