CJ50 Market data: Balfour ends 2005 on a high

PDF of market data December 2005

December brought a range of work for the Balfour Beatty group, bringing its total for 2005 to a huge £4,643m, nearly £2,860m ahead of this year’s runner-up, Bovis Lend Lease, and far exceeding its 2004 total of £2,402m.

Balfour Beatty Rail was awarded two new contracts by Network Rail (NR) worth £66m over three years, with an option to extend for a further two years. The contracts are for tamping and ballast regulating services in the South East and East Midlands.

Elsewhere in the company, Connect Roads South Tyneside – a specific vehicle within Balfour’s specialist PFI roads concession company Connect Roads – reached financial close on the £63m PFI streetlighting contract for South Tyneside Council. Under the 25-year contract, Balfour Beatty will take responsibility for the whole of South Tyneside’s streetlighting and highways signs service. Balfour’s power line and cabling subsidiary, Balfour Beatty Power Networks, will carry out the work.

Balfour also secured an £18.5m contract with the University of London to build a new halls of residence.

Carillion was close behind Balfour in second position with £492.5m of work, up from fourth place in November, much of which was taken up by a substantial design and construction workload for News International Newspapers.

Carillion will provide three new printing plants as part of a £600m investment by the publishing giant to update its printing facilities. The £25m Glasgow project at EuroCentral Business Park will house two new presses; the £45m development at Liverpool, five presses; and the £160m London project at Broxbourne, 12 presses. All three plants are due to be fully operational by the end of 2007.

Edmund Nuttall jumped from 19th position to take third place, with most of its £270m workload taken up by a £210m share of NR’s framework agreement for structure renewals in the South East. It also secured a £27m contract in Cumbria with British Nuclear Group.

Galliford Try was a new entrant in fourth thanks to a schools project in Northamptonshire valued at £192m. Meanwhile, Kier  stayed put in fifth place, securing 34 contracts with a total value of more than £214m, largely in the housing market.

HBG Construction rose from ninth place to sixth on the strength of just five projects totalling nearly £139m. The biggest of these is a £95m deal to
redevelop the former headquarters of Marks & Spencer after the retailer sold its central London offices to developer London & Regional Properties. The Baker Street office block will be altered and renovated according to plans by architect Make, home of Gherkin designer Ken Shuttleworth. The eight-storey building will be used mainly for offices and retail.

Skanska had a quieter month following a hectic November, falling from second place to seventh with 17 contracts in the civils and private commercial markets. This nevertheless totalled £93.4m, ahead of ISG InteriorExterior in eighth place with £65.2m. Mowlem rose two places to ninth with 24 contracts, and Morgan Sindall moved into 10th position with 39 contracts worth £52.3m.

In 12th position, Laing O’Rourke’s four contracts included a project to build the biggest secondary school in Europe. The £34m city academy in Peterborough, known as the Thomas Deacon Academy, will specialise in maths and science. Drawn up by Foster & Partners, the school will consist of two buildings covering 18,200m3 across three levels.

There was a bumper crop of  10 new entrants to the chart in December, in addition to fourth-placed Galliford Try, including: Barr (16th); Dean & Dyball (18th); Taylor Woodrow (19th); North Midland (24th); DB Russell (25th); Propencity (26th) Trak (29th); Fitzpatrick (32nd); Dyer & Butler (39th).

This was a particularly strong month for the private commercial and industrial sectors. The total contracts for the month were above 2005’s average value of £2,409m at £2,635m, and well in excess of December 2004’s total of £1,857m.