The compact Hydrofraise® with grippers, running on an electric power pack, in operation at the Testimonio II construction site in Monaco.
Business performance was solid in 2021, with volume and earnings exceeding 2019 levels. Creating a new integrated business has strengthened the Group’s resilience and growth potential in construction markets while fostering synergies.
- 2021 brought considerable recovery from the slump due to the public health crisis in 2020. Revenue rose 13.5% on 2020, and about 5% on 2019, to €26.3 billion.
The Ebit margin rate also increased, to 3.7% of revenue. The order book grew slightly compared to 2020, when it was already very high due to the exceptional volume of major new contracts awarded.
The move in early 2021 to combine VINCI Construction’s and Eurovia’s business activities within a single management unit is part of the Group’s long-term strategy, but also aimed at enhancing operational performance in the near term. By bringing together an unparalleled array of expertise in building, civil engineering and infrastructure, the new VINCI Construction business is strengthening its ability to support shifts in its markets and trades, at a time when the environmental transition, digital revolution and evolving practices and preferences are raising new questions about what to build and how to build it. Expediting synergies between the entities in this business is spurring innovation and fast-tracking development of products, services and solutions geared to take on these challenges.
Concurrently, organising the business into three complementary pillars – Major Projects, Specialty Networks and Proximity Networks – is optimising market coverage worldwide. The global and local dimensions interlink through a managerial ethos that facilitates cooperation across entities while enabling each of the 1,300 companies in the business to operate largely independently. This new organisation, which includes explicit ground rules that apply to all entities, is thus designed to optimise VINCI Construction’s all-round performance.
Within this framework and in accordance with the Group’s commitments, VINCI Construction sped up the implementation of its environmental policy, through action plans suited to each of its business lines. To reduce the carbon footprint of its business activities, it has started rolling out a programme to overhaul its asphalt plants, which involves running them on lower-carbon fuels and equipping them with machinery that significantly reduces their emissions.
Likewise, VINCI Construction is progressively introducing high-energy-efficiency facilities at its worksites, trialling hybrid or electric construction machinery alongside manufacturers or leasers, and developing its own low-carbon machinery, including the first compact electric Hydrofraise® with grippers, designed by Soletanche Bachy, and an all-electric drilling rig, which Botte Fondations is testing. In association with Leonard and partners in its innovation ecosystem, VINCI Construction is developing products that help to reduce projects’ environmental impacts including the implementation of optimised Exegy solutions of low-carbon concretes (see Close-up, page 93) and Rehaskeen®, a comprehensive façade insulation system designed for industrial-scale thermal renovation of buildings.
Regarding the circular economy, VINCI Construction offers high-efficiency materials recycling solutions, notably through the Granulat+ brand in France (see page 96), and on-site pavement recycling systems for road refurbishment projects. In its building and civil engineering operations, it is also developing digital solutions and design methods that help to reduce the volume of materials used and facilitate their reuse.
In order to preserve natural environments, VINCI Construction is rolling out solutions and services covering ecological engineering (particularly through the Equo Vivo brand) and urban biodiversity (Urbalia), and works closely alongside nature conservation organisations and experts to protect biodiversity at its quarries and worksites.