BrisConnections chief executive Ray Wilson likes to be in the midst of the action. And for BrisConnections it’s certainly been a year full of action. Photo: Glenn Hunt
CONSTRUCTION paused on Brisbane's $4.7 billion Airport Link project over Christmas, but the chief executive was still hard at it. While the workers downed tools for a well-earned break, Ray Wilson enjoyed some ''quiet time'' and ploughed on with the job of completing the world's biggest privately funded road project.
If anyone deserves some quiet time, it's Wilson. For the second time since the company's float, the share price of BrisConnections has plunged to 0.1¢ - the lowest tradeable price on the Australian Securities Exchange - and, for each one bought, there's still a further $1 to pay next month.
This year, Wilson has dealt with the failed investments of small investors, who bought into the stock unaware of the two further instalments to pay. He's gone to court to challenge rebel shareholder Nicholas Bolton, who bought almost 20 per cent of his company, and battled to get $280 million of cash from co-underwriters Macquarie Group and Deutsche Bank.
''In all truth, I've been through some very complex engineering projects, and dealt with crises that emerge out of cultural differences when you work in different parts of the world, but I've been through nothing like this before,'' Wilson says. ''This was the most challenging period in my career, but it has been one of the great learning experiences as well. It was like vertical learning. A colleague told me I probably went through more corporate issues in nine months than some chief executives go through in 30 years.''
Last financial year, the BrisConnections board met 27 times as it battled its funding crisis. All that time, work has been under way on the huge infrastructure project, which will link Brisbane's CBD with the airport, and the fast-growing TradeCoast Central industrial region north of the city.
Across Brisbane, BrisConnections has a total of nine project sites, and Wilson's office teeters on the edge of the biggest pits, at suburban Kedron, at the entrance to one of the major tunnels. Wilson's office vibrates to the progress of Airport Link.
''I like being in the midst of the action,'' he says, as the crane edges within metres of his window.
Wilson has been in the midst of the action this year. In addition to dealing with the ''peripheral issues'', as he likes to call them, such as the investment of Bolton, BrisConnections has spent more than $1 billion on its road project. ''It's the biggest project I have ever been involved with,'' Wilson says proudly. ''It's the physical complexity needed to deliver this piece of civil infrastructure, which is being built cheek-by-jowl with the community.''
A veteran of Thiess and Leighton Holdings of more than 15 years, the other projects Wilson has been involved with include ConnectEast and EastLink in Melbourne, and the Lane Cove Tunnel in Sydney. Those projects have run into financial trouble since their completion, primarily as a result of optimistic traffic forecasts. Wilson insists that Airport Link won't follow suit.
''In the traffic flow sense, the model is very conservative. We can sustain a very large fall in traffic revenues before we come against the limits within the model,'' Wilson says.
''I know that in these days of extreme cynicism about traffic models for toll roads one should be cautious about what you say, but I don't expect traffic to be a problem.
''Look, there is some justification for the cynicism. The Cross City Tunnel, the Lane Cove Tunnel, both had forecasts which were not met. The key thing is a fundamental economic reason for the road. In Melbourne, CityLink was the connection of the city to the airport. Here, we have both the airport and the TradeCoast. You don't really know until you get traffic on the road, but there's nothing to tell me that our model is in any way deficient.''
At the end of January, BrisConnections will start collecting the last $1-per-unit instalment from its investors and, for the first time, investors will know what the company is really worth.
It's a task that promises to be much easier than the last time the company chased up cash. In April, most of the units were held by Bolton, and other vultures who were circling the embattled stock, including Alan Bond's former adviser, Jim Byrnes.
Now, 98 per cent is held by just four big institutions - Macquarie Group, Deutsche Bank, Queensland Investment Corp and Capital World - including 81 per cent by the underwriters, Macquarie and Deutsche. The notice of the final call went out on December 15, to little fanfare.
''Those four institutions have an absolute commonality of interest with us, hence we are confident we won't go into a repeat of what happened in April,'' Wilson says.
''Those on the register have been with us through some extraordinary times. Despite all of those things, the funding structure was robust enough to keep the thing intact. We've come through that with a fully paid funding structure, debt and equity all fully secured. We'll complete the project because we've got the money to do it.''
