Kier

It’s faced bankruptcy and sold its most profitable arm, but the firm is now growing again The first line of the introduction to Kier’s latest results reads: “Over the last two years, Kier has undergone a transformation.” At a glance, this claim could look wrong. The company’s share price has…

The outlook for the year ahead changed dramatically towards the end of 2022 – from optimism and expected growth to worries about material costs and inflation. The last couple of months of the year saw a raft of gloomy forecasts about the state of the construction industry in 2023, with…

An increased margin was the main headline from Kier’s full accounts for this year, with the group recording a pre-tax profit of £15.9m in the year to 30 June 2022. This was up from £5.6m its previous 12 months. Its revenue fell for the second consecutive year, to £3.14bn, down from…

2021 saw the pandemic, Brexit, and materials & labour shortages hit the industry. Record job vacancies and costs followed strong – although uneven – growth. As we move further away from the era of full-on lockdowns, the prime minister’s age of ‘Build Back Better’ was meant to be upon us,…

Winner: Kier – HMP Five Wells The £253m HMP Five Wells project will deliver 1,680 new prison places, as part of the Ministry of Justice’s aim to modernise the prison estate, to make it more efficient, safer and better focused on rehabilitation. A core goal is to optimise design, procurement,…

Kier’s leadership took the unusual step of not speaking to the media following the release of its full-year results, which showed a £225m pre-tax loss for the contractor. Instead Construction News had to rely on city analysts to grill the business’s leaders – Zak Garner-Purkis picks out four things we…

Since Carillion’s demise two-and-a-half years ago, most large contractors have hammered home the message that they are focused on two things: cash and profitability. Revenue growth was almost looked upon with disdain in some quarters, as quality trumped any desire for quantity. This falling revenue trend has taken on a…

Schemes include blighted former Carillion builds, a proton-beam therapy unit and a hospital set for an early opening in response to the COVID-19 outbreak

In London, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow, Harrogate and Bristol, contractors are helping the NHS turn existing buildings into field hospitals to boost the nation's capacity to treat coronavirus…

Years of conservative procurement has conditioned defence estate contractors to think traditionally, but one woman is leading the charge for change with an outsider’s approach to transform the sector

When outsider Jacqui Rock became commercial director for the Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO) just over a year ago, one thing quickly became…

Kier reported a £41m pre-tax loss for the first half of its financial year this morning, while Kier Living, up for sale since last June, remains on its books – an albatross preventing the company from moving on so it can focus on its contracting strengths. On the face of…