page_title: Hochtief
section_title: Revival and international expansion
hierarchical_section_title: Hochtief / History / Revival and international expansion
context_page_description: Hochtief Aktiengesellschaft is a German construction company based in Essen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Hochtief is Germany's largest construction company and operates globally, ranking as one of the largest general construction companies in the United States through its Turner subsidiary, and in Australia through a 72.683% shareholding in CIMIC Group. In 2010 it employed more than 70,000 employees across five corporate divisions. One of these, Hochtief Concessions, is a major airport operator. The others are involved with construction project planning, finance, construction and operation. Work done in 2010 was €23.23 billion, with more than 80% coming from operations outside Germany.
  The company's history dates back to 1874 and includes engineering feats such as the transplantation of the Abu Simbel rock temples in Egypt, and infrastructure projects like the new Athens International Airport and Germany's first nuclear power plant. It is also noted for its involvement with the Bauhaus movement, particularly for its work at Zollverein colliery and the reconstruction of the Kandinsky-Klee house in Dessau; both World Heritage Sites.
context_section_description: Josef Müller took over as CEO in 1950. A decision was taken to undertake more international projects, following a period of essentially domestic work after World War II. This included a series of power infrastructure works in Turkey and bridge and smelting works construction in Egypt during the early 1950s. Many projects from this period were undertaken outside of the First World, often funded from development aid budgets.
  A high-profile success for the company came in the 1960s, again in Egypt. The rising waters of the River Nile (a result of the construction of the Aswan High Dam) threatened the ancient Abu Simbel temples complex. The entire site was dismantled and reassembled 200 m further from the river, and 65 m higher, at a cost of around US$36 million.
  The focus of the company began to switch away from purely construction and towards more turnkey work and service provision, for example the 1961-3 Hilton Hotel, Athens, project. Most work was domestic, driven by Germany's strong economic growth, with a particular strength in power plant construction. This included the construction of the Federal Republic of Germany's first nuclear power plant, Kahl Nuclear Power Plant, near Dettingen am Main. The construction contract had been awarded by AEG, which had been commissioned by the utility company RWE to build the plant. The plant began to feed its electricity to the grid in June 1961. By contrast, the first East German nuclear plant, at Rheinsberg, was connected to the grid in 1966.
  There was also considerable transport infrastructure activity, including on the Hernandarias Subfluvial Tunnel, Argentina in the 1960s and the New Elbe Tunnel in Hamburg in the 1970s
  By the mid-1970s, foreign work (such as the Bosporus Bridge in Turkey, completed 1974) was accelerating while domestic orders were receding, according to the company's annual report of 1975. By 1980, foreign work accounted for more than 50% of Hochtief's business. A major factor was the contract for King Abdulaziz International Airport (completed 1981), the largest airport in Saudi Arabia, and the most valuable contract Hochtief had ever been involved with. The architecture of the airport is highly rated aesthetically, and it has several unusual features, including Terminal Three, used only during the Hajj, reserved for pilgrims travelling to Mecca. It has a tent-shaped fibreglass roof, contains a mosque, can accommodate 80,000 travellers at once, and is believed to be the largest terminal in the world.
  The 1980s were a difficult time financially, with less foreign work coming through; though they headed the consortium that built the Mosul Dam in Iraq from 1981–84. There was domestic growth, highlighted by the architecturally radical Messe Torhaus in Frankfurt, completed in 1984. It was later involved in the construction of the Messeturm in the same city; once completed in 1991 it was Europe's tallest building. In the mid-1990s, Hochtief was involved in yet another major skyscraper development in Frankfurt, the Commerzbank Tower, which overtook the Messeturm to become Europe's tallest building, losing the record to Triumph-Palace in Moscow in 2003.
  The 1990s brought an opportunity to expand operations in the airport management sector, as many countries privatised their airports. When Warsaw Frederic Chopin Airport needed upgrading in the early 1990s, LOT Polish Airlines was unable to afford the cost, so a complex financing arrangement was established whereby a bank would pay Hochtief two thirds of the costs to upgrade the airport, while the airline assigned to the bank the revenues from aircraft using Polish airspace for a period. The company began to take responsibility for more operational aspects of projects, including service provision, financing, facility management and software development, following a concept of being a "system leader", as set out by CEO Hans-Peter Keitel. These tasks were felt to be higher up the value chain, and would help the firm shake off the slowdown that had followed the initial boom of German reunification. These concepts were not
caption: The old and new positions of the Abu Simbel temples
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