A Surrey-based infrastructure specialist has enjoyed an increase in profit and turnover on the back of two major acquisitions in the engineering sector.
Octavius Infrastructure celebrated a “very successful year” following the buys, which helped propel its pre-tax profit from £3.8m to £4.6m.
Turnover for the year to 31 March was up from £215.4m to £276.7m, with the acquisitions having added £21.3m, alongside organic growth in its core business.
It purchased R&W Civil Engineering – a highways engineering specialist based in Southampton – out of administration in July 2023 and took on its employees. According to Octavius, the acquisition “complements the reach and offering of the group’s existing highways business”.
R&W had a turnover of £31.8m, according to its latest accounts for the year to 31 March 2022. By April this year, the business had been integrated into Octavius and rebranded as Octavius Regional Civil Engineering.
Octavius also bought the shares of Navitas Engineering Group, a rail-electrification design consultancy, last December. The firm was too small to post full accounts, but had net assets of £1.6m in October 2022, according to its results for that year.
“Navitas Group will continue to operate as a standalone business whilst significantly augmenting the group’s railway-electrification capabilities,” Octavius said.
Octavius is now expanding its activity in the rail and highways sectors, meaning it is working across the whole of England and Wales for the first time.
It scooped places on five Network Rail frameworks during the reporting year, and also won spots on an undisclosed number of highway projects with local authorities. Among them was one on a £355m framework with Sheffield City Council, which it secured in August 2023.
The extra work helped to edge up its adjusted margin from 2.8 per cent ito 2.9 per cent, as turnover grew faster than the firm’s overheads. But cash was down from £9.3m to £7.5m.
Octavius’ turnover boost is likely to take it higher up the CN100 ranking, after it made its debut in the latest edition, placed 80th.
