Sheffield Forgemasters International Ltd. recently reported bookings of nearly $158 million, its largest amount since 2012, when bookings totaled approximately $156 million. The company, which has been pursuing diverse global contracts since the 2015 oil-and-gas market crash, credits U.K. and U.S. defense orders, materials processing and research-and-development projects as contributing to its backlog.

Sheffield Forgemasters is one of a handful of companies around the globe qualified to produce high-integrity components for the U.K. submarine program. The company is also creating some of the first components for the new class of small modular nuclear reactors working in partnership with California-based EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute).

Dr. Graham Honeyman, chief executive at Sheffield Forgemasters, said: “We are very pleased to report that our order book has breached the 100-million-pound mark for the first time in five years. This announcement follows a prolonged period of market austerity across all our market sectors after the global recession started to take effect. Despite the downturn in global markets, the company holds fast to the belief that we have to maintain a technological lead, so our investment into new skills and technologies has gone on unabated.”