Strabag Group’s German unit, Strabag AG, has reported a 39% increase in orders in the transportation sector as the country begins its overdue infrastructure renewal.
Work won included the renovation of the Hamburg-Berlin railway, the replacement of the Leine and Leineflut bridges south of Hanover, and construction of a 900m viaduct across the Uttrichshausen Valley near Kalbach in Hessen.
This last carries the A7, which at 1,000km is Europe’s longest motorway.
The company’s work on road building also showed growth, rising 6% to some €4bn.
This has brought the Viennese company’s order book to a record €5.2bn for the last financial year, helped by a €1.1bn order for power lines from three network operating companies.
Strabag expects Germany’s demand for infrastructure renewal to remain strong. Christian Hattendorf, a director of the company, said: “Due to the high need for refurbishment work on roads, bridges, rail networks and waterways, we expect capacity utilisation to remain high in the future.”
He added: “Efficient planning and approval processes are required in order to implement these projects quickly. However, we are optimistic that we will be able to play a decisive role in supporting the expansion of infrastructure planned by politicians in this country in the coming years.”
In March, the Bundestag passed a bill removing restrictions on public borrowing. This means that the newly installed government of Friedrich Merz has up to €1 trillion to spend on increasing the country’s military industrial complex and renewing its crumbling infrastructure.
Meanwhile, Strabag expanded its presence in its home market by buying Bauer Spezialtiefbau Austria through its Züblin subsidiary. Director Reinhard Kerschner said this move would “deepen our expertise in the field of pile construction”. No price was given for the transaction (see further reading).
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