One of South Africa’s oldest companies battles business rescue
Murray & Roberts has secured R250 million in financing for its South African operations, which were placed in business rescue in November last year.
The company is optimistic that it can survive, with the core of its assets and earnings coming from its underground mining business, which continues to operate as going concerns.
However, in a SENS announcement on 20 January, Murray & Roberts admitted that the order book for the company’s other subsidiaries had been impacted by its South African unit being placed in business rescue.
Founded in 1902, Murray & Roberts is one of South Africa’s oldest companies and has played a pivotal role in building the country’s mining infrastructure over the past century.
Established as a house-building company in the old Cape Colony by the Murrary and Stewart families, the company steadily grew in its early years.
Douglas Murray inherited Murray & Stewart from his father in 1928 and kickstarted its rapid growth into a construction giant.
Murray co-founded The Roberts Construction Company in 1934 with his friend Douglas Roberts. Murray pushed for the diversification of the business into construction materials and the industrial sector.
The Roberts brothers, however, maintained focus on building and sought growth by expanding into new markets across Africa.
Despite this difference in strategy, The Roberts Construction Company flourished and was listed on the JSE in 1951.
Following Murray’s death, Murray & Stewart merged with The Roberts Construction Company to form Murray & Roberts in 1967.
The companies continued to operate as effectively separate businesses owing to their different strategies until 1979.
By this time, the company had become much more industrial in nature and focused heavily on specialised engineering.

Murray & Roberts was not immune to the Apartheid-era politics of the time, with its investments outside of South Africa being severely limited by policies to ensure companies invested their cash locally.
To maintain its growth, Murray & Roberts entered into an agreement with Sanlam, whereby the insurance giant would control over 50% of the company’s shares and effectively control board appointments and strategy.
In exchange, Murray & Roberts would be ‘sold’ numerous industrial businesses that Sanlam owned at the time through Sankorp – rapidly turning the company into an industrial giant.
Over time, Sanlam reduced its shareholding to below 35% to avoid regulatory headaches, enabling a new management team to run Murray & Roberts.
Over the decade from 2000 to 2010, Murray & Roberts experienced significant growth, with its project order book increasing exponentially to R42 billion and revenues quadrupling to R32 billion.
This period in the company’s history was strongly characterised by the lead-up to the 2010 FIFA World Cup and the infrastructure investment programme launched by the government to prepare South Africa for the event.
It was also a time of global expansion as demand for mining, energy and transport infrastructure increased.
However, this momentum would not be sustained forever, as in the decade following the 2010 World Cup, the South African economy slowed, and infrastructure spending declined.
This put immense pressure on construction companies that were heavily reliant on government tenders for their revenue, with many looking offshore for growth opportunities.
Declining investment in new mines in South Africa compounded the company’s problems, with its local order book plunging in value.
These issues all came to a head in November last year when Murray & Roberts announced it would voluntarily suspend trading in its shares and announced its M&R Limited division would be placed in business rescue.
Its indirect subsidiaries, Murray & Roberts Cementation, Murray & Roberts UK, Cementation APAC, Cementation Canada and Terra Nova Technologies, continue to be a going concern.
The decision to place M&R Limited and its subsidiary OptiPower in business rescue followed discussions with certain of the division’s largest creditors and stakeholders.
In its latest business rescue update, the company said it had secured R250 million in post-commencement funding for its South African operations.
A Business Rescue Plan is expected to be submitted for creditors’ approval at or before the end of March 2025.
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