The construction behemoth working on the huge regeneration of Plymouth’s city centre is forecasting even bigger profits this year.
In an update to investors, Morgan Sindall Group Plc said it anticipates its full year results for 2026 will be “significantly ahead of its previous expectations”.
The company, which announced a £232.6m profit in February this year, said it is expecting 2026 to be even better than expected following strong trading from its construction and fit out divisions.
The company’s construction subsidiary has been overseeing four Plymouth city centre regeneration schemes which in total are costing more than £58m.
It has already carried out the revamps of Civic Square, Old Town Street/New George Street, and Royal Parade and is nearing completion of the Armada Way regeneration.
In its announcement to the Stock Exchange today, Morgan Sindall said the operating margin for its construction arm is now expected to be at the top end of its medium-term target range (3.0% – 3.5%) resulting from a “strong disciplined focus on operational delivery and risk management”.
Revenues are now expected to be towards £1.4bn, due to increased visibility for the remainder of the year supported by its high-quality orderbook and work at preferred bidder stage.
The group’s half-year results are due out on July 23.
Plymouth’s Royal Parade Bus Improvement Scheme, completed and opened March 2, 2026(Image: William Telford)
Morgan Sindall took on the £3m revamp of Civic Square in 2022 and shortly afterwards stepped in when the original contractor, Dorset-based Mildren Construction, walked off the site of the Old Town Street and New George Street regeneration.
Work had started on the ambitious upgrade in 2020 and was supposed to be finished in late 2022.but it was hit with delays, including finding unexpected items such as Blitz rubble underground, and the cost ballooned from £7m to £18m.
In late 2023 it was revealed that the council had to pay Morgan Sindall another £6m and borrow almost £3m to ensure the work was completed.
However, the work is now done and Morgan Sindall Construction Ltd won the landscape category at the Concrete Society’s awards for Devon and Cornwall and two further trophies at the Constructing Excellence South West Awards.
Morgan Sindall is currently working on the £30m regeneration of Armada Way. The original scheme had been priced at £12.7m but the cost skyrocketed after a new plan was drawn up by the incoming Labour administration in 2024, following a debacle in which 110 trees were felled under previous Tory control.
The tree-felling fiasco ended up costing Plymouth City Council more than £3.3m in additional costs including more than £1m paid to Morgan Sindall, £1.3m in inflationary costs due to the delayed scheme, and more than £484,000 in legal costs.
An independent learning review into what went wrong itself cost £130,500.
The cost of Plymouth’s Royal Parade Bus Improvement Scheme also skyrocketed by £2.5m after Morgan Sindall was brought in as contractor.
Work finally started on the project in July last year – six months after it was originally planned – and it is now complete.
The cost rose to £7,494,692 from an original “estimated” sum of £5m. PlymouthLive was told this is because a new contract had to be signed with Morgan Sindall.
Originally South West Highways was due to carry out the work to reduce congestion and improve reliability of bus services by increasing the number of bus stops on the shops side of the highway.
But this was considered to be a “risk” and the contract went to Morgan Sindall instead.
Morgan Sindall Group Plc is a giant fit-out and construction services group which employs more than 8,000 people.
It has six divisions: Partnership Housing, Mixed Use Partnerships, Fit Out, Construction, Infrastructure and Property Services and is involved in huge construction projects around the UK.
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