Coadjute now one of Europe’s fastest-growing technology companies
Managed Service provider Coadjute has been named as one of Europe’s fastest-growing companies, securing 111th place in the prestigious 2026 Sifted 250. Described by Sifted as a “snapshot of European tech at full tilt”, the Sifted 250 recognises the 250 fastest-growing firms in the sector Europe, ranked according to percentage revenue growth over the past three financial years. The achievement places Coadjute among an elite group of high-growth businesses operating within a European ecosystem of more than 50,000 funded startups. It also marks the latest milestone in an exceptional year for the company. Earlier in 2026, Coadjute was ranked No. 42 in the Sifted 100 UK & Ireland, recognising it as one of the fastest-growing businesses in the region. For Coadjute, the recognition reflects a period of rapid expansion as increasing numbers of estate agents and property professionals turn to its fully managed services to take on increasingly complex compliance and transaction-related work. Dan Salmons, CEO of Coadjute, said: “Coadjute is proud to be one of the fastest growing companies in the UK and Ireland. Now to be recognised by Sifted as a leading European company too is really the icing on the cake. “What makes this recognition particularly meaningful is that it is based on revenues, not opinion, so is a clear measure of the very rapid rate at which estate agents are now moving to our managed services. “UK estate agents have increasingly complex regulatory and operational responsibilities, and thanks to our market-leading technology and outstanding people, they can now handover much of that burden to us, freeing time up to focus on what they want to be doing – selling property. “This recognition belongs to our team, our customers, our partners and our investors, all of whom have played an important role in Coadjute’s rapid growth”. Rapid growth driven by managed services Coadjute provides fully managed AML compliance services designed for estate agents, combining specialist human oversight, efficient operations, and AI-native technology. Their AML compliance service supports agents with full compliance framework including identity verification, customer due diligence, PEPs and sanctions, Source of Funds and Source of Wealth, Enhanced Due Diligence, ongoing monitoring, business-wide risk assessments, policies and procedures, training and audit-ready reporting. The company’s managed-service model is designed to remove much of the administrative and compliance burden from estate agency teams, while giving businesses greater visibility, consistency and control. Coadjute has been continuing to expand its proposition, investing in new services to support estate agents across a broader range of compliance and transaction processes. The company is backed by Lloyds Banking Group, Nationwide, NatWest and Rightmove, and property expert and broadcaster Phil Spencer is an ambassador for the business. Dan Salmons added: “We’re delighted to be ranked at #111 in the 2026 Sifted250 for Europe. A friend told me that in numerology it’s a special number that means momentum, leadership and beginnings. Certainly, with the momentum and market leadership we have, we believe this is just the beginning for Coadjute”. A growing European success story Europe is home to more than 50,000 funded startups, spanning major technology hubs across the UK, Scandinavia and continental Europe. Against that backdrop, securing 111th position in the Sifted 250 places Coadjute firmly among a small group of businesses demonstrating some of the strongest sustained revenue growth across the European technology sector. The ranking follows Coadjute’s No. 42 position in the Sifted 100 UK & Ireland earlier this year, reinforcing the company’s emergence as one of the UK property sector’s most rapidly scaling technology-enabled businesses. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
TRU welcome Kirklees Council to Huddersfield station as programme reaches halfway mark in latest series of improvement works
Transpennine Route Upgrade (TRU) teams have made strong progress with works in the Huddersfield area while the railway has been closed, with work continuing until Sunday 4 October. The new leadership of Kirklees Council were invited to see the work at Huddersfield station firsthand and discuss the benefits TRU is bringing to rail users and local communities. Their visit provided an opportunity to highlight the transformational impact TRU is having on regeneration in Huddersfield. A recent Network Rail-commissioned study found that planning applications within 1.5 miles of Huddersfield station have increased by nearly 33% since TRU funding was confirmed in 2020, with the programme estimated to generate £1.9 billion in GVA, create nearly 5,000 full-time equivalent jobs, and support the delivery of almost 1,200 new homes. This impact is being unlocked through a once-in-a-generation upgrade of the station and the wider TRU footprint. TRU teams are halfway through a 16-day closure, and during the first week improvement works included: Before