Plant hire report highlights industry's top performers

Laing O'Rourke's plant fleet was the top performer in the latest Plant Hire Investment Report from Catherine Stratton. The company's gross book value jumped 76% to £92.7m.
The report contains statistics for 2003/04 on the plant hire industry beyond simple profit and loss accounts. Its analysis of the gross book value of the top 60 plant hirers' fleets shows the top 10 ranking remaining almost static.
Further sections look at the past year's acquisitions/disposals, hire companies' net turnover and turnover as a percentage of fleet value, trading profit and pre-tax profit. There were notable performances from Speedy, Gap, Brandon and VP.
Ashtead Group was the largest of only six plant hire companies (not related to contractors) whose fleet contracted in the period (by 2.7%), while Hydrex clocked up the largest expansion at 57%.
Across the 60 top companies, pre-tax profit averaged £800,500 (a 2.1% decline on last year) and as a percentage of gross book value the spread ranged from 29% for Andrew Sykes, to -52.5% for the Longville Group. Further tables give statistics on interest cover and employee numbers.
The report costs £249 and is available on 01865 741116.