19 December 2018 | FM World
All the major contract announcements and week-by-week market analysis.
DeepStore on song for Royal College of Music
The Royal College of Music awarded a three-year contract to DeepStore to house its library's collection of music archives. The Special Collection includes composer and performer archives, and 750,000 programmes. The Royal College of Music began working with DeepStore in 2016, and embarked on a tender process for a low-risk storage and retrieval system for its Special Collection.
Pizza Express renewed SWC deal
Specialist Window Cleaning (SWC), part of Incentive FM Group, was awarded a two-year contract extension by restaurant chain Pizza Express. SWC provides weekly window cleaning at 438 of the company's restaurants across the country. It is the third time that the contract has been extended over four years.
Bespak extended Cordant link
Bespak extended its contract with Cordant Group to provide cleaning and security services. Cordant Cleaning provides a range of bespoke cleaning services across various sites including King's Lynn and Cambridge, tailored for specific requirements such as grounds maintenance and general cleaning. Cordant Security provides manned guarding services at the Milton Keynes and Queenbury sites.
Mitie landed NHS deals in South West
Mitie secured two new five-year contracts worth £675,000 with the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust and Devon Partnership NHS Trust. Mitie delivered landscaping services across 72 sites for the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SWASFT). Its responsibilities for Devon Partnership NHS Trust involved grounds maintenance at 21 sites across Devon.
ISS rides on at Irish Rail
ISS in Ireland retained its contract with Irish Rail (Iarnród Éireann) for another five years. ISS provided cleaning services for Irish Rail rolling stock, offices, depots and stations and concourses since beginning operations in 1997. The company provides cleaning services at all large stations and depots at more than 65 locations nationwide.
More zoo time for Interserve
Interserve renewed its £2 million partnership with Edinburgh Zoo to deliver facilities services. The five-year deal covers cleaning, security, park presentation, and waste disposal and washroom services for the 82-acre site. The company worked with Edinburgh Zoo since 2013 and has introduced the removal of hi-vis clothing in certain areas in order not to upset the animals.
AM Services stays at Johnson Matthey
AM Services Group was awarded a contract to provide two years of security and cleaning services to Johnson Matthey in Clitheroe, Lancashire. Since the company was appointed in 2013, the contract has been subject to regular internal review. Johnson Matthey said the quality of service has given it sufficient confidence to extend the soft services deal without another tender process.
Axis secured UCL
Axis Security won a contract to provide manned guarding services for University College London's (UCL) entire estate. Two hundred security officers protect the university's main Bloomsbury campus. Axis will also provide security for additional buildings and departments across central London. Traditional functions, including emergency response, control room duties, and front-of-house reception duties have been incorporated into the contract.
Jet Aire tasted Yorkshire Water
Jet Aire Services was awarded a 12-month contract to provide drainage maintenance on behalf of Yorkshire Water. Valued at £100,000, the work includes cleansing and clearance services to be provided throughout the Yorkshire region as a Tier 2 contractor, direct for Yorkshire Water. The successful tender followed Jet Aire's recent investment in five recycler units, which are more powerful than standard jetting equipment.
Emcor flew at BAE Systems
Emcor UK was awarded an eight-year contract to support its work with BAE Systems Typhoon Total Availability enterprise (Tytan) up to 2026. The FM provider was responsible for providing hard and soft FM services, including mechanical and electrical maintenance, cleaning, groundworks, fabric protection, CAD and project works.
Graeme Davies rounded up this period of contracts with his perspective in the October 2018 issue of FM World:
Week commencing 1 October
Infrastructure support services specialist Renew said it had traded in line with expectations during the year to 30 September, and should show good growth in margins and profits in its financial results due in late November. The main driver is its engineering services business, which is tracking ahead of its budgeted performance, helped by the purchase of QTS in May. The specialist building business has not kept pace due to a more selective attitude to contracts, which has seen this division shrink to the point where it represents 5 per cent of group profits.
Week commencing 15 October
A third-quarter trading update from Rentokil Initial suggested that the business remains well on track for a solid full year performance. Organic revenue growth was 4.4 per cent and the host of acquisitions made during the period helped bump up overall group growth up by 11.8 per cent at constant exchange rates to £637.4m, on an ongoing basis. The company continues to bolt on businesses to its Pest Control operations. Up to the end of September, Rentokil had acquired 39 businesses in emerging and growing markets, adding £156 million in annualised revenues.
Week commencing 22 October
The government's desire to see smart meters installed in all domestic and small business premises by 2020 has helped Smart Metering Systems establish itself as a £600m-plus business. But recent hiccups have dealt a blow to its share price as doubts have been cast on whether the government's target can be met - so two contract wins in consecutive weeks were a relief to investors. It won a mandate with Shell-owned First Utility, giving it access to a potential 1 million meter points across its customer base, then followed that up with Bristol Energy, which has 100,000 meters.
Week commencing 29 October
Chancellor Philip Hammond used his Budget statement to drive the final nail into the coffin of the Private Finance Initiative, declaring that he would never sign off a PFI deal. This opened up a debate about what would replace PFI as a vehicle to deliver the government's infrastructure plans. Investors reacted calmly, although the brittle sentiment towards companies with significant PFI exposure - evident since before Carillion's collapse - was not eased and share prices in those companies with the biggest exposure in this area have remained under pressure.