the railway line reopens on Monday 5 October, works continue on: James Richardson, TRU managing director, said: “Huddersfield is one of the most significant sites across the TRU footprint. Our work at Huddersfield station and on the wider railway will deliver a once-in-a-generation transformation, that will not only improve connectivity but help drive economic growth and wider investment in the town. “People can clearly see the progress we’ve made since work started on site in 2023 and the scale of work being undertaken during this ongoing closure, which will pave the way for real benefits for passengers by early 2027.” Councillor John Hardie, Kirklees Council Cabinet Member for Regeneration, Transport and Highways, said: “Rail travel across Kirklees is changing, and it was fantastic to see first-hand the significant work taking place to transform Huddersfield Railway Station into a station for the future. “This generational investment in our rail infrastructure will strengthen the connections to towns and cities across the north of England, unlocking new opportunities for education, employment, and training for the people of Kirklees. “The Transpennine Route Upgrade is creating a railway network fit for Kirklees that supports our position as a vibrant, well-connected place to live and work.” Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Shawbrook completes £60.5m refinancing for Grace Real Estate Partners
Five-year facility supports the next phase of Grace’s 832-unit Northern Portfolio strategy Shawbrook has completed a £60.5m, five-year interest-only senior facility for Grace Real Estate Partners, refinancing its 832-unit Northern Portfolio and supporting the next phase of its investment and asset management strategy. The transaction represents the largest facility completed by Shawbrook to date. The facility is secured across a residential portfolio in Newcastle and the wider North East. It provides Grace with a long-term capital structure as it continues to optimise income, invest in the quality and energy efficiency of the assets, and capture further rental and operational upside. Grace, a UK-focused real estate investment and asset management firm, entered the Newcastle market in 2023 with the acquisition of a 478-unit residential portfolio. In June 2025, it acquired a further 354 self-contained studios across three freehold buildings in central Newcastle, creating a residential cluster of 832 units. Following the execution of its value-add strategy, Grace sought to refinance the portfolio’s existing debt and move the assets beyond the acquisition and initial value-creation phase into a period of continued optimisation and income growth. Since acquisition, the portfolio has achieved a c.22% uplift in value over aggregate acquisition value, supported by rental growth, targeted capital expenditure, improved occupancy and the professionalisation of operations. Grace’s modernisation and energy-efficiency programme has also been delivered on time and below budget to date. Shawbrook’s Structured Real Estate team worked closely with Grace to understand the portfolio’s income performance, its vertically integrated operating platform and its wider business plan. The resulting facility was structured to align with the established income profile of the assets and support continued investment across the portfolio. Tirath Singh, Head of Structured Real Estate at Shawbrook: “We are delighted to support Grace with this significant refinancing. The portfolio’s strong performance reflects targeted investment and active management. By understanding the assets and wider business plan, we provided a flexible, long-term facility to support the next phase.” Georges Tohme, Founding Director at Grace Real Estate Partners: “Shawbrook and their professional and dedicated team engaged with both the portfolio and our wider business plan from the outset, and that understanding was central to delivering a transaction of this scale with certainty. Since our initial investment in Newcastle in 2023, we have built significant operational scale, strengthened income performance and continued to invest in the quality and energy efficiency of the assets. The new facility provides an appropriate long-term capital structure for the next phase of our business plan. We are thrilled with the outcome of this refinancing.” Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Safer Online Purchasing: Cybersecurity for Construction Professionals
