Our history
1978
Our founder and Chair of the Laing O’Rourke Group, Ray O’Rourke commenced trading R O’Rourke & Son with a small team from offices in Leytonstone. R O’Rourke & Son soon established itself as a regional formwork and concrete specialist. Between 1978 and 1989 the group moved its head office to Grays and went on to create Select Plant Hire, allowing the business to use its own plant and equipment.
1995
Malling Precast was purchased and moved to our Grays facility, where it was able to design and manufacture its precast components – traditionally columns, beams and facades – allowing the structure business to install them.
1999
StrongForce post-tensioning joined the group from its native Australia, providing specialist post-tensioning not previously offered in the UK market.
2001
R O’Rourke & Son acquired John Laing Construction, marking the beginning of a new era for the business. This acquisition created the UK’s largest privately owned construction company. Soon after, the business constructed and moved into its current headquarters in Dartford.
2003
Expanded Piling was purchased, adding to the R O’Rourke & Son capabilities.
2005
The Expanded Group was formed, bringing all of the specialist businesses together to provide the market with a single-source construction capability.
2008
The group invested in the Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) approach. We constructed our Centre of Excellence for Modern Construction (CEMC) in the Midlands. CEMC is Europe’s largest and most advanced preassembly manufacturing facility, allowing us to effectively and efficiently design and produce preassembled and precast solutions and components.