Press Release 13 October 2005
Beca co-founder receives an entrepreneurship award
Sir Ron Carter, strategic advisor and former executive chairman of the Beca group, was honoured with a special
Commendation Award at the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2005 last night at a gala banquet in Auckland. The honour recognises his
commitment to entrepreneurship and exceptional achievements in business. From 17 finalists, five category winners and
the commendation were honoured.
“I am delighted to receive this honour and acknowledge that this would not have been possible without the strength of
the original partners at Beca and those that have subsequently taken over the firm. I believe that entrepreneurship
occurs across the entire senior ranks of Beca,” said Sir Ron Carter. “The Beca group is approaching 90 years of age, is
the largest independent employer of professionally qualified staff in the country and is still New Zealand-owned. At any
one time, it has a continuing design and management role for around $2 billion projects, and is a significant earner of
foreign exchange for New Zealand,” he added. Beca’s overseas earnings doubled during 2002-2005 and formed a third of its
total earnings, based on a strong foundation laid under Sir Ron Carter’s leadership.
Sir Ron was one of the four founding partners of Beca and when he stepped down in 2001, Beca had grown to 1200 staff,
with 15 permanent offices in Australasia and Southeast Asia. Apart from leading the engineering trail, he chaired the
panel on Auckland’s water shortage in 1994 and was on the prime minister’s review panel on electricity in 1992.
The key strategies he adopted at Beca were employee ownership, robust financial management and strategic international
partnerships. Three drivers of the business – marketing, execution and financial management naturally affect each other
and are interlocked, according to Sir Ron Carter. “They illustrate the principle of which I frequently advise our staff
– business success is easy – you only have to win work, carry it out economically and get paid for it!” he concluded.
ENDS
Note to editors
Sir Ron Carter: With a masters degree in civil engineering from the University of Auckland, Sir Ron Carter joined Gray
Watts and Beca in 1959 at the age of 23. After a two-year period in England working for the highly respected engineer
Ove Arup, he returned to New Zealand in 1962 and in 1965 became a co-owner with George Beca (of Gray Watts and Beca)
with a staff of 40. When he retired from the Board in 2001, the staff had grown to 1200 with projects in more than 40
countries. The growth in both the size and sophistication of work which Beca undertakes is a direct result of the
strategies that the company followed many of which are conceived and put into action by Sir Ron. In addition to his
contribution to the engineering profession, he headed a panel which reviewed the Auckland City Council’s financial and
contractual risk for the Britomart project in 1996. He has also headed the Civil Aviation Authority. He serves as a
director of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and Industry and is a member of Auckland Grammar School Foundation –
formerly on its Board for 18 years. Sir Ron is currently a director of four public companies and participates in many
organisations concerned with the delivery of infrastructure in New Zealand.
Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award: Ernst & Young developed the Entrepreneur of the Year Award programme 19 years ago in the United States. Now a global award
programme in 35 countries, it’s celebrating New Zealand entrepreneurs with the New Zealand Entrepreneur of the Year
Award programme for eight years.
Beca: Established in 1918, Beca is the largest employee-owned professional services company employing 1600 staff in 13
countries, with projects in over 63 countries. Beca works in five key sectors: industry, building, infrastructure,
environmental and resource management, and delivers engineering, planning, project management, applied technologies and
valuation services. Headquartered in Auckland, Beca operates from three market hubs: New Zealand, Australia and
Singapore, and designs and supervises projects with a total value of over NZ$2,400 million annually. Recent projects
include terminal expansion at the Wellington and Auckland International Airports, Britomart Transport Centre in
Auckland, Westpac Stadium in Wellington, Sky Tower and Casino Centre in Auckland, Manukau Wastewater Treatment Plant in
Mangere, Auckland City Hospital and the 338m Macau Tower in China. Beca is ranked 89th in the top 200 international
design firms (Source: Engineering News Record 2004). Beca is AS/NZS ISO 9001:2000 certified, and has won over 50 awards
in the last five years alone.
Visit http://www.beca.com