Hyder Consulting was a multi-national advisory and design consultancy with particular specialisation in the transport, property, utilities and environmental sectors. The firm employed approximately 4,200 people across the UK, Europe, Germany, Middle East, Asia and Australia and had been listed on the London Stock Exchange since October 2002. The name Hyder is the Welsh word for "confidence".[1]
History
Hyder Consulting was formed in 1993 when engineering firms Acer Group and Wallace Evans Ltd were acquired by Welsh Water and subsequently merged.[2]
Acer Group was itself an internationally recognised consultancy practice formed in 1987 by the merger of John Taylor and Sons[3] (established 1739) and Freeman Fox and Partners[4] (established 1857), and joined in 1991 by Sir Bruce White, Wolfe Barry, and Partners.[5]
Hyder Consulting was subsequently acquired by Western Power Distribution, which prompted Hyder's senior management to instigate a management buy-out that was completed in January 2001. The firm was then listed on the London Stock Exchange in October 2002.[6]
Freeman Fox and Partners had been involved in Melbourne's West Gate Bridge disaster in 1970. Thirty-five construction workers were killed and 18 injured in the collapse, and it remains Australia's worst industrial accident to this day. [7][8] Other structures involving Freeman Fox and Partners included the Sydney Harbour Bridge (1932),[9] the Adomi Bridge (1957)[10] and the Erskine Bridge (1971).[11]
In October 2014 it was acquired by Arcadis NV[12] and the Hyder Consulting brand was phased out from 2015.[13]
Further reading
External links
References
- Nine new letters that will change The Post Office BBC News, BBC, 2001-01-10, retrieved 2008-05-08^
- Jobs go at Acer and Wallace Evans – and YRM Construction News, 30 September 1993, retrieved 22 January 2020^
- John Taylor and Sons (Consulting Engineers) - Graces Guide www.gracesguide.co.uk, retrieved 2026-04-03^
- Freeman Fox and Partners - Graces Guide www.gracesguide.co.uk, retrieved 2026-04-03^
- Sir Bruce White, Wolfe Barry and Partners Structurae, retrieved 22 January 2020^
- Gwilym Roberts. Chelsea to Cairo: 'Taylor-made' Water Through Eleven Reigns and in Six Continents Thomas Telford Publishing, 2006^
- The Doomed Repair West Gate Bridge Memorial, retrieved 22 January 2020^
- Forty years on, the West Gate Bridge collapse still looms large The Age, 16 October 2010^
- List of bridges designed by Freeman Fox & Partners and built by Redpath Dorman Long or its predecessors in the booklet "50th anniversary of the opening of Sydney Harbour Bridge" 1982^
- Peter Adamson Scott, Gilbert Roberts. The Volta Bridge Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers, Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers, E-ISSN 1753-7789, Volume 9, Issue 4, April 1958, pp. 395-432, 1958, retrieved 2 August 2020^
- Construction of the Erskine Bridge - Erskinebridge.co.uk www.erskinebridge.co.uk, retrieved 2014-07-04^
- Vern Pitt. Arcadis completes £296m Hyder acquisition Building, retrieved 2026-04-03^
- Arcadis phases out Hyder and EC Harris MEED, 2015-09-21, retrieved 2026-04-03^