“Last year was a busy year for us and some the contracts we got as early as in 2016. We focus on industrial facilities. We had major beneficiaries like Daimler in Sebes, Bosch in Cluj, Pirelli and Michelin. We are now working with Ursus, Philip Morris, dm and B. Braun in Timisoara,” said Mircea Bulboaca, the owner of CON-A.
The projects CON-A worked on include the Ion Oblemenco Stadium in Craiova and the stadium in Targu Jiu, built under a partnership.
The largest construction company in Romania, however, is still Austrian-held Strabag, which posted almost RON623 million revenue last year.
CON-A achieved growth despite the difficult construction market with a growing shortage of labor year by year and with a significant decline in public investment, especially in infrastructure. Even though Romania needs hundreds, thousands of kilometers of highway, for instance, no new section was inaugurated in 2016 and only 15 kilometers opened for traffic last year.
“We have contracts this year, but we are experiencing a shortage of labor and are thinking of getting workers from abroad. We have grown quite a lot because of two plants, a precast concrete parts plant and a metallic structure plant, as well. This year we will prepare for next year. We won’t see any growth, it will be a year of consolidation.”
The revenue of the top ten construction companies dropped by almost 6% to EUR3.65 billion in 2017, according to the data centralized by ZF. Seven of the top ten builders are Romanian-owned, as construction remains a sector dominated by local entrepreneurs. (EUR1=RON4.6660)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)