Heijmans buys M&E contractor

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15 April 2008

Heijmans has acquired mechanical and electrical engineering contractor Burgers Ergon for € 70 million. Heijmans says the acquisition of this fellow Dutch company is an important step in its strategy to provide 'total solutions', and will allow it to compete more effectively for Design & Build (D&B) contracts, and Public Private Partnership (PPP) schemes.

Established in 1928, Burgers Ergon had sales of € 210 million last year and employs 1400 people. It is active in the health, education, commercial property and industrial construction sectors, and operates solely in The Netherlands with its head office in Eindhoven. According to Heijmans it is one of country's top five technical contractors.

Heijmans had sales of € 2,84 billion in 2005, placing it 30th in the CE-100 league table of Europe's largest contractors. The company has set a strategic target to generate 35% of its revenues from design work and 20% from service and maintenance activities by 2008, and it says the acquisition of Burgers Ergon will move it closer to achieving this. In a statement, Heijmans said that demand for total solutions is clearly visible in the market and the importance of the installation component – provided by Burgers Ergon – is greater than ever.

In other news, Heijmans has now completed its partial acquisition of German contractor Oevermann, which it announced in November. It paid € 14,5 million for the assets and liabilities of the businesses but the real estate will remain the property of the selling party.

Oevermann is expected to have recorded sales of around € 230 million revenues in 2006, with some 70% of this coming from road building activities. Heijmans said the deal is in line with another of its strategic objectives, of generating about 20% of its revenues outside the Netherlands.

According to Heijmans, both acquisitions are expected to have a positive affect on the company's profit per share in 2007.

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