Construction and property group reports revenue rise but pre-tax profits dip
Property development, construction and civil engineering firm Caddick Group has reported an annual 2.5% revenue rise to £152.4m from £148m in 2016; but pre-tax profits nearly halved on the year before.
The West Yorkshire-based family-run business has reported pre-tax profits of £7.96m in its annual report for the year ended 31 August 2017, a drop from pre-tax profits of £18.8m for the year before.
The group continues to increase activities in the residential and build-to-rent sector through subsidiary company Moda. Backed by Apache Capital Partners, Moda has a £2bn pipeline of 6,750 rent-only apartments in high profile city centre sites across the UK including Glasgow, Liverpool, Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and Edinburgh.
The group’s activity in the industrial and logistics sector also continues to grow, with the completion of phase one of its £100m prime distribution and logistics scheme near Wakefield, called Crosspoint33, let to TJX, parent company of TK Maxx, and forward sold to Tritax.
In 2017, Caddick also received planning approval to redevelop the historic, 6-acre Quarry Hill site in Leeds. Relaunching the area last September under the name SOYO, the £300m masterplan will create hundreds of new homes, leisure and hotel space with high quality public realm. Working alongside the existing cultural organisations in the area, SOYO will provide one the very best places to live, work, play and be entertained in Leeds.
The group also expanded its land acquisition activities throughout 2017, launching a strategic land arm seeking new opportunities throughout the UK to bring forward medium to large scale sites for residential and commercial use. Caddick Land now gives the Caddick Group full development lifecycle capabilities, able to take a site from the planning stage through to delivery and sale.
The group’s construction and civil engineering division saw a jump in activity during the year, with Caddick Construction posting a rise of 20% to £98m and civil engineering activity rising 9%.
Caddick Construction has also expanded activities in the North West. Taking over from Carillion on site, Caddick Construction will now deliver the £154m, 466-home Angel Gardens build-to-rent project in Manchester on behalf of Moda. This has ensured the continued delivery of the project and included the hiring of over 20 Carillion staff, to ensure construction work was re-started after only two weeks of Carillion’s liquidation, the scheme is still due to complete in 2019.
Paul Caddick, chairman of Caddick Group, said: “I am pleased to report that the core group businesses have all continued to be profitable during the year. The profitability for the year has continued to strengthen the balance sheet and we continue to reinvest this in bold new projects.
“The entire Caddick Group has demonstrable substantial cross-sector experience, with a proven track record of delivering institutional-grade assets. As demonstrated by the Carillion crisis, the full spectrum offering of the Group gives us a unique strength in the marketplace, as does a strong relationship with the supply chain, while the addition of the strategic land arm gives us whole lifecycle capabilities and will enable us to further extend our presence across the country.”
