“It has been a very successful year for the group,” chief executive John Dowsett writes in the 2024 annual report of Octavius Infrastructure.
This puts the company into stark contrast with its former parent company, Geoffrey Osborne Limited, which limped through the past couple of years before collapsing into administration in April this year.
In the year to 31st March 2024 Octavius Infrastructure grew turnover grew by 28% to £276.7m (2023: £215.4m) thanks to both organic growth and two acquisitions.
Pre-tax profit was up 20% to £4.7m (2023: £3.9m), including £2.0m of exceptional items relating to the cost of integrating acquisitions.
Roughly a third of the revenue growth was down to a pair of acquisitions – £21.3m out of the £61m increase.
In July 2023 Octavius Infrastructure acquired the assets of Southampton-based R&W Civil Engineering in July 2023 out of administration for £485,000. [See previous report here.]
R&W added £18.8m to Octavius turnover in the latest financial year, at an operating loss of £780,000.
Octavius also paid £6.8m in December 2023 for Navitas Engineering, a specialist rail electrification design consultancy. Navitas added £2.5m turnover during the final three months of the year and £332,000 profit.
Group employee numbers grew during the financial year from 456 to 598; employee costs rose from £29m to £41m.
Private equity investors led by Sullivan Street Partners acquired Osborne Infrastructure from family owned Geoffrey Osborne Ltd in September 2021. In March 2022 it was rebranded as Octavius Infrastructure.
The owners hope to double the size of the business over five years. The challenge, Octavius chief executive John Dowsett writes in the annual report, is “that we need to both bid and win a greater volume of contracts, whilst also taking on larger and more complex projects. There is a balance to be struck to optimise the value of work versus the price tendered. Under-pricing work risks reduced contract profitability, whereas over-pricing may lead to lower volume of work won. Additionally, complexity of customer tender requirements is increasing, putting further strain on the ability of the team to deliver bids of the right quality, at the right price, in the desired volumes.”
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