黑洞社区

Scott Wilson鈥檚 Glaswegian chief executive Hugh Blackwood has a battle-hardened air about him.

He says he 鈥渓earned his craft working in Africa building basic infrastructure and sleeping under heavy mosquito nets鈥�. It鈥檚 just as well, as after 30 years with Scott Wilson (and two at its helm) he鈥檚 leading the 拢360m-turnover listed engineering group in the fight against recession and the new government鈥檚 plan to take a baseball bat to public spending.

Then there鈥檚 those acquisition rumours that just won鈥檛 go away, although he insists: 鈥淭his company is not for sale.鈥�

There is a whole range of relationships we can have with US firms without being bought

Blackwood (pictured) says that while selling up is not part of the plan, forming alliances with large US firms is. Scott Wilson already has tie-ups with acquisitive US firm Aecom, understood to be poised to add David Langdon to its shopping basket, on jobs in Iraq and on Turkey鈥檚 Izmit bridge.

The firm is also in an alliance in Saudi Arabia with CH2M Hill. 鈥淭here is a whole range of relationships we can have with US firms without being bought,鈥� says Blackwood. 鈥淯S firms may be bigger but they don鈥檛 have the global reach of many UK consultants, while we benefit from the heavyweight back-up.鈥�

He adds that global consolidation a la Balfour Beatty and Parsons Brinckerhoff is a 鈥渘atural response to the increasing sizes of projects, especially in infrastructure鈥�.

In fact, he makes US-UK tie-ups appear to make so much sense you can鈥檛 help wondering whether he is in the market to be acquired after all. 鈥淲ell, we are not in the market for being bought at the moment, but you can鈥檛 rule anything out,鈥� he says.

Things might be different when the firm鈥檚 share price perks up. It was 94.5p at the time of writing compared to 拢3.50 before the recession. Blackwood puts this down to worries about public spending and the company鈥檚 拢24.2m pension deficit (as of last May). 鈥淏oth these are about uncertainty so as soon as we have at least an emergency budget that will improve certainty,鈥� he says.

Some say the hole in the pension fund has put off buyers, but Blackwood says: 鈥淲e鈥檙e contributing 拢1m a year to the deficit at the moment but we won鈥檛 be in five years.鈥� He adds that the maximum payout for the fund is not until 2035.

And whether he wants to sell or fend off a takeover, the next results, at the end of June, should help: 鈥淥ur cash situation has never been better,鈥� Blackwood says (see box).

Looking further ahead, he is building up existing international business rather than chase work in new territories, to counter the slump in the UK public sector. A year ago international work made up 32% of turnover; now it鈥檚 40% and growing.

Of the remaining 60%, about half is in the UK public sector, although a lot is in the parts that look like holding up best, such as renewable energy and nuclear. An Achilles heel could be its work on Crossrail. Blackwood believes the project could be postponed or cut, as 黑洞社区 reported last week. But he thinks the design phase 鈥� the most valuable to the firm 鈥� will go on into next year as planned. 鈥淚t鈥檚 tough but we are in high spirits.鈥