BAM UK & Ireland has recruited Mike King, Robertson Construction's former executive technical services director, to lead its Scotland construction business, a hire that gives the Dutch-owned group a leader with deep Scottish public sector delivery experience just as NHS Scotland's capital pipeline restarts.

BAM UK & Ireland, part of the Netherlands-listed Royal BAM Group, delivers construction, infrastructure and facilities management across the UK and Ireland through BAM Construct UK, BAM Nuttall, BAM Contractors Ireland and BAM Ventures, with the wider group employing around 13,200 people and generating €6.5bn (£5.55bn) in revenue in 2024.

Robertson Construction Group, part of Robertson Group and headquartered in Elgin, Moray, is Scotland's largest construction company, employing more than 3,200 people across construction, timber engineering, facilities management and housebuilding, with group revenue of £574.6m (€672.3m) in 2024.

King spent four years as Robertson's executive technical services director after seven years as a project director and group preconstruction director, having previously worked at Scottish Canals, on the Helix and Kelpies project, Taylor Woodrow Construction and Balfour Beatty Construction. He succeeds Jim Ward from 17 September; BAM's recent Scottish work includes the £72m (€84.2m) Parkhead Health and Social Care Centre in Glasgow.

Appointing a director with hospital delivery experience to lead a Scottish construction business now looks timed to a restarting capital cycle rather than routine succession.

Scotland's 2026-27 budget confirms a roughly £1bn capital allocation for NHS estate renewal, including replacements for University Hospital Monklands, the Princess Alexandra Eye Pavilion, Belford Hospital and St Brendan's Hospital, alongside new Community Health Hubs, two years after a moratorium froze major NHS building projects nationwide.

That freeze fell hardest on contractors reliant on NHS pipeline continuity, and King's health and social care delivery experience, including BAM's own recently completed Parkhead centre and radionuclide dispensary work for NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, positions BAM to move early as boards resume business cases.

For the sector, senior appointments built around health-sector delivery experience are becoming a leading indicator of which construction groups are positioning themselves for Scotland's reopening NHS capital pipeline, rather than simply reacting once individual contracts are tendered.

Source: Highways Magazine / Scottish Government