world architecture top 100 January 2016 65

merger mystery

Why do some tie-ups create successful powerhouses, while others serve only to

damage relationships with trusted partners? David Blackman investigates

Managing the merger of two big

businesses is no easy task.

And the construction industry

has seen a wave of big tie-ups in

recent years, the most signifcant

of which is AECOM’s union with

its competitor URS to entrench

its position as the world’s biggest

construction consultant.

However, the merger seems to

have gone down like a lead balloon

among the world’s top architects,

according to BD’s WA100 survey.

When it comes to which cost

consultant architects think

provides the best service, AECOM

has dropped from frst to equal

ffth place.

The company, which only

picked up two votes in this

category from the WA100

respondents, was overtaken in

the poll by Rider Levett Bucknall,

Langdon & Seah, Gardiner &

Theobald and Turner & Townsend.

Rider replaced AECOM at the top

followed by the Singapore-based

Langdon & Seah, which is soon

to disappear as a separate brand

following its absorption into the

Dutch-based Arcadis group.

Responding to the news of its

slip down the polls, AECOM said:

““Of course we are disappointed

that we have lost our number

1 position, particularly having

spent so many years at the top.

“AECOM is an organisation that

prides itself on being responsive

to clients and the wider market,

and as such we have spent time

over the last year looking at how

we can best serve our clients,

including the architecture

community.”

It’s a diferent story so far at

WSP Parsons Brinckerhof,

created following the sale of

the US-based engineer by UK

contractor Balfour Beatty. WSP

has retained its edge over Arup as

the services engineer that ofers

best-quality service, according

to respondents, although the

tables were turned when the

same question was posed about

structural engineering.

The WA100’s favourite project

manager was Mace by a clear

margin. Opinion on contractors

was more mixed with no company

scoring more than the four votes

secured by Bouygues, followed

by BAM and Brookfeld on three

apiece. In this category, big didn’t

necessarily mean beautiful, with

German giant Hochtief barely

troubling the scorers and the UK’s

biggest contractor Balfour Beatty

failing to secure a single vote.

Commenting on her frm’s

success in topping the cost

consultant poll, Rider Levett

Bucknall global chairman

Ann Bentley pointed to the

partnership’s independent status.

“This is a fantastic accolade for our

work globally, and we are proud

that the architecture community

holds our consultancy in such

high regard.

“Our market has seen a lot

of change over the last few

years, with many mergers and

acquisitions taking place. Our

status as an independent frm

gives us a clear diferentiator and

it is an important distinction for

our clients when they are selecting

their partners to appraise their

projects. Our company structure

is focused on a regional approach

in every country we operate in,

meaning that we can provide

local support and expertise

underpinned by the strength and

knowledge of the global practice.”

Philippe Honnorat, UK head

of building services at WSP

Parsons Brinckerhof, said that

his company’s merger is working

one year on. “Because we have very

diferent client bases we are not

stepping on each other’s toes,” he

says, explaining that while WSP’s

biggest strength traditionally

lay in private-sector building

work, Parsons Brinckerhof was

more rooted in public sector

infrastructure projects.

Bringing the two companies

together has created

opportunities – for example,

Parsons Brinckerof’s strength in

transport had helped open doors

at the UK’s two biggest airports,

Gatwick and Heathrow. The

other big plus point is Parsons

Brinckerhof’s strong footprints in

the Asian and US markets.

Tony Williams, of the

consultancy Building Value, says

that the contrast in the WA100

poll fortunes of AECOM and WSP t

WHEn yOU Buy A COnSULTAnT, yOU ARE nOT BuyInG ASSETS, A fACTORy OR LAnD, yOU ARE BuyInG PEOPLE AnD PEOPLE ARE MOBILE

