Willmott Dixon topped the contract wins league table in January with almost £300m of new work secured.
The firm made the top spot largely thanks to two big residential jobs, according to data from construction intelligence provider Glenigan. Seashell Trust, a charity that supports children and adults with learning difficulties, picked the contractor to deliver a £100m social housing and school project in Cheadle, Greater Manchester. Willmott Dixon also won a £63m contract to build theFinzels Reach build-to-rent scheme in Bristol(pictured). Overall the contractor landed 15 contracts in the month with a total value of £295.7m.
| Top 10 contractors, January 2021 | ||
| Contractor | No | Total (£m) |
1 | Willmott Dixon | 15 | 295.7 |
2 | Costain | 1 | 250.0 |
3 | Bowmer & Kirkland | 7 | 215.1 |
4 | Kier | 22 | 168.3 |
5 | Graham | 7 | 158.9 |
6 | Morgan Sindall | 33 | 141.1 |
7 | Robertson | 5 | 132.1 |
8 | Readie | 5 | 89.4 |
9 | Laing O'Rourke | 1 | 81.8 |
10 | Royal Bam | 5 | 71.4 |
| League tables are subject to revision |
Total wins for the top 50 firms were down in January to £2.64bn compared to £3.23bn in December, but about level with the £2.63bn recorded a year earlier, in January 2020.
Costain took second place in the month thanks to a single win – £250m contract to upgrade the A1 between Birtley and Coal House. Bowmer & Kirkland landed third spot, its highest placing since March 2017. The firm won £215.1m worth of work spread across seven jobs. The largest of these was a £125m warehouse job in Pontefract for retailer Next.
The other big win during the month was the Holland Park residential scheme in Glasgow for Moda Living,which went to Robertson. Glenigan has valued the whole project at £120m. The contract helped the firm to seventh place in the January table.
On the rolling 12-month total, Kier re-took top spot. The firm swapped places with Morgan Sindall, which dropped to second.
Top 10 contractors, year to January 2021 | |||
| Contractor | No | Total (£m) |
1 | Kier | 180 | 1,557.6 |
2 | Morgan Sindall | 260 | 1,527.2 |
3 | Willmott Dixon | 129 | 1,335.1 |
4 | Royal Bam | 56 | 1,232.5 |
5 | ISG | 62 | 1,124.9 |
6 | Wates | 43 | 1,016.2 |
7 | Bowmer & Kirkland | 37 | 912.3 |
8 | Winvic | 32 | 872.7 |
9 | VolkerWessels | 73 | 744.5 |
10 | Costain | 8 | 715.6 |
| League tables are subject to revision |
Willmott Dixon’s strong start to the 2021 helped it to move from fourth to third.
Costain was the only new top 10 entry in the month. It replaced Balfour Beatty, which dropped down to 13.