Keltbray Group, a UK leading specialist business which offers engineering, construction, demolition, decommissioning, remediation, rail and environmental services, today announced a 50% increase in turnover for the financial year ending 31 October 2014, from £144.7 million to £216.9 million. In the 39-year history of the Group, this is Keltbray’s best ever performance.

Gross profit increased by 40% from £26.9 million to £37.6 million, while operating profit before interest was £7.9 million (3.7%); an increase of £5.4 million from 2013. The Group’s cash position improved from £3.8 million to £10.4 million in hand at the year end.

Keltbray Group employs around 900 people and has three reporting streams: Demolition & Civil Engineering, Rail and Environmental Materials Management.

Keltbray’s Demolition & Civil Engineering business stream, which covers over 70% of Keltbray’s business and includes piling, asbestos management, engineering design consultancy as well as haulage and plant hire, increased turnover by more than 66%. This is a result of securing a good, long term pipeline of work.

Keltbray’s Rail business stream, which covers 22% of Keltbray’s business and includes overhead line electrification installation, design and build, as well as engineering and civils projects, grew by 9%.

About Keltbray’s 2014 results, Chief Executive Officer, Brendan Kerr, said: “2014 saw a continued strengthening of our performance. This improvement has been driven by the demolition and civil engineering business stream, where experienced project teams supported by our in-house design capability, provide innovative solutions and delivery on complex challenging projects such as Earls Court, Bradwell Power Station, Angel Court and London Bridge stations.

“Our piling and asbestos businesses are now established as major players in their sectors and allow us to offer an integrated service to our clients which cannot be matched in the UK market. As part of our works at Chelsea Barracks, the piling business was awarded a £10 million contract for secant piling that was successfully completed in a tight timeframe of 34 weeks. The asbestos removal business won a large framework contract with Royal Mail covering all their UK properties and a considerable project on the major development at Battersea Power Station. This is likely to be succeeded by further contract awards for our other demolition and civil engineering businesses.

“In our Rail business we are continuing to invest in overhead line electrification plant with delivery of four new road rail vehicles and a bespoke high output wiring unit in 2015. The wiring unit is a unique machine within the rail electrification industry and the only one of its kind in the UK. It will equal the only current high output wiring methodology which is currently undertaken using a wiring train, and offers significant cost savings. This will add to the existing electrical plant capability, which is one of the largest in the UK. Despite the latest delay in the UK electrification programme, we are confident that there is a huge potential for growth in this sector, although there will be some disruption in the short term.

“In our Materials Management business stream, the Remediation business had a very successful first year of trading and has good growth opportunities.

“We continue to maintain our efforts to work sustainably and have recently published our second annual report to measure the progress we are making. We are investing in behavioural safety training across the Group to improve the culture and attitudes of the workforce and are developing our human resources and training functions to manage our future skills and labour requirements effectively.

“To secure the future of our business and plug the widely reported skills gap, which is one of the biggest challenges our industry faces, we will continue our focus on development and training, and build on the number of apprentices and trainees, which increased by 43% in 2014.

“We do not anticipate another year of 50% growth but will achieve double digit turnover growth in 2015 and look forward to developing our existing and new businesses aligned with our core sectors.”

ENDS

More information

  • High resolution images of Brendan Kerr are available via this link: https://flic.kr/s/aHsk1eYf3
  • For more information, please contact Keltbray’s head of communications, Marit Meyer-Bell, on tel. 0786 765 3392 or by email to [email protected]

Keltbray Group

Keltbray is the UK’s leading specialist engineering, construction, decommissioning and environmental services business providing fully integrated services to meet the needs of diverse and complex projects. We are committed to engineering innovation and industry leadership in health, safety, quality and the environment. Our in-house training focuses the business on excellence and on delivering value to our clients thereby fostering long lasting relationships and partnerships. High profile projects include Europe’s tallest building – The Shard, London’s Thames Link and deplanting at Bradwell Power station. For more information, see www.keltbray.com