Aecom poaches Arup boss in latest raid on rival

Aecom has poached one of Arup’s most senior partners, David Glover, just weeks after prising a team of sports specialists away from the firm.

Glover - who had been at the engineer for 22 years - will become deputy chief executive of Aecom’s building engineering business, which employs 4,000 people worldwide.

The move comes just three weeks after Aecom tempted four sports architects to jump ship from ArupSport, the division that worked on the Singapore Sports Hub. High-profile director
J Parrish also left for Aecom earlier in the year.

The losses at Arup follow a restructure last year which led to 550 staff leaving the business, 15% of its UK workforce.

However, Robert Care, UKMEA chair, said he wished Glover well “on a personal level”, and that the sports team was only poached after a “restructuring that made these people available”.

Tristram Carfare will take over Glover’s role as Arup’s UKMEA building practice leader.

Steve Morriss, Aecom’s Europe chief executive, said part of Glover’s role would be to help integrate the US-based firms’ businesses, including Davis Langdon.

Morriss said: “We’re bringing in various capabilities and combining them so that more of our work is done under the one Aecom banner.”

He added the sport recruits were part of a global push to pick up more work in the sector and it was heavily targeting the Moscow 2018 and Qatar 2022 World Cups. Aecom set up a dedicated global sports group six months ago, which is based in London and headed up by Peter Flint.

Morriss said: “We want to become even more famous for our specialism in this area. We’ve got a major investment in sport globally.”

Jeremy Horner, chief executive of Davis Langdon, said: “This is great news for Aecom globally to have someone of Glover’s calibre. His appointment signals Aecom’s emphasis on the built environment rather than just infrastructure.”

Jim Burridge, Arup’s global sports business leader said Arup still has a broad skill base in the sports market.