Santander and Inditex were also finalists
Madrid, 19 October 2006. Joan Clos, Spain's Industry Minister, presented Ferrovial with the "Best of European Business" award for "Europeanness", organised by consulting firm Roland Berger simultane-ously in ten countries of the European Union to recognise companies that contribute to boosting Europe's competitiveness in line with the objectives of the Lisbon Agenda.
The award to Ferrovial is a recognition of its recent acquisition of UK airport operator BAA and, particu-larly, the strategy of investment, diversification and internationalization implemented in recent years by the company, which now has a presence in a dozen countries worldwide, six of them in the European Union.
Ferrovial and the Spanish award-winners in the other categories (Telefónica for cross-border mergers and acquisitions and Gamesa for growth) will compete with the other award-winners in a European final next March in Brussels, the capital city of the European Union.
Ferrovial: growth, internationalization and diversification
Half a century after its foundation, Ferrovial is a multinational group specialised in the development, fi-nancing, maintenance and management of transport and urban infrastructure and services, with a stable presence in a dozen countries of Europe (the UK, Poland, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Switzerland and Greece), North America (the US and Canada), Australia and Latin America (primarily Chile).
The priority of business growth has been sustained by a major programme of investment with a clear fo-cus on international expansion. Between 1997 and mid-2006, investments totalled close to 9 billion euro, 80% in the field of infrastructure and services concessions.
As a result, Ferrovial has changed profoundly, from being exposed primarily to cyclical activities (construc-tion and property development accounted for 90% of its 1998 operating profit) to becoming a group which obtains 64% of EBITDA from infrastructure and services.
