ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

International facilities management providers Atalian and Servest have merged to form Atalian Servest, now one of the world's largest FM outsourcing companies.

The new organisation has a turnover of €3 billion, employs more than 125,000 people worldwide and operates in 33 countries across four continents. The merger follows the formation of a joint venture between the two organisations in 2016.

Servest is headquartered and operates in the UK while Atalian has its headquarters in France and operates in Europe, the US, south-east Asia and Africa. They offer a full range of facilities services including cleaning, catering, security, building services, energy management and compliance, front of house, landscaping, waste management and pest control to clients in the private and public sectors.

Through its partnership with global ICT services specialist Getronics Atalian Servest will also focus on developing its technology-led workspace solutions including tools focused on workspace management, managed cloud, unified communications and applications. This will enable the company to operate in the workplace technology market and provide a FM and mobile technology offering to its client base.

"Our two organisations are very complementary with like-minded business approaches based on an entrepreneurial strategy where organic and acquisitive growth are of equal importance," said Matthieu de Baynast, group ceo at Atalian. The merger of our organisations will enable businesses to have more choice when looking for a global FM partner."

Rob Legge, chairman UK and USA at Servest, added: "At a time when the Brexit deal is creating headlines about the UK's exit from Europe, this is a genuine story of UK and European harmony and collaboration. Many of our multinational or global clients are looking for a more standardised service delivery across geographies and can now benefit from our approach wherever they are based."