Author Archives: Ben Vogel

Preliminary work is underway on the site of a £4bn gigafactory in Somerset, and a piling contractor has been appointed. Agratas, the battery division of Indian conglomerate Tata, confirmed last week that it is building a 40GWh battery cell factory on the 616 acre Gravity Smart Campus near Bridgwater, Somerset.…

GF Tomlinson Group returned to profit in its 2022/23 financial year despite a third consecutive annual fall in revenue, according to its latest accounts. Turnover of £66.2m for the 12 months ending 30 June 2023 marked an 18 per cent year-on-year decrease on the previous year’s £81m, which itself fell…

Carey Group posted higher turnover in its 2022/23 financial year but a profit slump almost eliminated its margin, its parent company’s latest accounts show. In the 12 months to 30 September 2023, the contractor’s turnover increased by 9.8 per cent from £366.4m to £402.4m, according to Araglin Holdings’ annual report.…

Equans Regeneration is exiting the new-build housing market after it reported a £135.6m loss for 2022. In its first published accounts since being acquired by Bouygues in October 2022, the group admitted that higher turnover failed to prevent a plunge into the red in 2022 amid “particular pressure in the…

Morgan Sindall Construction and Skanska UK have each won jobs in Cambridge from rail pension-fund manager Railpen. Skanska has picked up a £200m contract to build the 50,000 square metre Botanic Place office scheme on Hills Road, close to the university’s botanical gardens. Designed by architect AHMM, the scheme includes…

McLaughlin & Harvey has reported an £8.6m pre-tax loss, which it blamed on macroeconomic conditions and problem jobs. In the 12-month period to 30 June 2023, the County Antrim-based firm turned over £736.6m but delivered a margin of -1.2 per cent amid loss-making projects, inflation and labour supply issues. The…

A timber and building materials supplier in Wales has been successfully sold out of administration. Gwent-based TG Howell & Sons Ltd entered administration earlier this month, with Katrina Orum and Huw Powell of Begbies Traynor appointed as joint administrators on 5 February. They oversaw a pre-packaged sale of most of…

Briggs & Forrester’s latest set of group accounts have revealed pre-tax profit growth despite lower turnover, with directors hailing a “significant turnaround” in fortunes. The firm, the fifth largest mechanical and electrical (M&E) specialist in the UK and ranked 68th in the latest CN100 list of top contractors, saw revenue reach £212.5m for…

Turnover was stable but pre-tax profit fell in Bam’s UK construction arm in 2023, partly due to rising costs on an unnamed major project. Bam Construct & Ventures said it made revenue of €1.05bn (£900m) for the calendar year, compared with €1.06bn in 2022, in unaudited figures announced today by…

A drop in new work and depressed infrastructure activity contributed to falling UK construction output in December last year, according to the latest official figures. The sector contracted by 0.5 per cent in December compared with November, with a total value of £15.25bn, Office for National Statistics (ONS) data shows.…