AECOM on trade ties between the UK and Russia

As we all readily acknowledge, the trade and investment links between the UK and Russia are of paramount importance. Not just from a purely economic point of view, but also so that we may forge closer relationships between our countries, understand each other’s needs and cultures, and grow together. This was very clear to me during my visit late last year when I joined a delegation of UK business leaders to Moscow, accompanying British Prime Minister David Cameron and Foreign Secretary William Hague. During the course of our visit, it became increasingly apparent that companies with global experience such as AECOM are playing a significant role in areas such as major transport and civil engineering projects in helping to modernize Russia’s infrastructure. 

I was proud to be able to show the role that we at AECOM are playing in Russia. We have been operating there for many years now, and are helping to forge the kind of partnerships that Mr. Cameron talked about as we help realize ambitious and rewarding projects.

AECOM is a global provider of professional, technical and management-support services — including engineering, design, and cost and project management consultancy. We support clients in more than 130 countries around the world and employ more than 45,000 professionals. We have an established presence in Russia, with offices in Moscow, St. Petersburg and several regional cities, and over 300 staff in country. By drawing on a wide range of skills and global experience as well as our local resources, we can assemble the multidisciplinary teams that are needed for major development projects across the country. 

The industrial manufacturing sector has provided an important platform for us to take a more prominent role in developing Russia’s infrastructure, working with key clients who are investing in the country. We have provided engineering and construction management services for several industrial facilities for General Motors, including new buildings in St. Petersburg and Togliatti. We are currently building four separate projects for Volvo, including a new automotive construction equipment and cabin assembly plant at Kaluga and are mid way through the construction of Peugeot Citroen Mitsubishi’s automotive factory in Kaluga. At Dmitrov, we are designing and project-managing a new Royal Canin pet food manufacturing plant, while construction has now begun on a 15,000-square-meter manufacturing facility for electricity-generating equipment in Primorsky Krai, for Hyundai Heavy Industries. The technology being used in many of these factories is state-of-the art and the introduction of robotics into the automotive sector is constantly supporting Russia’s drive for modernization.

President Medvedev set out a plan to modernize Russia, not only in manufacturing but across a broad spectrum of sectors including the use of nanotechnology. AECOM is working closely with Rusnano on a number of initiatives, for example, we have worked closely with the Chuvashia regional administration in designing the first sustainable house in Russia, which incorporates the latest technologies to increase energy efficiency.  This area of expertise is consistent with AECOM’s passion for creating a better environment and the infrastructure that supports it. 

Our current initiative is to bring the smart-cities approach to Russia with tried and tested, innovative partners that can each blend their respective skill base to form a team to provide an integrated solution to many of the issues facing Russia and other countries. This will encompass intelligent transport systems to ease congestion and manage the interface of traffic and daily conditions; energy efficiency across the work place and people’s homes; data management and storage and many other state-of-the-art processes that can improve the lives of the local communities.

The need for inward foreign investment and federal investment in these areas is high, and the long-term benefits and rewards are attractive.

Transport is a sector where we can add real value by bringing experience of planning and delivering new road and rail infrastructure, particularly our familiarity with forms of financing, procurement and delivery that are relatively new to Russia. Russian Railways, which is responsible for the country’s new high-speed railway lines, asked us to deliver a series of workshops in Moscow during July 2011. Our staff covered topics such as public-private partnerships, traffic and revenue forecasting and mega-project delivery, drawing on experience from high-speed rail projects in Spain and Crossrail in London.

We recently won a role as technical expert for the delivery of the first, 43-kilometre section of the new M11 toll road between Moscow and St. Petersburg – a project delivered through a design, finance, build and operate mechanism. We will be providing design review and construction supervision services for the North-West Concession Company, and we will monitor the compliance of the project for Avtodor. 

The addition of global project and cost consultancy Davis Langdon to AECOM in 2010 has added a further dimension to the scope of our activities in Russia. A recent appointment as part of the masterplanning team for a 35-hectare site in Samara, has involved us in an ambitious mixed development on a former industrial site. It has been made possible by prior investment in transportation as part of Samara’s bid to be a host city for the 2018 World Cup and is a great example of where new infrastructure is creating opportunities, particularly in regional cities. 

We are seeing that environmental performance of new development is increasingly a priority for clients, investors and public authorities in Russia. We were proud to have been part of delivering Russia’s first LEED (new construction) Gold-rated building, a bearing manufacturing plant for SKF Group in Tver. This was also the first factory anywhere in Europe to achieve this award. For Sochi 2014, we are using the BREEAM assessment method to rate the performance of new facilities built for the XXII Winter Olympics Games. 

Finally, another sporting achievement we are looking forward to at AECOM is the opening of the new 42,000-seat Spartak Stadium in Moscow, for which we are providing full design services. We also prepared the wider masterplan for this stadium, commissioned for the World Cup in 2018 and are actively engaging with many regional administrations across Russia to support the World Cup and Russia’s preparation for it.

The impact of sporting facilities such as these and their associated infrastructure, when taken together with investment in areas such as transport and industrial and commercial facilities, hold the promise of delivering lasting benefits for Russian cities and the people who live and work in them. 

Steve Morriss is Europe Chief Executive of the engineering, design and management consultancy AECOM. With around 5000 staff in Europe in 24 countries, the company offers a broad range of technical and creative skills and expertise in all areas of the built environment.