Kentz ‘in good position to grow’

Irish-founded international engineering services group, Kentz has said that its cash position has remained strong into 2013 and provides “considerable financial flexibility” to support the group’s strategic growth plans.

The business, which has operations across the world, has plans to expand into western Africa and claims to be progressing well with its target of opening a regional office in Ghana.

In an update to the market, yesterday, the Jersey-headquartered group — which was originally founded in Clonmel — said that trading in the less-important first half of the year has been in line with expectations. It also noted that — between the end of December and the beginning of May — it had an order intake valued at $900m (€690m), with its pipeline of prospects up by 6%, year-on-year.

The company — which specialises in providing infrastructural support services for major oil and gas exploration companies around the world — also said that its backlog of business rose by 9% in the first five months of this year — covering nearly $3bn worth of contracts — with around 80% of that work classed as reimbursable contracts.

Its most recent work win came, last month, via a $100m contract to build support structures for a major gas exploration project in Australia.

Kentz chief executive, Christian Brown said that the company is more optimistic than many of its peers, regarding its short-term future prospects.

“We’re very pleased with the progress we’ve made during the first half of 2013. Our future growth plans are underpinned by the continued expansion of our global footprint, the strengthening of existing client relationships and our success in winning work with new clients.”

He added: “Despite a cautious outlook from some of our peers in the services industry, our broad range of services has provided us with the opportunities to continue and grow our pipeline and backlog since December. We remain confident of achieving our target of delivering double-digit earnings growth in 2013.”