SHAPE Australia backlog tops $1.5b after roughly $800m DigiCo data centre award
SHAPE Australia has secured a contract worth about $800 million from DigiCo Infrastructure REIT for the next stage of its SYD1 data centre in Sydney. The company said its backlog passed $1.5 billion as at 19 October.
Construction and fitout firm SHAPE Australia (ASX: SHA) has taken its contracted backlog past $1.5 billion, helped by an October award worth approximately $800 million from DigiCo Infrastructure REIT (ASX: DGT). With that award, the company's project wins for the period exceeded $1.4 billion as at 19 October.
The work is the following phase of the SYD1 data centre project, where SHAPE earlier completed a 20-megawatt Stage 1 upgrade. Both sides ran an early contractor involvement process to define, design and price the expansion, and then settled on a fixed-cost deal. SHAPE expects the contract to bring in about $200m in additional revenue in each of FY27 and FY28, on top of what it had forecast beforehand.
DigiCo has confirmed the customer contract is executed. It also said grid capacity, water access and State Significant Development Approval are all in place. Funding comes from its existing liquidity, debt facilities and proceeds from the sale of US assets, according to DigiCo.
SHAPE has put together a delivery team of more than 50 specialists and agreed pricing and terms with major subcontractors so they line up with its head contract obligations. James Fitzgerald, general manager for New South Wales, is accountable for the expansion, with executive reviews covering progress, cost, cash flow and risk. Management is keeping separate resources for its core business. Chief executive officer Peter Marix-Evans called the contract "an important milestone for the Company, building on our successful Stage 1 delivery and detailed planning with the client".
In the September quarter SHAPE won $504.6 million of projects, against $336m a year earlier. Backlog at 30 September was $762.7m, up 21 per cent from $628.4m at the end of June. Modular construction brought in $20.6m of revenue in the quarter, compared with $14.5m in the same period a year before. Modular by SHAPE opened a manufacturing facility and branch in Perth during October, its third nationally, and has won an education project after securing a place on a WA government modular building panel.
As at 19 October SHAPE counted more than $1.7 billion of known opportunities over the following 120 days and a wider pipeline above $4.5 billion. Headcount reached 1,000 in October.