BAM seeking to recruit 100 people for building projects here and abroad

BUILDING contractor BAM is seeking to recruit 100 people from Ireland to work on projects here and in locations such as Jordan and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The Dutch-owned company yesterday reported that it made profit before tax in 2011 of €4 million, 9 per cent less than the €4.4 million the business earned in 2010.

BAM, formerly known as Ascon, is working on a number of projects including the A5 motorway between Derry and Monaghan, a development at the port in Aqaba, Jordan, and a stadium and hotel in Al Ain in the UAE.

The company is beginning a drive to hire 100 people, including engineers, contracts managers and quantity surveyors, to work on these developments and its Irish projects. It is also bidding for a number of other prospective contracts in Ireland and Scotland.

The company said that, in the Republic, the State had selected it as preferred bidder for a number of school building and infrastructure projects.

Those deals are expected to be closed by the end of the year. Recently the company’s joint-venture proposal with Heineken Ireland to develop the old Beamish Crawford brewery site in Cork received planning permission from the local authority.

Accounts published by BAM yesterday show revenues fell by just under 15 per cent to €228 million from €270 million.

Chief executive Theo Cullinane said the company had improved its profit margin against a background of falling construction activity and reduced State spending on large public projects.

Its balance sheet shows no bank debt at the end of 2011, but it owed its parent, Dutch group Royal BAM, €28.5 million.

Net assets topped €63 million at the end of last year. In 2011 it wrote €2.2 million off the value of its Irish properties, compared with a €37.7 million charge in 2010.