Construction group Taylor Woodrow today said the Solihull home of takeover target Bryant would become its new housebuilding headquarters.
Taylor Woodrow will also retain the Bryant brand and relinquish its own housebuilding base at Feltham, Middlesex in favour of the West Midlands. The company, which last month launched a £556m swoop for Bryant, said it was still too early to say how many jobs would be lost through the merger.
Taylor Woodrow added it would reduce the number of regional offices from 19 to 12 as it sought cost savings between £10m and £15m. It hopes to get approval for the takeover at an extraordinary general meeting on Monday and through a vote of Bryant shareholders later this month.
The deal is one of two mergers stemming from Bryant’s failure to seal its own “merger of equals” with Beazer Homes last month. Beazer is now poised to become part of the UK’s largest housebuilding group after last month receiving a £558m takeover offer from rival Persimmon.
Bryant currently employs a workforce of around 1,600, with 200 of those based at Solihull. Taylor Woodrow’s Taywood Homes operation has a 600-strong housebuilding staff, of which 80 are based at Feltham.
A Taylor Woodrow spokesman said it was still undecided what the firm would do with the Feltham office and its workforce. He added: “This acquisition is not driven by cost reductions but about becoming the best in the business. There will be job losses but they will be kept to a minimum.”
The enlarged operation, to be called Bryant, will be headed by Paul Phipps, aged 48, currently Woodrow’s executive director for housing. Nick Smith, 43, managing director of Bryant Homes technical services division, will become operations director.
However, there is no place for Peter Long, currently chief executive of Bryant, or his finance director Pat Scannell.
The new business, which will build 6,000 homes pa with a turnover of around £845m, will be based around four geographic divisions.
EGi News 06/02/01
