Laing O'rourke Forms Powerful Joint Venture For Hs2

Leading UK and European engineering companies, Laing O’Rourke Group, FCC Construcción and  Murphy, have combined to form a powerful joint venture to bid for work on the HS2 high-speed rail scheme, one of the country’s largest strategic infrastructure projects that will initially link London and Birmingham before extending north to Manchester and Leeds.

The joint venture combines world-class experience in delivering major high speed rail projects, together with acknowledged global expertise in tunnelling and station development and delivery. The partners also have an exceptional track record in key areas such as engineering innovation, including off site manufacturing, sustainability, employment, training and skills development.

The tendering process for £900m of enabling works on HS2 began recently with work packages covering the North, Central and South areas of HS2 Phase 1. The new consortium, known as LFM, will apply a lean, value added strategy towards the bid framework, with Laing O’Rourke and Murphy initially targeting the enabling works contracts on the project, and FCC Construcción joining the team to compete for the main Tier 1 packages later in the year.

Nadia Savage, Project Director, High Speed Rail at Laing O’Rourke, commenting on behalf of the joint venture said: ‘The combination of Laing O’Rourke, FCC Construcción and Murphy brings together a powerful team, bidding for future contracts on the HS2 high-speed rail scheme.

‘LFM combines international best practice high speed rail experience with offsite manufacturing expertise and a UK-based directly employed workforce.  Our lean and staged  strategy will add value where and when it’s needed, providing a cost conscious, shaped and positive approach to meet the client’s needs precisely.  We will engage with the supply chain to establish a robust, sustainable network of suppliers to achieve the UK Government’s and HS2 Ltd’s aim of ensuring that SMEs are afforded the chance to secure 60% of the works, while providing opportunities for a future generation of construction professionals.’

Joint venture partners background:

LAING O’ROURKE

A globally diverse engineering and construction group headquartered in Dartford, UK, Laing O’Rourke has extensive global rail industry experience and is currently involved in major projects in the UK, Canada, UAE, Australia and Hong Kong.

In the UK, the Group is engaged on the country’s largest commuter rail projects for Network Rail, Transport for London, Crossrail and Manchester Metrolink. Part of the UK’s first ‘pure construction alliance’ for rail, Laing O’Rourke is working on the first phase of Network Rail’s £250 million programme to improve performance and capacity on the Stafford section of the UK’s West Coast Main Line. Elsewhere, it is undertaking a programme of intensive construction on major stations for Crossrail, including Tottenham Court Road, Liverpool Street and Custom House, and continues with the expansion of Greater Manchester’s Metrolink network as part of the MPT Consortium. Also in London, the company has begun work on the Northern Line extension. Activity for both Crossrail and Manchester Metrolink has seen the extensive use of Laing O’Rourke’s Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) expertise, providing both cost and time savings.

Internationally, Laing O’Rourke has recently completed rail electrification projects in Auckland, New Zealand and Adelaide, South Australia and continues to work with Transport for NSW and Sydney Trains. In Hong Kong, the Group has been working for MTR Corporation Ltd on three urban rail projects, two at West Kowloon and one at Admiralty, forming a dramatic expansion of the MTR network. Admiralty involves building new rail tunnels and platforms below and adjacent to the existing Admiralty Station, as well as adding a major below-ground interchange concourse.

FCC CONSTRUCCIÓN

Headquartered in Spain, FCC Construcción, part of the FCC Group, is one of Europe’s leading infrastructure organisations. Throughout its 110 year history, FCC has been involved in all aspects of the rail sector. It has international expertise that extends from creating high-speed railways to underground lines and new trams, including the creation of new stations and major city terminals.

It has been instrumental in the development of many of facets of Spain’s high-speed rail network and has built more than 700 km of high speed rail lines in Spain and all of its main stations including Atocha in Madrid, Santa Justa in Seville, Delicias in Zaragoza, La Sagrera in Barcelona as well as Gerona and Vigo stations.

FCC has extensive tunnel infrastructure experience having built the high-speed railway tunnels under Gerona, the Guadarrama Tunnels between Madrid and Segovia, created a world speed record at La Cabrera Tunnel, boring 86 metres/day.

J. MURPHY & SONS LTD

J. Murphy & Sons Ltd is a leading multi-disciplined engineering and construction company with a rich heritage of safe, innovative and sustainable solutions to the most complex infrastructure challenges.

With over 4,000 employees and with offices in the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and the Middle East, Murphy has been helping clients build more resilient infrastructure for more than 60 years in the civil engineering, tunnelling, rail, energy, water and wastewater, pipelines, building, highways, public realm and security, and piling sectors.

The company is distinguished by its culture of innovation, diverse capability, ability to self-deliver and substantial holding of plant and equipment which give it unrivalled flexibility and agility in providing customer-focused service to clients and adapting to market requirements.

Murphy’s extensive rail sector experience includes working with market-leading clients such as Crossrail, Network Rail, London Underground, Eurotunnel and the Channel Tunnel Rail Link.

Under the CP5 work bank, Murphy is working with Network Rail to help deliver a part of the multi-billion pound portfolio of works, including a large volume of civil engineering, structures and earthworks schemes over the next five years. Murphy has also been involved in Network Rail’s National Electrification Programme.

The company’s legacy also includes the Crossrail Thames Tunnel C310, the only contract to tunnel under the River Thames as a part of Crossrail’s scheme. Other major projects have included the Lower Lea Valley Cable Tunnels project for the Olympic Village, the Thames Tunnels for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, major power cable tunnels and infrastructure for National Grid and EDF Energy.

For further media enquiries on the Laing O’Rourke, FCC Construcción and Murphy Joint Venture for HS2 contact: 

Matthew Moth, Julien Cozens, Zack King at Madano. Tel: 020 7593 4000 or email:

[email protected]; [email protected] and [email protected].

For further details on the joint venture partners, please visit:

www.laingorourke.com

www.fcc.es

www.murphygroup.co.uk/