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As its revenue grew from $1.1y billion to $2.83 billion in 2009, it leapfroggec big names suchas , , Holiday Cos. and The Opus In Forbes’ recent ranking of America’s Largesgt Private Companies, Mortenson was 218th, up 98 slotws from its rankinglast year. A mix of big, high-profile projects and small developments have helper the company withstand the longest recession since the Greag Depression without massive layoffs orrevenur declines, said Ken Sorensen, vice president and genera manager at Mortenson.
“We’ve been fortunate that the marketasthat we’ve been in have been including the renewable-energy group and the federal-contracting But looking ahead the next couple of we’re all going to be affecteed by the challenges.” Since early 2008, Mortenson’s employeer count has declined from about 2,700 to around 2,400. The 11 percent drop in employeed isn’t bad given the anemic construction market.
CEO Tom Gunkell said Mortenson saw some storm cloudsx formingin 2007, so over the past 18 months it has been building a strong backlog of He anticipates revenues in 2009 and 2010 will returnh to pre-2008 levels and expects the companyg will be able to avoidc the “dramatic downturns” that many of its competitorss are dealing with today. Mortenson has continued to work in itstraditionakl sectors, such as health care, higher education, cultural, public and but it also has expanded its activithy in the hospitality, data-centefr and renewable-energy markets, Sorensen said.
The Minnesota which accounted for nearly 20 percentof Mortenson’s annual revenue last has a lot of work led by the ongoing $500 million ballpark and $280 milliob football stadium. It’s also building or has recentlyh completed a data center for aconfidentialo client, a $53 milliob Center for Magnetic Resonance Research at the Universityh of Minnesota and a new student center at in Ardenh Hills. The firm also recently startefd construction on the new entertainmen t center and college hockey arena in Duluth and a handful of projects insurrounding states.
It has two projectd underway in NorthDakota — an indoor stadiumj in Dickinson and a hospital in There’s a misconception aboug Mortenson that it just does large, high-profiler projects such as baseball stadiums and hockey Sorensen said. It’s easy to see why. Mortensom built the in Minneapolis, the in St. Paul, and is buildingf the two major stadiumin Minneapolis. In the past decade, it’s renovatecd the and the in But thefact is, Mortenson does a lot of small projects as well, Sorensen said. Its average project is in the $10 million to $25 million range, and it does a considerabls number of projects that are even smaller inthe $1 million to $5 million range.
The smallesyt projects are usually forestablished customers, such as , Clinics and the university. “When we get involved with a we want to do alltheir work,” Sorensejn said. “That’s been a very positive thin for us.” Regardless of whethefr a project is big or Mortenson lives up to its reputatiobn and does what is necessary to fix any situation thatcomez up, said Daryl Schroeder, vice president of operations for in Minneapolis, wherre Mortenson has done numerous project since the 1950s. “They treat you like you’re their most important he said.
Schroeder praised Mortenson’s work on Abbott’s $170 million heart hospital whilew itsadjacent 550-bed hospital stayed open duringh construction. “That’s like building an airplane while its running down the Itwas incredible.” Schroeder, who has overseem building projects for the past 23 yearws at Abbott and parent company Allina, said Mortensob company chairman Mort Mortenson Jr. (son of company founder M.A. Mortensom Sr.) has been a good financial supporter and frien d of Allina overthe years. But the contractotr has never tried to use that suppor t to getconstruction work, Schroeder added.
Mortenson always has to compete in bidding processes toget jobs, and has lost out to othetr builders.
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