Italian contractor Webuild has signed a deal to take over most of the current and future projects of Australian construction group Clough, which entered voluntary administration in December.

Webuild had been negotiating to acquire Clough from its South African parent company, Murray & Roberts, last year but pulled out of the deal in early December after carrying out due diligence (see our previous report here).

Webuild has now signed a contract with the administrator, Deloitte, to acquire Clough’s assets including offices, intellectual property and more than AU$4bn-worth of current and future contracts.

The deal, worth around AU$36m, makes Webuild a major player in the Australian construction market, taking its overall order backlog to more than AU$12bn and its workforce, including 1,100 Clough employees, to around 3,000.

Australia is a key market for Webuild, which currently has an estimated AU$300bn-worth of contracts lined up for the 2022-2025 period.

The company is part of a consortium that has just won the third and final phase of the Sydney Metro/Western Sydney Airport project and is also working on the North East Link, the missing section of Melbourne’s beltway.

Webuild is also working in Australia's Snowy Mountains on Snowy 2.0, the country’s largest hydropower project.