WET News

34 Leaders 2015 Skanska targets water as key growth area Trant collaborates to drive programme delivery SkanSka Uk Maple Cross House Rickmansworth T: 01923 776666 www.skanska.co.uk TRanT EnginEERing Rushington House Southampton SO40 9LT T: 023 8066 5544 www.trant.co.uk the LeADeRS 2015 The water sector is a key area that Skanska wants to grow for two reasons. One is that the sector is embracing the collaborative approach. Thomas Faulkner, managing director, of Skanska UK, says the organisation also sees itself as being able to offer a far better service to clients "when we work in that environment". Secondly, he thinks many of Skanska's employees are "much better at working in an open and transparent culture", whether that is part of the Swedish influence or just the leadership styles that it has in the UK. Skanska's work in AMP6 includes three major contracts with Anglian Water (Integrat- ed Main Works Capital Alliance), Thames Water (eight2O as part of the SMB venture with MWH and Balfour Beatty) and Dwr Cymru Welsh Water (Capital Delivery Alliance). The company has embarked on a major recruitment drive having announced that it plans to Trant has, and continues to perform well in the key areas of safety, quality, time and cost, and fully supports the collaborative team ethos that is driving the effective and efficient delivery of our programmes of work," says Gerry Somers, Trant's director, water. The company has been awarded an engineering- design services framework contract with United Utilities (UU) for industrial process and production. The three-year contract has an option to extend by a further two years. The contract was won following a rigorous selection process. A range of services are covered in the framework contract, which is valued at up to £50m across three D&B Suppliers, of which Trant Engineering is one, including: • Provision of specialist OT front-end design services for projects to meet the various create around 1,500 jobs in the UK over the next two to three years. The jobs are required to complete major water, rail, building and roads contracts that it won. Mike Putnam, president and CEO of Skanska UK, says: "With more focus on infrastructure investment, we have seen our visible pipeline of new work growing strongly during the last nine months, giving us increased confi- dence about the future. According to Faulkner, the company's UK water activities have "been limited" to business requirements for end-to-end operational data • Investigation of suitable technology and developing solution feasibility studies. • Defining solutions with user requirements, construction scope, interfaces, constraints estimates and project management services • Turnkey delivery of implementation phase, including detailed solution design, functional design Anglian Water over the past ten years. However, Faulkner says it is a key sector for it to grow. He says: "We worked hard over the last five years engaging with other clients in the water sector, and particularly Thames, to explain the benefits that we see from more a more collaborative approach and particularly an alliance approach. "It's terrific when you see clients who are open to new ideas, open to ways of finding cost efficiencies and working better while listening to their supply chain." specification, ICA panels, PLCs, SCADA equipment and communications networks field instruments • Procurement of so ware licences and systems integration delivery, construction management, including principal contractor role, and installation work for retrofitting at existing works • Carrying out factory and site acceptance testing, commissioning and hand over training. THE nUMBERS 2011 2012 2013 % CHangE Sales £M 1,166.8 1,092.3 1,120.7 3 Gross profit £M 129.6 139.4 121.1 -13 Operating profit £M 37.7 41.6 40 -4 Pre-tax profit £M 44.9 43.4 44.2 2 Staff 4,194 3,823 4,360 14 Net assets £M 198.7 258.9 257.7 -0 THE RaTiOS 2011 2012 2013 % CHangE Return on capital % 22.6 16.8 17.1 2 Gross margin % 11.1 12.8 10.8 -15 Operating margin % 3.2 3.8 3.6 -6 Net margin % 3.9 4 3.9 -1 Sales/employee £K 278.2 285.7 257 -10 THE nUMBERS 2011 2012 2013 % CHangE Sales £M 78 67.3 79.4 18 Gross profit £M 8.1 7.4 7.3 -2 Operating profit £M 1.476 0.965 0.8 -18 Pre-tax profit £M 1.420 0.854 0.6 -30 Staff 568 503 538 7 Net assets £M 5.4 5.5 5.3 -5 THE RaTiOS 2011 2012 2013 % CHangE Return on capital % 26.4 15.4 11.3 -27 Gross margin % 10.4 11 9.1 -17 Operating margin % 1.9 1.4 1 -30 Net margin % 1.8 1.3 0.8 -41 Sales/employee £K 137.3 133.8 147.6 10

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