Roads

Cold Asphalt: Colas was founded to operate a patented breakthrough innovation for bitumen emulsion that revolutionized road techniques. Building and maintaining road infrastructure, in in the broadest sense of the term, has always been the Group’s core business.

Almost every Colas unit around the world does road work: mainland France, the French overseas departments, the British Isles, Europe, North America, Latin America, the Indian Ocean, Africa, the Middle East, Oceania, as well as, yet more rarely, in Asia.

In 2022, revenue for the Roads segment totaled € 14.2 billion, i.e., 71% of the Group's total revenue.

Safe, sustainable, low-carbon, recycled, accessible, shared, connected... Colas aims to imagine and build all the roads of tomorrow, and is gradually positioning itself as a global integrator of sustainable mobility solutions, particularly in anticipation of sustainable cities. Backed by its capacity for innovation and its R&D expertise, Colas offers its customers a full range of infrastructure and mobility solutions designed to be both user friendly and environmentally friendly while responding to the challenges of climate change.

The Roads segment is very diverse, covering a wide range of jobs and skill sets.

A very diverse business segment

Colas performs more than 55,000 projects each year around the world, building and maintaining:

roads and highways
airport runways and aprons
port facilities, industrial and logistics hubs, shopping centers
city streets and urban development (cycle paths, pedestrian areas)
reserved lane public transport networks (trams, subways, bus rapid transit)
leisure facilities (greenways, motor circuits, sports equipment)
environmental projects (retention basins, landscaping, wind farms)

Colas also operates in:

the manufacture, installation and maintenance of safety, signaling and traffic management equipment for infrastructure (Aximum subsidiary)
minor civil engineering and drainage activities, as well as more complex civil engineering (engineering structures)
building, in specific geographical zones (new construction and rehabilitation in Greater Paris, Indian Ocean and Pacific islands; deconstruction in France under the Premys brand)

Major road projects

The Group's road construction and maintenance units perform a very large number of small-scale projects, as well as contracts of greater size and complexity.
These larger projects can be carried out in the form of complex contracts such as concessions, P3 (Public Private Partnership), PFI (Private Finance Initiatives) or ASC (Asset Support Contracts). Colas may also take a stake in concession companies, most of the time minority interests, on highway and airport infrastructure, freeways and public transport.
The Group created Colas Projects, an entity dedicated to managing major projects, to provide local Colas companies with expertise in studies and roll out.