HS2 today shortlisted bidders for its Track Systems and for Tunnel and Lineside Mechanical and Electrical (M&E) systems. The winning organisations will go on to deliver around 280km of state-of-the-art high-speed track and infrastructure that will enable the UK to run some of the world’s most frequent and reliable long-distance
The publicly traded Daiwa House Group (Daiwa House Industry Co., Ltd., with a turnover of around € 32 billion) signed a share purchase agreement with the current shareholders of Flexbuild Holding (Flexbuild) on December 18, 2020. Flexbuild is the holding company of Jan Snel Group (Jan Snel), which realises modular building solutions in the
Big or small the key to a profitable business is efficiency and with so many great tools out there to help it can be difficult to know where to start. From Kanban boards to VoIP phones here are 7 of the best efficiency tools that you absolutely need to look
Recent correspondence from British Steel has indicated increases in the cost of steel sections, the step increase in the cost of steel is very high considering the volatile market structural steelwork fabricators are working under. The problem here is that the market rate for structural sections has been for far
RPMI Railpen (Railpen), the investment manager for the £30bn railways pension schemes, and Wrenbridge have achieved planning consent for a 185,000 sq ft warehouse development in Dartford, set to create approximately 500 new jobs. The 9-acre site, which was acquired by Railpen in February 2020, will comprise five Grade A
HS2 today shortlisted bidders for its Track Systems and for Tunnel and Lineside Mechanical and Electrical (M&E) systems. The winning organisations will go on to deliver around 280km of state-of-the-art high-speed track and infrastructure that will enable the UK to run some of the world’s most frequent and reliable long-distance rail services. Following on from the start of construction, today’s announcement unlocks more opportunities for Britain’s construction and engineering sector, hard-hit by the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic. Both sets of contract opportunities cover design and construction between London, Birmingham and Crewe, where HS2 trains will join the existing West Coast Mainline. The winners of the Track systems contracts will also take a lead role in managing and coordinating the complex interfaces between the track and other elements of the rail systems. The following organisations will be invited to tender for Track Systems: Lot 1 – Phase One (Urban – London and Birmingham) – £434m Balfour Beatty Group Ltd, ETF SAS, TSO SAS (BBVT Joint Venture) Ferrovial Construction (UK) Ltd and BAM Nuttall Ltd (Ferrovial-BAM Joint Venture) Colas Rail Ltd STRABAG AG UK and Rhomberg Sersa UK (STRABAG Rhomberg Sersa Joint Venture) Lot 2 – Phase One (Open Route – Central) – £526m Balfour Beatty Group Ltd, ETF SAS, TSO SAS (BBVT Joint Venture) Ferrovial Construction (UK) Ltd and BAM Nuttall Ltd (Ferrovial-BAM Joint Venture) Colas Rail Ltd STRABAG AG UK and Rhomberg Sersa UK (STRABAG Rhomberg Sersa Joint Venture) Lot 3 – Phase One (Open Route – North) – £566m Balfour Beatty Group Ltd, ETF SAS, TSO SAS (BBVT Joint Venture) Ferrovial Construction (UK) Ltd and BAM Nuttall Ltd (Ferrovial-BAM Joint Venture) Colas Rail Ltd Lot 4 – Phase 2a (Track) – £431m Balfour Beatty Group Ltd, ETF SAS, TSO SAS (BBVT Joint Venture) Ferrovial Construction (UK) Ltd and BAM Nuttall Ltd (Ferrovial-BAM Joint Venture) Colas Rail Ltd STRABAG AG UK and Rhomberg Sersa UK (STRABAG Rhomberg Sersa Joint Venture) Rail, switches and crossings and pre-cast slab track will be delivered by separate suppliers – with the Track Systems contractor coordinating the design, logistics and installation. The winning bidders are set to commence work on site once the tunnels, bridges, viaducts and earthworks are complete. The winning Track Systems contractors will oversee the design and construction of plain line track, switches and crossings, an infrastructure maintenance depot, managing construction logistics and supporting the testing and