Testing, inspection, and certification group SOCOTEC UK & Ireland has acquired Derby-based Inertia Consulting, adding approximately 50 employees and extending its technical expertise in bridge engineering and infrastructure asset inspection. The deal is the group’s seventeenth UK and Ireland acquisition since 2017. Financial terms have not been disclosed.
Founded by David Roome in 2006, Inertia specialises in bridge design, inspection, structural assessment, temporary works, and non-destructive testing. It operates from offices in Derby, Falkirk, Cwmbran, and Cheshire, and counts National Highways among its customers. Its work covers existing civil engineering structures as well as projects requiring new designs and technical investigations.
The acquisition brings those capabilities into SOCOTEC’s existing civil and geotechnical engineering operations, which also provide construction testing, monitoring, surveying, and structural investigation. Combining the activities broadens the range of services the group can supply to organisations responsible for roads, railways, and other large infrastructure assets.
Bridge owners require regular inspection and assessment to determine whether structures remain suitable for use and what maintenance or repair work should be prioritised. Non-destructive tests can help engineers investigate the condition of materials and structural components without removing them unnecessarily. Temporary works design addresses the supporting arrangements required while repair, inspection, or construction tasks are undertaken.
Inertia’s experience therefore adds a more specialised set of bridge and structural engineering skills to SOCOTEC’s existing testing and monitoring services. The enlarged organisation intends to pursue further work with National Highways, Network Rail, other infrastructure owners, and major contractors, building on customers already served by both businesses.
Inertia has developed its services over two decades, including work involving difficult access inspections, bridge capacity assessment, structural surveys, and the management of inspection programmes. Its regional offices provide an existing national operating footprint rather than a single Derby delivery base. SOCOTEC’s wider network adds testing and investigation resources to those established client relationships.
Hervé Montjotin, chief executive of the international SOCOTEC Group, said the transaction would increase the UK business’s scale in bridge engineering and structural inspection. Matthew Marriott, chief executive of SOCOTEC UK & Ireland, identified infrastructure asset management and temporary works design among the capabilities being added.
Roome and fellow Inertia director Ryan Bradley have pointed to the opportunity to expand the company’s specialist services within a larger group. The transaction follows SOCOTEC’s earlier acquisition of the LSTC Group, which added expertise in energy transmission and distribution infrastructure. That deal was described as its sixteenth UK and Ireland acquisition since 2017.
The latest purchase extends the same buy-and-build strategy into bridge engineering. Inertia’s staff and specialist inspection capabilities now join SOCOTEC’s broader engineering platform, with road and rail asset operators central to the enlarged business’s target market.
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