Simon Moon, CEO of Atkins Middle East, says he expects early-stage construction work in the region to pick up soon.

In an interview with MEED, he said that consultants had been through the pain of a slow down well before it began to hit contractors, and were now seeing signs of a turnaround. More design and consultancy work is being tendered and awarded he said, particularly in Dubai.

“The market is driven by sentiment, especially on the property side, and we are seeing a lot of design work coming out of the UAE,” Moon said. “We’re seeing governments profiling the longer-term infrastructure trend, but at the moment there’s no major impact that we’re seeing,” he added.

However, for contractors, that mean while new contract work is on the horizon, it could be a year or more before the main contracts are tendered.