Expanding Into Scottish Territory
Readypower are delighted to announce the opening of its new railway operations hub in Scotland. Following our plans since the MBO two years ago, the group has once again moved into new territory after our excellent reception and growth from our move into the north of England.
Russell Jack, CEO of Readypower Group said:
“It has always been an ambition of mine to move the Readypower business north of the border. I was born in Glasgow myself, as was our CFO Gerry Devanney. Many of my family still live in Scotland and it is a place that I have always held close to my heart”.
Scotland’s Railway Opportunity
The opportunity is huge with the spend on rail in Scotland during CP6 and beyond. We have continued to invest in property, people, assets and systems and process. This enables us to deliver industry leading levels of customer service, the fundamental principle on which the business has grown.
We have secured an excellent two-acre site in Blantyre with offices, workshop facilities and enough room to install a training track. The intention will be to use this as our Scottish operations hub and thereafter open other small satellite facilities around Scotland as and where the work requires. It is the same successful model we have followed in England and Wales.
Our Excellent Scotland Team
We always look to invest in good people. Scotland was no different and we were absolutely delighted to have high-quality people who wanted to come and join the business at this exciting stage.
Cameron Barr has joined us as Head of Operations Scotland. Cammy brings a huge wealth of experience with him, having worked at AB2000 for over 15 years. Having come from the ground up like most of the Readypower senior team, Cammy understands how to deliver an excellent product and customer service. His intimate knowledge of the Scottish market will be essential in growing Readypower Scotland.
Krysty Headley Joins the team as Rail Operations Manager Scotland. Krysty has been in the industry for over 12 years and has worked for Hydrex, Caledonian and TXM. She has a huge amount of experience working with Babcock, Network Rail and others and has a thorough understanding of the track renewals market which will be essential for us in CP6. We were delighted when she decided to join us.
Steven Laing joins the team as POS Compliance Manager. Steven also has very strong client relationships with key customers on various frameworks in Scotland. Having been with us for a few weeks Steven has already demonstrated a very keen eye for detail, excellent customer facing qualities and an extremely determined work ethic. He is an excellent addition to the team.
We intend to get the Scotland business off the ground and then add more quality to the team as the work grows. We have started recruiting operators, service engineers and other essential trades for the running of the front-end operations.
One of the key aspirations of the executive team two years ago was to make Readypower Group a company that people wanted to work for. This was by treating people fairly, including key benefits in salary packages and rewarding the company’s success with incentives to deliver good customer service. The huge response from our adverts for staff in Scotland has given us a great deal of satisfaction that the company is now viewed as an attractive place to work. We get a huge amount of satisfaction from this and we will continue the journey to do more.
It is our long-term intention to become the supplier of choice in Scotland for RRV hire, POS provision and also specialist civil engineering packages through our Readypower Terrawise business. We have invested in a dynamic team who between them have around 40 years’ experience of success in the Scottish rail market. This combined with a brand-new fleet of machines for exclusive use by our Scotland operating centre positions Readypower as a leading Rail Fleet and Service provider.
A New Challenge Brings New Technology
Adding a new fleet of Liebherr RRV machines, the first of this type of machine in the Readypower fleet is the end result of listening to the customers requirements and providing the machine capable of completing the job to a very high standard. The ultra-reliability coupled with a full-size twin cab make this particular RRV very well suited to the terrain of Scotland. When you have longer distances between access points, and a large geographical expanse, it is important to have a comfortable cab for both operator and machine controller. It is also very important to have a very reliable machine. This quality German engineered machine ticks all those boxes.
We will be introducing a new fleet of Doosan cranes and Long Reaches into the Scottish market. These machines are the most popular in England due to their excellent lifting capabilities and versatility. We believe that they will be very well received and offer a different way of working to the general rail-based cranes on offer now.
We will also be adding brand new 400kg Basket MEWPs to the Scotland fleet to work on both structure inspections and overhead line projects. Lastly, we will be adding around a dozen track renewal specific machines with heavy lift trackrailers and state of the art 3D GPS laser dozers. All of this will be in place over the next few weeks meaning that Readypower can support any type of specialist rail work for Network Rail and other contractors.
Over the last five years, Readypower Group have been the fastest growing company in the sector by providing market leading customer service with a well invested asset fleet and the very best people. We hope we can bring this operating model to Scotland and help both Network Rail and its principle contractors achieve success delivering an exciting programme of infrastructure improvements for the Scottish travelling public.”