Global brewing giant SABMiller paid a whopping £120million to buy craft brewer Meantime last year, despite it making an annual profit of just £1.5million on sales of £17million in 2014, according to the most recent accounts filed.

Reports at the time of the sale in May 2015 estimated the price at between £30 million and £50 million, but the true figure was revealed in SABMiller’s annual report, released last month.

The windfall was shared by Meantime Brewery Company founder Alistair Hook, Nick Miller, who was chief executive at the time, and about 60 other shareholders.

Glass half full: Alistair Hook was one of two main shareholders

Rupert Ponsonby, a barley farmer and public relations consultant to the food and drink industry, was an early investor at the company, based in Greenwich, South-East London.

He told The Mail on Sunday that it was ‘splendiferous’ to have been able to share in Meantime’s good fortune.

‘It can be really hard for a bigger brewer to get into the craft beer market and particularly to acquire a company with such integrity as Meantime,’ he said.

‘Alistair Hook has from the start been interested in using different hops and yeast in his beers and keeping the company’s individuality, and the Meantime name, thanks to Greenwich Meantime, is a globally-recognised brand that could be huge in many different countries in the future.’

Meantime was founded by Hook in 1999 in his Greenwich flat with £500,000 borrowed from friends and family. He and Miller owned the two largest stakes. It is one of the top-performing modern craft breweries, with beer sales growing 58 per cent in 2014.