A construction project site runs on ordering – there’s lumber, fixtures, tools, permits, software licenses and what not. Almost all of this is purchased online now instead of picked up at a counter or ordered over the phone from a rep. That shift saves time. And on a schedule where delays cost real money, time saved matters. It also opens an undesired door. Construction cybersecurity was mostly about protecting blueprints and bids on a server. Now it means protecting every purchase order moving through emails and a browser tab too. The worrying thing – most crews haven’t caught up to that yet. Spotting fake retailer messages You receive an email from a supplier. Everything about it seems to be right – invoice attached, payment overdue, etc. On a project site where hundreds of purchase orders are due at any given time, that email won’t ring any bell. A busy procurement manager will simply click it and approve. It’s even easier for him to believe that it’s genuine if the logos or formatting are close to the one that the original vendor usually sends. That’s the exact vulnerability most tips for spotting fake retailer messages talk about. Think of the Walmart logo and an email from an almost Walmart-like domain. It would be easily believable. Moonlock suggests that checking the domain character by character, not just the display name, is important. No payment should ever be made through a link that comes inside an unexpected message. Purchase volume is quite high, and the amount involved is also huge, so construction companies make a good target for the scammers. Big dollar amounts and fast approvals are the combination that scammers really look for. Vetting vendor portals Not every supplier site is what it claims to be. A cloned portal, a slightly off URL, a login page copied pixel-for-pixel from the real thing – it’s built to catch exactly the person in a hurry to place an order before a delivery window closes. Secure online purchasing starts before checkout, with a quick check of the URL bar and a look for a verified vendor badge, not after the card’s already been entered. Using a company card with a set purchase limit for online material orders adds one more layer here too – it caps the damage if a cloned page or a phishing attempt ever does get a card number. Catching invoice fraud early This one doesn’t always look like a scam. A fake invoice shows up mid-project, formatted like every other one that’s come through from that vendor, asking for payment to an ‘updated’ account number. Nobody flags it, because nothing about it feels unusual on its face. That’s exactly the point of it. Here’s what you can do: Construction procurement security comes down to exactly this: a second set of eyes confirming anything unusual before money actually moves, rather than trust extended automatically because a thread already looks legitimate. Securing job-site Wi-Fi purchases Construction sites are not like your typical corporate-style glass buildings where there’s proper, secure Wi-Fi available. Purchase orders are routed through every possible place – a truck, a trailer, half-finished office, etc. It’s more about where the signal is available. The security in this is of course compromised. Public and shared networks do not offer the security that you would expect in a corporate office. That means the purchases are in a way being made in open. A mobile hotspot with its own password beats an open network every time a payment is involved. Avoiding counterfeit parts Search for something as ordinary as a specific brand of exterior-grade screws or a particular drill bit. Counterfeit tools and parts under a legit manufacturer’s name, using photos lifted straight from the actual product page, are common. And when the price tag is just low enough below market, the deal seems to be irresistible. A breaker that fails inspection or fasteners that don’t hold under load cost far more in rework and delay than the few dollars saved ordering them. Sticking to manufacturer-authorized sellers and checking a seller’s rating and review history before ordering anything safety-related, catches most of this. Training the crew It’s not the company as an entity that scammers target. The people working there are the ones that are targets. Purchase managers, civil/electrical/mechanical engineers, foreman and supervisors – whoever has any level of authority in purchase matters is what they look out for. This is why cybersecurity for construction professionals is the requirement for everyone. A simple IT policy walkthrough can’t make the cut in today’s volatile digital environment that the construction sector is seeing. Recognizing procurement risk patterns None of this works without knowing what’s actually being defended against in the first place. Cybersecurity risks in construction procurement cluster around a handful of repeat patterns on every project – spoofed vendor emails, cloned portals, altered payment details, unsecured job-site networks. Once a crew can name the pattern by sight, spotting the next attempt gets noticeably faster. Building a purchasing policy Going forward, it’s not additional software or a layer of security tools that you need to strengthen your cybersecurity efforts. It’s more about habits that are built through a culture at the project site. It’s about regular training programs and spreading awareness, especially involving the people who have authority to sanction purchases and approve payments. A clearly defined purchase policy makes the defense even stronger. Conclusion The fraud itself costs almost nothing to prevent and everything to recover from once money’s already gone. This is usually the exact moment a company finally starts paying attention. Act in advance, not after you are caught on the wrong foot.
