Balfour Beatty turnover hits £9bn

Balfour Beatty’s revenue have hit £9bn after it grew by 3% in 2010.

In full year results to 31 December, the country’s biggest contractor announced that pre-tax profits rose by a fifth, from £265m to  £319m.

Yet after exceptional items and amortisation, profits were actually down by nearly 30%, to £187m.

The biggest cost was £31m for the “acquisition, integration, reorganisation and other costs” of consultancy Parsons Brinckerhoff, which Balfour Beatty said it had now successfully integrated.

In its outlook, Balfour said it was targeting the global infrastructure market: “Over the medium and long term, we expect global infrastructure to be a growth market.”

“We have put in place a clear strategy, and the Group is well-placed to benefit from the growth in this market based on our depth of infrastructure knowledge, breadth of capability and the strength of our balance sheet,” it said.

The dividend per share grew slightly to12.7p from 12.0p in 2009. Balfour’s order book was up 8% at £15.2bn.

The contract also revealed it had paid £5m for contracts picked up from collapsed contractor Rok, which failed last October.