International infrastructure group Balfour Beatty has returned to profit following two years of losses.
The firm, which is involved in major road and rail projects, including Crossrail, has announced its results for the full-year ended 31st December 2016.
A tunnel on the Crossrail project
It reported a statutory pre-tax profit of £8m, compared to a loss of £199 in 2015. The group’s underlying profit from operations (PFO) was £67m, compared against an underlying PFO loss of £106m in 2015.
Balfour Beatty launched its ‘Build to Last’ business transformation programme two years ago.
Group chief executive Leo Quinn said: ‘The transformation of Balfour Beatty is well underway. We have returned the Group to profit and significantly exceeded our Build to Last Phase One targets.
‘We have upgraded leadership, processes and controls while continuing to invest in the Group’s unique strengths. As a result, we have improved not just the quality of our order book but our customer satisfaction scores.’
He added: ‘Having simplified the group, we are focused on our core markets in the UK and US, where governments are committed to large scale expenditure on infrastructure.’
The group said UK construction had returned to underlying profitability in the second half of 2016.
Its order book is up 15% at £12.7bn, with underlying revenue of £8.5bn.
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