Balfour bags £43m brace of office contracts

Balfour Beatty has unveiled two further major commercial wins worth £43m, following its successful bid to construct AXA Real Estate’s £57m Sixty London office complex.

The contractor has won a £25m deal to construct an 11-storey office building in the City for Viridis Real Estate Service on behalf of its client Emmatown Properties.

Balfour has also secured an £18m contract in Glasgow to construct a five-storey residential and retail scheme at 185-221 Buchanan Street for Land Securities.

All three projects are due for completion in 2013.

In a separate development, subsidiary Balfour Beatty Engineering Services (BBES) confirmed it had received more signed and returned contracts under the controversial new Building Engineering Services National Agreement (BESNA) last week.

BBES said it had received 892 signed contracts by the end of last week. The contractor is still waiting on 358 employees to return signed BESNA contracts.

Unite members at BBES will be re-balloted for strike action this Thursday over the BESNA changes.

Balfour Beatty chief executive Ian Tyler said on the contract awards: “We are delighted to see encouraging signs of renewed activity in the London commercial sector and to be able to demonstrate our diverse capabilities which enable us to take advantage of such growth opportunities.

“We have been able to harness technology to create innovative solutions for our customers and look forward to working with them in delivering these first class schemes.”