AN environmental and engineering consultancy in Newcastle has seen sales of £39.2m in the 40 weeks to the end of December last year.

The former Entec, which was bought by global engineering giant Amec for £60m two years ago, saw turnover of £52.5m in the 52 weeks to the end of 2010. Last year the company's profits were £3.6m compared with £8.6m in the whole of 2010.

The firm, which employs 644 staff, started as a division of Northumbrian Water and was bought seven years ago by its management team before becoming part of Amec Environment and Infrastructure UK.

The firm, which has 13 sites across the country, works across the public and private sectors with consultancy expertise predominantly in engineering, environment and safety.

Its customers include most of the UK water companies and the National Grid, EDF, EoN, BAA and the Crown Estate in the energy sector.

The previous financial year the firm saw its turnover drop from £55.7m to £52.5m and cut 22 staff, which it said and said its fortunes reflected “the broader conditions in the UK economy in recent years”.

Its sales had fallen by more than £10m between 2009/10 and 2010/11 which it said was largely due to a lack of public sector contracts as the Government cuts back on spending.

But its profits had risen in 2010/11 from £6.6m to £8.3m, due mainly to its decision to “re-balance staff numbers” with available work and the level of demand from its customers. In 2009 it cut more than 70 staff.

Parent company Amec, which employs more than 27,000 staff worldwide, has annual revenues of more than £3.3bn and operates in around 40 countries.