Ackermans & van Haaren, a diversified group active in 5 key segments: Marine Engineering & Infrastructure (DEME,one of the largest dredging companies in the world), Private Banking, Real Estate, Leisure & Senior Care, Energy & Resources and Development Capital, has announced their business results for the first quarter of 2015.
DEME (AvH 60.40%) realized an economic turnover (i.e. including the jointly controlled companies on a proportional basis) of 641.5 million euros in the first quarter of 2015, compared with 600.5 million euros at the end of March 2014.
Despite the high level of activity, the net financial debt remained under control and even decreased slightly to 179.9 million euros. MEDCO (DEME 44.1%) received the Quality Award for the New Port Project (Qatar) because of the outstanding progress made and the accelerated maritime access to the new port.
In Australia, too, the dredging works on the large-scale Wheatstone project were completed ahead of schedule.
For the deepening and widening of the Suez Canal (Egypt), 10 vessels are currently dredging a 24-meter deep navigation channel over a distance of 28 km. These works are ahead of schedule.
The order book increased to 3,530 million euros at the end of March 2015, compared with 2,420 million euros at the end of 2014. At the beginning of 2015, several new contracts worth a total of 1.6 billion euros were won, including the major Tuas project in Singapore. The construction of this mega port involves a.o. the reclamation of 300 hectares of land, the construction of an 8.6-kilometre quay wall, and the dredging of the harbor channels. The works will take six years to complete.
The five-year contract for maintenance dredging on the river Scheldt between Vlissingen and Antwerp was signed, while DEME Concessions entered into a partnership to develop the MEG I offshore wind farm, one of the largest in Germany.
DEME continues its investment policy and expands its dredging fleet with four environmentally friendly trailer suction hopper dredgers (a.o. “dual fuel” with LNG) with capacities of respectively 1,500, 3,000, 8,000 and 14,500 m³. Also, from 2017, the self-propelled jack-up vessel Apollo, the multipurpose and cable-laying ship Living Stone, and the self-propelled DP2 crane vessel Rambiz 4000 (Scaldis) will serve the offshore energy market.
On May 19, 2015, GeoSea also completed the acquisition of the offshore assets of HOCHTIEF. GeoSea acquired full control of jack-up vessels Innovation and Thor and pontoons Wismar, Bremen and Stralsund. The vessel Vidar will be transferred upon completion of a current HOCHTIEF project.
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