Chief executive switches focus from London to India, Middle East and US

Cyril Sweett chief executive Dean Webster has declared the firm is targeting a £100m turnover and predicted more consolidation in the QS and project management sector.

Webster said he had given up responsibility for running the firm’s London office to concentrate on expanding the firm. That office is now being run by Andrew Hemsley, who formerly ran the firm’s consulting business.

Webster said the £50m-turnover firm’s growth would come mainly internationally in regions such as India, the Middle East and America.

Webster said he was aiming to emulate the growth of Turner & Townsend, which is now a £130m turnover business.

He said: “It’s part of this whole consolidation process. You are going to see the big firms continue to pull away. The whole world is consolidating. We need to become a global player from a revenue perspective to service our clients.”

We need to become a global player from a revenue perspective to service our clients

Dean Webster, chief executive, Cyril Sweett

Webster said the firm had started sending people out to the Middle East to work on new schemes. He also pointed to major opportunities in Ireland, particularly in the PFI hospital market.

He added that he has now amalgamated the firm’s UK and international boards so as to cross-sell within the business. “I don’t want to treat them as two separate parts of the business. I want to make sure members are thinking more internationally. More and more clients want to go overseas and more overseas clients are coming here.”

New London regional director Hemsley said he would use his experience in running the firm’s consulting division to look at upgrading the firm’s core QS and project management offerings. “That’s not to say they are bad, just that you have to lift yourselves by the bootstraps sometimes.”

Hemsley is considering setting up incubator teams within his division to work in emerging sectors away from the firm’s strengths such as retail and PPP.

Hemsley’s former role has been taken by Alastair Bloore.

Source

QS News