Keen for growth outside Britain, National Express has earmarked the freeways of North America for future expansion. Like its rivals FirstGroup and Stagecoach, it has been buying transport companies in the US, in particular those that run traditional Simpsons-style yellow school buses.

National Express started its operations in the US in 1998, six years after floating on the London Stock Exchange with a value of £60 million. Now the company has a presence in 31 states in the US and in Canada and its business in North America is worth roughly ten times the value of the company on its stock market debut.

In North America, National Express transports more than 297 million passengers, is under contract with 374 public agencies, and operates more than 14,000 vehicles. It employs nearly 22,000 drivers and support staff.

The company’s business is split into three parts: the Student Transportation Division — the yellow school buses — the Public Transit Division, and the Airport Management and Development Division. National Express is also the guardian of the first privately operated airport in the United States, Stewart International in New York.

British companies like yellow school bus contracts because the market is consolidating rapidly, with many so-called “mom and pop” firms ready to be bought out. Contracts are highly cash-generative, with good margins, and are let for three to five years. Durham School Services, National Express’s US yellow school bus group, is America’s third-largest student transport company.

National Express seems to have avoided the risky areas that Stagecoach waded into when it bought Coach USA — a ragbag of tourist-linked coach businesses and private taxis. Nor has it yet run into some of the industrial relations problems that FirstGroup have encountered in the US with its public buses and yellow school buses. The Service Employee International Union claims that in the US, FirstGroup pursues an “anti-union” policy. But FirstGroup accuses the American union of bullying its employees into joining.

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