黑洞社区

Engineering, construction and services firm Balfour Beatty has said that trading has been in line with expectations in the year to date.

Chairman Steve Marshall said the firm's cash position remained strong, with net average cash of 拢200m for the first four months of the year.

He attributed this to a high-quality order book of around 拢12.8bn, as well as 鈥渃ontinued infrastructure expenditure by our customers, the benefit of acquisitions and our tight control of costs鈥�.

Balfour Beatty said reduced rail volumes in the UK and Germany had affected the start of the year but that work on a high-speed line connecting Bologna to Florence continued well.

Balfour Beatty said reduced rail volumes in the UK and Germany had affected the start of the year

Balfour US has won new contracts in North Carolina, Texas and California. The firm acquired RT Dooley in North Carolina for $40m and won a five-year contract to deliver the US national grid's electricity transmission capital investment programme in New England.

In the UK, the firm said that Southwark's 拢200m 黑洞社区 Schools for the Future package, on which it is construction partner, had reached financial close. Twelve schools are to be built under the programme by Balfour's Transform Schools team in three waves, with the first due to open in September 2010.

鈥淥ur strong market positions, the resilience of our business model and our high-quality order book mean that we anticipate making progress in 2009,鈥� the firm said.