commissioning phase. They will also act as Construction Design and Management (CDM) Principal Contractor for the trace and be responsible for logistics and consents co-ordination. The winner of the estimated £498m Tunnel and Lineside M&E package will be a Principal Contractor, delivering the design, supply, manufacture, installation, testing, commissioning and maintenance (until handover) of the Phase One and Phase 2a Tunnel and Lineside M&E systems. This includes the tunnel services within the shafts, tunnels and cross-passages, low voltage power services and distribution in the open route. The contractor will also design, supply, install, test and commission the tunnel ventilation systems. The following organisations will be invited to tender for Tunnel and Lineside M&E: Alstom Transport UK Ltd Balfour Beatty Bailey Joint Venture (BBB JV) – a joint venture between Balfour Beatty Group Ltd and NG Bailey Ltd Costain Group PLC HS2 Ltd’s Procurement and Commercial Director, David Poole said: “Rail systems are some of the most important parts of the HS2 project – the high-tech equipment and systems that will allow our trains to deliver an unparalleled service in terms of speed, frequency and reliability. “The appointment of the Track Systems and M&E suppliers will be an important milestone for the project, and a significant opportunity for the industry and the wider supply chain. At the peak of construction, HS2 will support around 30,000 jobs and contracts like this will provide a real boost for employers across the supply chain, helping to boost skills and provide opportunities for years to come.” Contracts for Track Systems and Tunnels and Lineside M&E are expected to be awarded in 2022.
The publicly traded Daiwa House Group (Daiwa House Industry Co., Ltd., with a turnover of around € 32 billion) signed a share purchase agreement with the current shareholders of Flexbuild Holding (Flexbuild) on December 18, 2020. Flexbuild is the holding company of Jan Snel Group (Jan Snel), which realises modular building solutions in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom. With this agreement, Flexbuild and Jan Snel will become part of Daiwa House Group and together are taking an important step in the ongoing rollout of industrialised building across Europe. Investing in new markets Jan Snel and Daiwa House are forerunners in industrialised and modular building. Daiwa House is already active in Asia, North America and Australia. Together with Jan Snel, Daiwa House will be capable of further expanding its modular building business within the European market. The growing housing shortage and a lack of professionals in the European market has resulted in increased demand for smarter housing solutions in the market. By combining global knowledge, manpower and solutions, Jan Snel can offer well-suited solutions for the European housing shortage. Strong growth ambitions Jan Snel is the market leader in the Netherlands in the field of industrialised and modular building. By producing housing under controlled conditions in their factory, Jan Snel is able to improve both the quality and speed of the construction process. The reusage of materials, in combination with less waste and fewer emissions, enables the shift towards a more circular economy. Jan Snel specialises in innovative, industrialised solutions for the residential, healthcare, office, educational and industrial sectors. The Dutch company (based in Montfoort) has been making international progress and is already active in Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom. Harry van Zandwijk, CEO of Jan Snel, explains: “The signing of this agreement is a reflection of our growth ambition. Daiwa House will add further expertise in industrial building to Jan Snel’s existing knowledge. With this, we want to become the clear market leader in Europe. In comparison to traditional construction methods, our modular construction method is smarter, faster and more sustainable. By combining our solutions and expertise with the strength of Daiwa House, we are laying a strong foundation for the future.”