tony williams, building value

065_WA100_2016_ddv2.indd 65 11/12/2015 16:01

coSt conSultantS

2016 practice

1 Rider Levett Bucknall

2 Langdon & Seah

3 Gardiner & Theobald

4 Turner & Townsend

5= AECOM

5= DG Jones

5= Arcadis

5= Hanscomb

SerVice enGineerS

2016 practice

1 WSP

2 Arup

3= Aurecon

3= Buro Happold

5= Hoare Lea

5= Meinhardt

Structural enGineerS

2016 practice

1 Arup

2 WSP

3 Thornton, Tomasetti

4= AKT II

4= Aurecon

4= Buro Happold

4= Eckersley O’Callaghan

BeSt partnerS Surveyed architects’ favourite professional associates

66 world architecture top 100 January 2016

proJect ManaGerS

2016 practice

1 Mace

2= Drees & Sommer

2= Arcadis

2= Hill International

2= RCP

BuildinG contractorS

ranK

2016 practice

1 Bouygues

2= BAM

2= Brookf eld Multiplex

4= Laing O’Rourke

4= Larsen & Toubro

4= Lendlease

4= Sir Robert McAlpine

4= Skanska

4= Züblin

2016 pra

1

2

3

4

5= AECOM

5=

5= Arcadis

5= Hanscomb

2016 pra

1 Mace

2=

2= Arcadis

2=

2= R

2016 pra

1 WSP

2 Ar

3= A

3=

5=

5= M

2016 pra

1 Ar

2 WSP

3

4=

4= A

4=

4=

Residential developers are

architects’ favourite clients,

according to the WA100 poll.

Responding to a poll question

on who had been their best type

of client this year, 23% named

housebuilders, followed closely by

offi ce developers (19%). Healthcare

providers were the third best

client, named by 13%.

for those working in the far

East, though, these splits feel

increasingly arbitrary. Keith

Griffi ths, chairman of Hong

Kong-headquartered Aedas argues

that projects being delivered in

East Asia’s big cities increasingly

fall into the mixed commercial

camp, embracing retail, offi ces and

loft apartments. “We very rarely do

a stand-alone offi ce development

in Asia. There’s a much wider

range of product.”

nik Karalis, chief executive

of Woods Bagot, agrees that

mixed-use is the biggest trend

he sees. “Tenants are looking to

diversify uses.”

He believes that developers

are keen to avoid putting their

eggs into one basket for sound

commercial reasons. “Land values

are so signif cant that projects

sometimes don’t stack up without

a massive tenant so you now need

a blend to make feasibility stack.”

Griffi ths adds that where offi ce

development is taking place in

the far East, it is the campus-style

developments that were popular

in the UK during the 1970s and

80s. “Many of the companies are

enormous multinationals and

they are building large

campus-type developments across

most of the large cities in China.”

But with a rapidly ageing

population, healthcare looks

set to be the long-term growth

area in construction. The Global

Construction 2030 report,

recently published, forecasts that

China will need tens of thousands

of new and upgraded hospitals and

clinics to cater for the country’s

exploding elderly population

over the next 15 years, which

helps to explain why the Chinese

government has recently opened

up its healthcare sector to foreign

investment through public private

partnerships.

Doug Wignall, president of US

practice HDR, says that his firm

is well placed to benefit from

greater demand for a new wave of

retirement living communities,

thanks to its expertise in the fields

of both healthcare and hospitality.

And he predicts that the

application of new technolog will

transform the nature of healthcare

facilities being built. “There is a

strong decentralisation of projects.

facilities are based more in

communities and neighbourhoods

rather than for cities and regions.

They are smaller in scale but have

to be planned as part of the overall

urban framework.”

tHe FUtUre’s mIXeD

Parsons Brinckerhof this year

refl ects the dif erent ways the two

companies have merged.

He praised the decision

by Canadian consultancy

Geniver, when it bought WSP

three years ago, not to junk the

internationally better known

British brand. “They had good

sense to change the name of the

group and they haven’t looked

back.” now they have repeated

the trick by retaining the Parsons

Brinckerhof name.

By contrast, recent

empire-building by AECOM

and Arcadis has seen the

disappearance of venerable and

well-respected brands like Davis

Langdon and EC Harris. In the

case of AECOM’s UK operations,

recent months have seen the

departure of a number of key

personnel.

Williams says: “When you buy

a consultant, you are not buying

assets, a factory or land, you are

buying people and people are

mobile. you protect that: otherise

you are buying fresh air.”

t

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