Contractors Carillion and Willmott Dixon are showing increases in workloads and profit as architects Fosters and Make post record losses, according to reports in the construction press this week.
In an interim management statement for the third quarter, Carillion said it expects to double revenue in Canada and the Middle East to £1bn within five years, simultaneously announcing a £124m deal to build two 45-storey residential towers in Dubai.
Meanwhile, according to the Construction Enquirer website, the contractor’s UK support services arm, is also facing its largest ever pipeline of contract opportunities, as it picked up property and infrastructure maintenance work from local authorities and public bodies seeking savings through outsourcing.
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Chief executive John McDonough said: ‘We expect substantial opportunities for growth as we move through 2011 and into 2012 and 2013, as pressure on both central and local government to reduce the cost of public services leads to an increase in outsourcing.”
McDonough said Carillion had won £200m in energy services contracts, while its BT Openreach support services contract is also expected to increase in value by £30m to £145 m. He said that this area of the contractor’s work is expected to deliver a 5% margin this year.
Willmott Dixon, which posted a 37% rise in pre-tax profits to £8.6m in the six months to 30 June, up from £6.3m in the same period last year, was also relatively optimistic about the future. Turnover rose fractionally to £481m from £475m.
Looking ahead, chief executive Rick Willmott said that “secured order books have held up better than expected in our capital works and support services divisions, and we’ve made good progress in positioning the regeneration division to deliver future growth.”
The group’s strategy to maintain similar revenues in 2011 and 2012 would mean securing ‘an increasing proportion of the declining publicly sector market, focusing on health and social housing, and to secure a substantial foothold in new private sector markets as they come on stream.”
In a difficult week for UK architects, writedowns, interest payments and restructuring charges left Foster + Partners facing a £18.5m loss for the 12 months to the end of April 2010.
The latest accounts from the group showed borrowing stood at £327million, resulting in the massive interest repayments of £40m, according to Building Design. T
his transformed an underlying operating profit of £25m, up £366,000 on the previous year, into a pre-tax loss of £15m compared to £16m the previous year.
Despite continued losses, its highest paid director, assumed to be Norman Foster, received a £90,000 pay rise, while the company’s six directors shared wages of close to £5m, up 5.5% on last year, reveals Building.
Meanwhile, Make, the practice set up by Lord Foster’s former partner Ken Shuttleworth, nearly halved its turnover during 2009, losing almost £1m due to bad debt in the Middle East.
Revenue fell from £18.5m to £9.8m, while pre-tax profit tumbled from £521,000 to a loss of £890,000. Explaining the loss, Shuttleworth told Building: ‘We have had one Middle Eastern client who hasn’t paid us.’
UK revenue was severely hit, falling from £16.5m to just £6.6m in 2009, with a lack of work across the private sector to blame.
