Global infrastructure management
The Company has further broadened its range of services by creating Eurovia Infra, which specializes in large-scale infrastructure projects in France and internationally.
Eurovia, a leader in public-private partnerships
Known as PPP (public-private partnership) in France and North American and PFI (private finance initiative) in Great Britain, this business model shares a common purpose: as part of its public works mandate, a government department or agency enters into a partnership with a private-sector company, contracting it to fund, design in whole or in part, build, maintain, and operate engineering structures or public works, including road infrastructure.
For the duration of such long-term contracts, the company receives remuneration from the government. This business model allows communities to entrust urgent or complex projects to third parties and companies to deliver effective projects on a timely basis.
PPP contracts feature specific benefits: it provides a global cost perspective; it allows the parties to allocate the investment over the long-term; and it can use pre-financing to hasten project launch, implementation, and delivery. Eurovia's know-how in terms of techniques and means of production, its capacity to manage complex operations involving multiple business lines, its experience with public works and related services, its size and comprehensive range of capabilities, and its association with the VINCI Group have made the Company an experienced and leading expert in the area of PPPs.
Eurovia Infra: a structure for managing global projects
In early 2008, in efforts to further its involvement in global projects, Eurovia created Eurovia Infra. Managing large-scale infrastructure projects is an expertise that the Company inherited through its merger with Entreprise Jean Lefebvre (EJL). Along with SGE and GTM, the latter was an original shareholder of Cofiroute, a highway concessions company established in 1970.
Over the years, EJL has consolidated its offering and transferred its expertise in global project management, including funding, to Eurovia teams when the two entities began working more closely together in 2000.
Eurovia Infra, which includes a staff of approximately twenty people, follows a simple guideline: it provides design, coordination, expert consulting and assistance on all operations projects that include funding. This is an appropriate and responsive approach to the surge in projects of this kind in recent years that comprise a funding component, including high-speed rail lines, highways, light-rail systems, airports, and canals. It is also a logical development since it is in accordance with the VINCI Group's stated objective of increasing its participation on major projects in France and on the world stage.
And the world stage includes the many countries in which Eurovia is already present: in addition to France, the Company operates in Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Spain, England, the United States, Canada and Chile. Eurovia Infra helps all of the Company's foreign-based operations to respond optimally to requests for proposals with specific consulting and design services. It also helps the Company win projects in countries where it is not present. A case in point is the Netherlands, where Eurovia Infra, in partnership with other suppliers, is involved in a highway-widening scheme at the Rotterdam port.