Kier Builds London Retrofit Pipeline with £60m Holborn Office Transformation
Kier is set to deliver a major £60 million office retrofit in London’s Holborn district after being selected as preferred contractor for Railpen’s transformation of 26 Red Lion Square. The contractor is entering into a pre-construction services agreement for the 100,000 sq ft development, known as The Fenner, ahead of a planned start on site later this year. Designed by Stiff + Trevillion, the extensive refurbishment will transform the existing building into eight floors of Grade A workspace, with construction expected to take around two years. Rather than pursuing wholesale redevelopment, the project will retain and reuse significant elements of the existing structure, combining this approach with substantial architectural and environmental upgrades. Plans include new façades addressing both Theobalds Road and Red Lion Square, alongside enhanced ground-floor amenities intended to improve the arrival experience and provide modern facilities for occupiers. More than 9,000 sq ft of roof terraces will also be introduced, adding external amenity space to the building and helping reposition the property for the next generation of central London office occupiers. Sustainability and operational performance are central to the redevelopment. Railpen is targeting BREEAM Outstanding, EPC A and a NABERS 5-star rating for The Fenner, placing ambitious environmental objectives at the heart of the refurbishment programme. Five contractors competed for the project, with Kier ultimately selected on the strength of its proposed team and experience delivering complex office schemes within central London. Graham Potts, regional director at Kier Construction London & Thames Valley, said: “Railpen is a new and significant client for Kier, one whose ambitious pipeline and progressive agenda aligns perfectly with our own values and approach.” The appointment further strengthens Kier’s growing workload in London’s commercial refurbishment and retrofit market. It follows the contractor securing Derwent London’s £99 million redevelopment of Holden House on Oxford Street, as well as The Crown Estate’s transformation of the Grade II-listed 10 Piccadilly, comprising approximately 90,800 sq ft. Together, the projects underline the increasing importance of retrofit within the capital’s office construction market as property owners look to modernise existing assets while retaining valuable structures and improving energy performance. The Fenner is also part of a much larger investment programme being undertaken by Railpen, encompassing around 600,000 sq ft of commercial refurbishment and development across London and Birmingham. With new façades, upgraded amenities, substantial roof terraces and ambitious environmental targets, the £60 million Holborn project will see an existing central London office asset comprehensively repositioned without sacrificing the embodied value of its underlying structure. For Kier, the scheme represents another significant addition to a growing portfolio of high-value retrofit projects as the transformation of existing buildings continues to become an increasingly important part of the UK commercial construction market. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Grainger Unveils £60m BTR Vision to Transform Chester’s Linenhall Site
Grainger is progressing plans for a £60 million Build to Rent development in the heart of Chester, which could bring around 300 professionally managed rental homes to a long-vacant city centre site. The listed residential landlord and developer is working with landowner Chester Race Company and UK Land & Property to regenerate the former Linenhall stables site, located between Chester Racecourse and the city centre. Plans are being developed for a six-storey residential scheme comprising approximately 300 BTR apartments, with a planning application expected to be submitted to Cheshire West and Chester Council in November. Subject to securing consent, construction could begin during 2027. The development would replace an existing consent for student accommodation and instead create a purpose-built rental community aimed at a broad range of residents, including young professionals, couples and people looking to downsize. Architect Falconer Chester Hall is part of the professional team developing the proposals, alongside Tier Consult, Ridge, Curtins, Fenix Heritage, Asteer Planning and Clayton Property. The Linenhall site has a long history of proposed redevelopment. Formerly occupied by stable buildings serving the nearby racecourse, the land has been cleared since 2009 and is currently operating as a surface car park. The approximately 1.8-acre site sits within Chester’s historic City Walls and a conservation area, giving the design team the challenge of introducing a substantial new residential development within one of the country’s most distinctive historic city environments. Earlier proposals for the land have included private apartments and purpose-built student accommodation, but despite previous planning permissions, a major redevelopment has yet to come forward. The latest £60 million BTR proposals could finally unlock the site while supporting the continued growth of Chester’s city centre residential population. Louise Stewart, chief executive of Chester Race Company, said the partners believe residential development represents a strong long-term use for Linenhall, with the ambition to create a high-quality scheme that contributes to the growth and vitality of the city centre. The location is particularly suited to the Build to Rent model, providing residents with access to the city centre’s employment, retail, leisure and hospitality offer while also being positioned close to Chester Racecourse and public transport connections. For Grainger, the project would add another significant development to its expanding UK BTR portfolio, while bringing its long-term rental management model into Chester. The proposals also reflect the wider role Build to Rent can play in city centre regeneration, particularly where underused brownfield or surface car park sites can be transformed into professionally managed residential communities. If approved, the Linenhall development would replace a long-standing gap in Chester’s urban fabric with around 300 new homes, representing a major investment in both the city’s residential market and its wider built environment. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals