Despite all the protestations of Donald Brydon, chairman of Smiths Group, that the appointment of a new chief executive does not herald a sale or break-up of the group, the selection of Philip Bowman has only served to fuel that speculation.

For Mr Bowman, Australian born but British educated, has acquired the reputation of a deal-maker in his last two big corporate jobs. He was appointed chief executive of Scottish Power, although he had no experience of the utilities sector, in January 2006; by November it had been sold for £11.6bn to Iberdrola, the Spanish group.