Kier brings in O’Rourke veteran to new role dealing with London clients

Kier is bringing in a senior project leader from Laing O’Rourke to a newly created role of London regional director to grow the firm’s commercial work in the capital.

Gus Wright joins in January and will report to Kier’s construction boss for London and Southern David McKenzie.

Kier has been rebuilding its presence in the London commercial market in the past couple of years, targeting jobs worth around £50m to £60m.

Last autumn, the firm beat Mace and McAlpine to a mixed-use scheme set to go up close to Tottenham Court Road Crossrail station in London’s West End.

The firm inked the £50m deal in September with developer CO-RE, which is masterminding the six-storey block with M&G Real Estate.

Over the summer it pipped McAlpine to a £60m office and retail scheme on Tottenham Court Road for Derwent. The job, called the Network Building, is Kier’s first for the developer.

And earlier this year it inked another debut deal, this time for Stanhope, to build a £50m residential scheme at the former TV Centre in West London.

McKenzie said: “As part of our strategy, we have built up a strong portfolio in London and Gus will further enhance our operational leadership, capability and capacity to our London clients.”

Wright leaves O’Rourke after more than six years in a second spell at the firm after first joining the business, when it was known as Laing Construction, in the early 1990s. He left the firm, which was picked up by O’Rourke in 2001, for Ardmore in 2004 where he worked seven years before becoming an operations director at Mace for three years.

News of his appointment follows that of the departure of Liam Cummins, the firm’s group boss of construction after three years.

Cummins, who joined from Laing O’Rourke, goes next month to take up chief executive role in a different part of the industry. He is being replaced by current group commercial director Stuart Togwell but no announcement on who is replacing Togwell has been made yet.