Big or small the key to a profitable business is efficiency and with so many great tools out there to help it can be difficult to know where to start. From Kanban boards to VoIP phones here are 7 of the best efficiency tools that you absolutely need to look at in 2021. Kaban Boards What is a Kanban board you ask? It’s a simple way of showing the status of task, projects or jobs in a simple, visual form. Think yellow sticky notes on a whiteboard but in electronic form. Because they are hosted in the cloud it’s a bit like having that whiteboard in your pocket so you can check what’s going on at any time, anywhere. They are great for planning, collaboration and just getting your life in order.Two of the best are Trello and Asana. Both have free options that have a huge number of features and are really easy to use, learn and share. Codebook OK so we all know that we shouldn’t use the same passwords for all our apps but it’s so hard keeping up with all the codes, pins and passwords you have. Meet Codebook from Zetetic. Codebook saves all your passwords securely with one log on and then synchs across all your devices so that you always have the right password at the right time. Another free app, Codebook can even generate strong passwords so you can ditch the dreaded ‘password123’! VoIP phones If you have a mobile and a landline then you already know that whilst connectivity is great in theory, in practice it can have its downsides including dropped calls, difficulty conferencing and multiple numbers for your customers to call. Wouldn’t it be great to have a single number that a customer could call that would find you wherever you were? How much time would you save searching around for contact numbers or dealing with calls when you simply don’t have the time? VoIP phones have been around for a while now and although back in the day the call quality could be somewhat ‘inconsistent’ the availability of high-speed internet and 5G means that it’s often better than a copper landline. VoIP phones have tons of features like virtual receptionists, menu filtering and voicebox to email and for many of them, you don’t even need any special equipment. If you’re looking for the best VoIP phone services then check out this list by Neil Patel with some great suggestions. Zapier So you have all of these great apps and they are all working away in their own areas but what happens when you want to integrate and automate your tasks? Check out Zapier. Now Zapier doesn’t do anything itself. Instead, it uses actions (called triggers) to start other actions in different apps. So for example when you receive an email, it can automatically save any attachment into your Google docs and then send you a slack message telling you there is new content. It’s a superb automation app that links all your software up and allows you to automate features and set up workflows. Zapier claims that they work seamlessly with over 2000 apps and rising, so your favourite software should have no problem integrating. Productivity checkers Do you know where you waste most of your time? Do you know which websites you really ought to be avoiding? Know when your most productive hours are? Let’s face it we’ve all disappeared down a Twitter rabbit hole or spent and hour (or two) checking out what old school friends are doing on Facebook. The first step to improving your productivity is to understand where you are losing your time and productivity checkers like Rescue Time or Toggl will show you exactly when you are most productive and thus maximise your efficient hours. Spelling and Grammar helpers If you are someone who has difficulty with spelling or grammar then you know that it can take forever to write a simple letter or email and get it just right. But help is at hand in the form of Grammarly or Hemmingway. Both of these apps will check what you re writing and highlight any problems with suggested spelling changes applied at the click of a button. Yes, they save you money but in addition, they also give you confidence that your business communications are where they need to be. Sanebox Most people have trouble managing their inboxes, so they rely on email organization apps. It’s not just spam. There are newsletters that you don’t really need just now, things you’ve been CC’d into for no reason and reports that you thought might be useful sometime. Sanebox is a method of making sure your inbox focuses on the things that are important and reduces the amount of time you spend dealing with nonsense. You can teach it what to do with specific emails based on rules you set and it will also learn what to do based on y our behaviour. The free version is great and for a small subscription, you can add on a few more productivity tools from the Sanebox stable. Let your apps take the strain With so many great productivity apps available on the market it seems crazy not to give them a go. Most of them are free in the basic versions and will save you huge amounts of time and give you control back over your working day. Why not check out our suggestions now and start saving yourself some time right away?
Recent correspondence from British Steel has indicated increases in the cost of steel sections, the step increase in the cost of steel is very high considering the volatile market structural steelwork fabricators are working under. The problem here is that the market rate for structural sections has been for far too long at a level that is unsustainable for steel mills to be viable. Equally, the market rate for fabricated structural steelwork is equally unsustainable in the long term when you consider part of the business is a bespoke design and detailing service, coupled with a semi-production type business, followed by unique sites requiring unique solutions. Recently, due to demand in other parts of the world, the cost of iron ore has almost doubled since March 2020 to a figure of $160 USD/dmt. Metallurgical Coke has also risen in the order of 45% during the same period. These two commodities being vastly important in determining