Lowering the expectations of first homebuyers is something that has to happen in a climate where the cost of property is climbing, according to AHS Hospitality managing director Stephen Lauder.
Navigating a business through Western Australia’s economic boom presents enormous challenges for business, according to several leading WA business executives.
Several Perth entrepreneurs are nervous about the impact a change of federal government next month could have on the Australian economy in three to five years’ time.
Western Australian agribusiness exporters experienced mixed fortunes this season, with drought conditions putting pressure on the grains sector, while other sectors, such as meat, livestock and forestry experience a growth in revenues.
While Western Australia’s mining industry is well-represented on the list of the state’s top exporters, a number of manufacturing and technology companies are also creating significant export revenue.
The ‘seachange’ phenomenon and unprecedented growth in recreational boat registrations in Western Australia are being met with increased marina development activity up and down the coast.
Western Australia’s residential property market has come off the boil, sending Perth’s median house price down to $446,500 in the June quarter, according to preliminary figures of the Real Estate Institute of WA.
Perth’s commercial office market has been a landlords’ dream during the past 12 months, prompting significant sales activity in the CBD and a few headaches for tenants.
In Western Australia’s turbo-charged economy, the property sector has been a standout performer, across the board – but the huge rises in values are not always good news.
Wesfarmers CEO Richard Goyder has great admiration for retailing executives such as Archie Norman, who was largely responsible for turning around the fortunes of UK supermarket group, Asda, before its sale to American retail giant Wal-Mart in 1999.
When Coles CEO John Fletcher famously told the media that he had barely been in a supermarket for 25 years, it passed largely unnoticed that this could be a problem as he took the helm of Melbourne-based retailers Coles Myer Ltd, as it was then known.
An innovative takeover sweetener for Coles Group Ltd shareholders became all the more important last week when an independent expert’s report revealed Wesfarmers Ltd would effectively secure the retailer on the cheap.
The state government has copped a lot of flak over cost increases and construction delays on its metropolitan railway expansion project, but its problems are modest compared with some of the largest resource projects being built in Western Australia.
The petroleum and iron ore sectors have grown to dominate Western Australia’s resources industry but there is still plenty of growth happening in other sectors as diverse as molybdenum, vanadium, nickel, gold, copper and zircon.
The state government and iron ore miners in the Mid-West are facing crunch time over the development of new railway and port infrastructure, which is needed if planned mines are to proceed.
The state’s two proposed biofuels projects, both slated for the Kwinana-Rockingham industrial area, are well into their advanced stages, with one due to commence construction later this year.
More than 850 megawatts of additional generation capacity for the South West Interconnected System is expected to come online by October 2008, with 3 major private energy projects currently under construction scheduled for completion within the next year.
The iron ore sector has been at the forefront of Western Australia’s resources boom and, while industry heavyweights Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton still dominate, new producers are gradually emerging.
While Western Australia is witnessing a boom in mining and resources projects, several major non-mining projects, with a combined value of almost $2 billion, are also in the pipeline.
The oil and gas sector is set to make an increased contribution to WA's strong economy with eight major expansion projects under way, including the state’s single most expensive development, Woodside Petroleum’s $12 billion Pluto gas project.
Western Australia’s skills shortage has prompted a flurry of activity by government and industry, although the state is struggling to find traction on the issue.
A review of Western Australia’s vocational education and training system, undertaken earlier this year by KPMG has called for a redistribution of the Tafe sector’s infrastructure assets and an injection of further capital to improve services.
The federal government’s Australian Technical Colleges continue to attract criticism over claimed low enrolment levels and insufficient graduate numbers, despite strong support from the business sector.
Growing Alcock Brown-Neaves Group from two building companies to more than a dozen businesses was a matter of identifying opportunities in the market and going after them as they arose, according to the firm’s managing director, Dale Alcock.
