Serco is the world’s 59th largest arms company, according to SIPRI. Headquartered in the UK, Serco specialises in cross-sector public service delivery, notably in the defence, transport, justice, immigration, health and citizen service sectors. The company was founded in 1929 as a UK division of Radio Corporation of America and began working in defence in the UK during the second World War.
Serco made UK£ 1.89 billion in revenues from its defence business in 2024, about 35% of its total revenues. A further 33% of its revenues come from its justice sector and immigration work. Serco’s headquarters is in Hook, Hampshire and it also has an office in London. Outside of the UK, it has a presence in Belgium, the US, Australia, and the UAE and has subsidiaries in all these countries. Most of its revenues – 56% – derive from its European and UK contracts. It has 50,000 employees globally, over 31,000 of which are in the UK. Subsidiaries include the joint venture VIVO Defence Services Limited (VIVO), a company with 2024 revenues of UK£ 917.8 million.
Services to the UK military
Serco has been a significant supplier of goods and services to the UK Ministry of Defence and its associated agencies for over 60 years, serving British armed forces in over 30 locations worldwide. It also supports its human resources and supply chain processes.
Serco manages the MoD’s Defence Academy. Serco is the largest provider of painting and graphics services to the RAF. It manages supply chains and services and provides engineering services on 91 Royal Navy vessels. It manages and does works to UK military bases, housing, estates and assets globally. Serco provides engineering services to the UK’s Solid State Phased Array Radar System missile early warning system. It also provides engineering services to UK fighter jets. In 2025, Serco won an MoD contract to service the RAF’s Typhoon fighter jet fleet. In 2025, Serco obtained a recruitment solutions contract from MOD worth an estimated UK£ 1 billion.
Until 2021, Serco was one of three shareholders of the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE), the UK company that manufactures, maintains and develops the warheads for the UK’s Trident nuclear missiles. AWE is now fully government-owned.
Support services to other militaries
Serco provides similar services to other militaries. These include the US and Australian militaries. A few notable contracts are discussed below.
In 2024, the company won a US$ 323 million contract to upgrade defence infrastructure at the US Space Force’s Pituffik Space Base in Greenland, and in 2025, it won a US$ 247 million contract to support soldier readiness and performance within the US Army’s Holistic Health and Fitness (H2F) System. In 2019, Serco’s Australian subsidiary won a contract to provide national garrison health services to Australian department of defence
Controversies
Immigration detention and asylum accommodation
Serco is a major provider of accomodation for asylum seekers. In 2019 the three companies were awarded a 10-year contract to provide dispersal asylum accommodation in different regions. Serco manages accommodation for 42,000 people in the North West and Midlands and in the East of England. Its contract was worth UK£ 2.109 billion in total. In 2024, an investigation by OpenDemocracy and Liberty Investigates found that the Home Office held no centralised data on the performances of Serco and other asylum accommodation companies.
Serco also manages detention removal centres in the UK. In 2020 it was awarded a UK£ 200 million Home Office contract to manage two immigration removal centres near Gatwick airport. Serco had previously been mired in controversy over its handling of abuse allegations at the Yarl’s Wood detention removal centre it managed; detainees had gone on hunger strike at the centre.
Serco has also been investigated by the SeriousFraud Office for overcharging on electronic tagging contracts, which resulted in a UK£ 19.2 million fine in 2019.
Saudi Arabia
Serco is heavily involved in Saudi Arabia, where it has an office and is supporting the country’s Vision 2030 project. In 2022, Serco predicted that 50% of its income would come from Saudi contracts by 2026. It won its first contract in that country in 2015 for US£ 185 million to provide training and consultancy services to support Saudi Arabia’s North-South Railway. In 2023 it was contracted to provide Fire Rescue Services at Red Sea International Airport.
It is currently supporting the development of the kingdom’s controversial mega-cities, including the NEOM economic zone. NEOM, which the Kingdom intends to “be the size of Belgium” and “the world’s first cognitive city,” is widely regarded as a vanity project of the Saudi royal family. The BBC reported in 2024 that Saudi security services had a shoot-to-kill policy to evict tribal villagers occupying land intended for NEOM’s development. The mega-cities development depends on labour rights abuses and low-waged and slave labour, according to Human Rights Watch. Serco also won a UK£ 90 million contract to deliver emergency response services in NEOM. In 2023, Serco reported that it was continuing “to invest in our advisory-to-operate business in Saudi Arabia… focussed on supporting the country in its development of sustainable future cities.”
