9 October 2015

The acquisition of the Rhead Group is a significant step for Costain in realising the Company’s strategic goals and underlining further its leading status as an engineering solutions provider.

Established in 1985, Rhead is a professional services consultancy focussed on programme and commercial management. It provides a range of solutions for the lifecycle of infrastructure, construction and asset management programmes, primarily in the UK, for a number of blue-chip customers including National Grid, Wales & West Utilities and BAE Systems.

Costain already has a strong reputation for delivering innovative engineering solutions but the acquisition of Rhead, which was announced in August 2015, will further enhance the Company’s programme management and advisory capability. The acquisition also strengthens Costain’s integrated service offering across the business, allowing each sector to draw on the depth of knowledge and experience that exists within the Group.

“Our aim is to broaden our front-end advisory and programme management capability and deliver solutions that fundamentally transform our customers’ businesses. That, in a nutshell, is what Rhead does for its customers,” said Alex Vaughan, Costain’s Managing Director for Natural Resources.

Alex added: “Rhead is a business that drives technological innovation and integration in how it delivers solutions, so it’s very similar to Costain. We share the same values in how we go about our business, with an emphasis on delivering excellence for our customers.”

Those customers are consolidating their supply chains and are seeking an increasingly integrated service offering from their Tier 1 service providers through larger, longer-term collaborative contracts, and that’s where Rhead can help too.

“Our ‘Engineering Tomorrow’ strategy is focused on major customers who are spending billions of pounds addressing national needs in energy, water and transportation. We work with 30 to 40 major blue-chip customers who have complex needs requiring innovative solutions from an integrated team that will take responsibility for delivering those solutions collaboratively,” said Tim Bowen, Costain’s Corporate Development Director.

Rhead Group is currently being integrated into Costain’s Power Sector, which is now headed by Rhead’s former Chief Executive Nigel Curry. Curry has a strong track record of ensuring client expectations are exceeded and project teams are focussed on delivering value, innovation and excellence.

Under Nigel’s leadership, Rhead built up a strong track record delivering large infrastructure programmes for the energy, power generation, defence, transport and utilities sectors, eventually managing a portfolio of major capital projects valued at over £4 billion per year.

"We’re already seeing increasing opportunities to support existing and new clients with a broader range of services. Examples include supporting the Water and Power sector customers with innovative technology to deliver increased efficiency and predictability to support their capital programmes,” said Nigel.

Rhead brought with it a strong reputation for bringing together people from diverse backgrounds and disciplines to work in an environment that promotes collaboration and innovation. Over the years, Costain has embraced a similar collaborative approach to problem solving, and the benefits of the acquisition are already being felt across the business.

“The acquisition of the Rhead Group has helped to build the programme and commercial management advisory capability within Costain, both in terms of people and systems. We have also built scale in our Power Sector so we can pursue more opportunities in this growth market, and we have opened new areas of addressable market in our five other sectors where we can cross-sell the newly acquired programme management capability, said Tim.

 

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