FEATURE STORY
Strengthening Our Business:
Bringing new people, skills and expertise into the KBR family
KBR’s Government Solutions (GS) EMEA business has gone through an impressive transformation over the past 12 months. Last year, the business acquired two UK-based consultancies, Harmonic and Frazer-Nash Consultancy, enhancing our innovative, technology-driven advisory capabilities.
About Frazer-Nash Consultancy
Frazer-Nash Consultancy is a leading provider of systems engineering, assurance and technology advisory services with expertise in areas such as mechanical, electrical, electronic and cyber.
Frazer-Nash Consultancy was formed in 1971. Since then, they have achieved sustained levels of growth, providing systems and engineering technology services to a broad range of customers. Frazer-Nash now has around 900 employees with innovative design and development expertise in energy, defense, government and infrastructure, healthcare, process manufacturing, transport, and space. Frazer-Nash helps their clients overcome highly technical and complex problems. Their client base spans a range of critical national infrastructure organizations, as well as operators and regulators in strategic sectors, including defense and energy, both in the UK and Australia.
About Harmonic
Founded by Tom Samuel in 2003, Harmonic is an entrepreneurial UK-based transformation and delivery advisory business.
Predominantly supporting the UK defense market and other areas of the UK government, Harmonic offers a unique combination of business-winning, systems and delivery expertise that enables them to act as a transformational partner for its clients. Harmonic helps businesses improve their ways of working, manage change, and achieve the best possible outcomes in business winning and project delivery.
Did you know?
Harmonic sponsored Captain Preet Chandri’s polar expedition. Preet recently became the first woman of color — and the third-fastest woman ever — to complete a solo expedition to the South Pole.
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Harmonic’s Darran Venn award is presented each year to a colleague who has gone out of their way to help others on the team — whether in a work context, supporting mental health, or otherwise. Darran Venn was a Senior Systems Engineer and much-loved Harmonic team member who was killed in a road traffic accident.
Frazer-Nash committed to the Science Based Targets Initiative in March 2021, joining a growing group of leading companies that are demonstrating the highest level of ambition on climate and paving the way to a net-zero future.
In September 2021, Frazer-Nash undertook a report for the UK government which explored the feasibility of space solar power. Published by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), the report considered the technical feasibility, cost and economics of space-based solar power (SBSP) as a novel generation technology which could help the UK achieve net zero emissions by 2050.
Aligning Our Values and Integrating Our Teams
When it came to selecting companies to bring on board, the alignment of values and ambitions was extremely important to KBR. It was also important to both Harmonic and Frazer-Nash to ensure their new home was the right fit for them and their people. There were very clear similarities with KBR’s people-centric values and the values that Harmonic and Frazer-Nash lived and operated by. Both consultancies demonstrated a strong ethos based on encouraging entrepreneurial spirit and trusting their people to make decisions, challenge thinking and proudly own their work.
Now, almost nine months since the announcements of the acquisitions, Harmonic is fully integrated with GS EMEA’s Advisory team, operating as one division under the KBR Harmonic brand and winning strategically important work with new and existing clients such as Lockheed Martin, the Royal Navy and the Royal Airforce.
Since the sale’s completion in October, the Frazer-Nash division has been focused on developing its understanding of how the business operates and delivers success, as well as providing some functional support elements historically received from their prior owner. Frazer-Nash has also recently won new contracts with the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA), BEIS, the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) and the Australian company Trusted Autonomous Systems. These are important wins for KBR as they align well with our strategic ambitions to grow our presence across the sustainable energy, nuclear and defense markets.
Leanne Huitson, Chief of Staff for GS EMEA, has played an integral role in the successful integration of Harmonic and Frazer-Nash.
“We are embarking upon a really exciting time for the people across the GS EMEA organization. We had three different divisions who were all successful in their own rights, and now we have a fantastic opportunity to build something even better together. We have lots of discovery to do, lots of connections and understanding to build — whilst not overly distracting people from their key focus of delivering incredible solutions and services to clients. But we have great people from all three divisions involved in maturing these next steps, and we’re already seeing tangible results from the steps taken so far.”
With the addition of the skills and expertise that both Harmonic and Frazer-Nash bring to KBR, the GS EMEA business has been able to grow its technical and advisory capabilities, extend its reach deeper into its chosen markets, and strengthen the overall organization to enable even greater support of our customers and more opportunities for our people.