the market rate of BOS produced steelwork. In a similar way, scrap has also recently increased in value by circa 70% from March 2020 to a price of $425 USD/t. With scrap being an important component of EAF produced steel, we would expect Arcelor to increase their prices in a similar way. It was explained to me over twenty years ago that any increase in the price of steel is headline news, whereas any increase in concrete just seems to go under the radar of the news outlets. Historically, an increase in the price of steel is swiftly followed by an increase in the price of concrete by a similar margin, I’m sure an economist would be using the term, “The Law of one Price” at this stage. I think we all know that the price of structural frames, irrespective of the material are set at a very low level due to the large capacity of the Tier 2 framing sub-contractors. These Tier 2 sub-contractors have for years being providing excellent frames at prices with wafer thin margins for decades. The resilience of Tier 2 sub-contract framing providers to events and changes beyond their control is nothing short of staggering. What is required is a very steady increase in the market rate of buildings such that all levels of the supply chain are making a reasonable margin for the risks they are taking in the construction industry, all the way from Tier 1 Principal Contractors, to Tier 2 sub-contractors and down the line to Tier 3 sub-contracts and suppliers. Historically, going back in the order of twenty years the steel mills used to try to maintain steady increases to their product by accepting the risk of buying iron-ore, coke, scrap and energy prices within their price structure. When demand for steelwork increased dramatically in China, circa 2004, the steel mills changed direction and decided their business model was not working and began pricing steel with rapid fluctuations in commodity items being passed down to their customers, namely Tier 2 sub-contractors. Perhaps, this was necessary to keep steel mills operational, as we all know the UK steel producer has been a serial loss maker for far too many years. The problem with this approach was now the fluctuation in the market rate of a commodity passed up the chain rapidly, which upsets the market rhythm by blowing budgets every time commodity prices increase, leading to further delays, further depressed prices as fabricators become nervous about not having enough work to meet contribution in their factories. So, it is not great when the commodity increases in price, but it must be great when the commodity reduces in price due to a lack of demand. Well the problem here is that there are simply too many steelwork contractors chasing too little structural steelwork, a hint of a dip in the price of steel is passed to the Tier 1 contractors probably at a faster pace than an increase as steelwork contractors push for an edge in an over saturated market. What is for certain when everybody in the construction industry has suffered the consequences of the uncertainties of BREXIT and the continued uncertainties of COVID, the last thing the industry wanted was what is seen by many has a large increase in the market rate of steel. Budgets for many future contracts will be based on artificially low framing prices and the result is going to be delays in contract awards, further value-engineering exercises and someone in the supply chain is going to ultimately “catch a cold”. Ideally this will be equally shared out throughout the supply chain from the clients right down to the suppliers, but I’m not confident that this will happen. I suspect there will be further delays to contracts commencing, which will make 2021 a much tougher year than already expected. What is for certain a “race to the bottom” in pricing will do nothing to maintain the quality of fabricated steelwork in the market.
RPMI Railpen (Railpen), the investment manager for the £30bn railways pension schemes, and Wrenbridge have achieved planning consent for a 185,000 sq ft warehouse development in Dartford, set to create approximately 500 new jobs. The 9-acre site, which was acquired by Railpen in February 2020, will comprise five Grade A warehouse units ranging in size from 13,000 sq ft to 73,000 sq ft. Work on the new development is scheduled to start in October, and due for completion in June 2021. The new development will form part of The Bridge, a 1.8m sq ft mixed-use development which currently provides commercial accommodation for occupiers such as Mercedes, DHL, Sainsbury’s and Network Rail. The site is easily accessible from Central London and other areas of Kent via major motorway and railway links, and benefits from close proximity to Junction 1A of the M25 corridor and City Airport. The new buildings will also have excellent sustainability credentials, with Railpen and Wrenbridge targeting a BREEAM Excellent rating and Planet Mark Certification. Alastair Dawson, Senior Asset Manager at Railpen, commented: “Despite the challenges presented by the current Covid-19 crisis, we are pleased to be able to efficiently move forward with this major project. Achieving consent for Dartford is a great step in expanding Railpen’s industrial portfolio, and the subsequent creation of jobs reflects the keen focus on social aspects of our investment strategy.” Jeff Wilson, Director at Wrenbridge, added: “Securing planning consent in such a short period of time is testament to our innovative and highly sustainable development plans. The scheme, and those working within it, will benefit from a range of high quality environmentally advanced technologies all within a landscaped setting with amenity on the doorstep.” The newly approved Dartford development joins a wide range of real estate assets owned and managed by RPMI Railpen, including a new scheme of six high specification warehouse units in Waltham Cross, also in partnership with Wrenbridge, which is due to complete in March 2021. CBRE, Cushmam & Wakefield and Glenny have been appointed as the leasing agents for the new development.
