We are one of New Zealand's foremost Retaining Wall Construction companies. It all began in Wellington in the mid 1980's, with a small company constructing Crib Wall retaining units.
Builder Chris Burke saw the potential and bought the company. Within a few years the company expanded to meet growing local demand, and began both making, and installing the retaining wall units. Seeing the increasing opportunities in other parts of the country, Chris made the move to Auckland, and in 1994 ICB Retaining Walls Limited began offering the full range of retaining wall construction options.
Since then the company has carried out numerous projects for Construction companies, City Councils, Railways, NZTA, Mining and Harbour Companies.
The company is a trusted designer and builder of a large range of retaining wall solutions and its success is reflected in its continuing growth by offering a proven record of experience, innovation and reliability. We are just as confident about the future.
Image: Pinehill Stormwater Retention Ponds 1 & 2
our people
We have a key group of expert staff and a number of experienced contractors, who work together to complete projects in a timely, innovative and professional manner.
Meet the team:
Chris Burke - Founder
Chris founded ICB Retaining and Piling Ltd in 1988 and led the business until 2024. A former Chairman of CCNZ’s Auckland branch, Chris holds life membership and has also served as an Executive Member of the Auckland Business Forum.
Contact Chris:
M: 0274421463
Mike Burke - Managing Director
Mike’s journey with ICB began in 1994, working in the Petone factory as a 15-year-old. Over the years, he gained hands-on experience, worked in the back office, and became a Board advisor in 2012. In 2024, Mike took over as Managing Director. He is also a multi-company director, accredited NZ Business Mentor, member of the Institute of Directors, and former Convenor for the Westpac Auckland Business Awards.
Gary Cooke - General Manager
Gary joined ICB in May 2016 as Construction Manager. He is a qualified Civil Engineer with more than 30 years’ experience in civil engineering & management.
Contact Gary:
P: (09) 220-2011
M: 027 441 7132
Derek Manning - Construction Mgr
Derek has a 35-year career that spans consulting engineering, project management, mining, roading & telecommunications.
Contact Derek:
M: 027 200 2041
Greg Innes
Administration Manager
Greg is a qualified automotive Engineer, with broad experience in administration. He takes the leading role in ensuring we meet the highest standards in health and safety management.
Contact Greg:
P: (09) 220-2017
M: 027 487 0448
Michaela Kim
Accounts Manager
Michaela is our Accounts Manager. She has over 40 years experience in the accounting sector of which 15 years at ICB.
Contact Michaela:
P: (09) 220-2012
Sheryl Pettett
Estimator/QS Assistant
Sheryl joined ICB in 2016 as Estimator/QS Assistant, with 15 years of experience in project management, design, and estimating. She has worked on copper and fibre projects, commercial builds, roadworks, subdivisions, and major telecom initiatives like UFB and RBI.
Contact Sheryl:
P: (09) 414-1130
Zeinab Adnan
Engineering/Estimating manager
Zeinab is our Engineering / Estimating Manager who has over 12 years experience with ICB in civil engineering projects, price estimation and construction of retaining walls.
Contact Zeinab:
P: (09) 414-1130
Stefano Loveday Operations Manager
Stefano brings 17 years of construction experience, including six in residential and 11 in retaining, piling, and multi-story structures. As Operations Manager, he ensures projects are managed with precision and professionalism.
Contact Stefano:
M: 027 441 7217
Ciaran Riddell Project Manager
Ciaran has eight years of experience in construction and project management, plus four years as a Software and Electrical Engineer. He combines these skills to manage projects with excellence and efficiency.
Contact Ciaran:
M: 021 450 790
Vedant Gosvami Project Manager
Vedant is a qualified Civil Engineer having worked as a site engineer he joined ICB in 2024.
Contact Vedant:
M: 027 441 7211
Retaining walls built on Albany Highway - 2024
Colter Prince
Plant & Equipment Manager
Colter joined ICB in 2022. Colter is a trained diesel/petrol mechanic with 20+ years experience in plant repair and servicing.
Colter and his team keep our fleet of vehicles, plant and equipment working efficiently.
Contact Colter:
P. (09) 414-1130
M. 021 384 417
May Seleq
Contracts Administrator
May has a BSC in Survey Engineering, and has 33+ years experience in major projects, including site and quantity surveying, & estimating. May has had 20 years experience in accounting and office work here in New Zealand of which 13 years has been with ICB.
Contact May:
P: (09) 220-2013
The fundamentals
Health and Safety
We are committed to providing a safe and healthy workplace to ensure the wellbeing of our employees, our clients, and members of the public.
Our goal is to eliminate all injuries, accidents, and incidents.
To achieve this goal we:
Make safety a priority on all of our sites
Require active participation by everyone in the business to adequately plan the work we are always carrying out and to act safely
Require the Site Safe and/or Constructsafe Passports as a minimum training standard for all our employees and subcontractors and we encourage all staff to undergo further safety training
Ensure that our regular planned inspections include monitoring of current Passports in workplaces we control.
People
We believe it’s our responsibility to work in a manner that meets the needs of today, without compromising the needs of future generations.
So that means making a commitment to our clients and our communities:
Endeavouring to exceed industry environmental best practice
Doing what’s best for the communities in which we live and work.
Leaving a legacy of craftsmanship and permanence, that enhances our local communities and provides clients with long-term quality assets.
Sustainability
Investing in our People is essential characteristic of our business. We continually work on people development to progress their career aspirations as well as negotiating effective ways to develop their capabilities so their process is meaningful and worthwhile.
We believe that we achieve a competitive advantage by developing a thriving and capable workforce.
We will achieve this by:
Developing a culture of Zero Harm to ensure that all our people return home safely to their families at the end of their working day
Leading by example and living our values:
Planning for Safety
Planning for Quality
Being Reliable
Being a Positive Team Player
Being Firm and Fair
Innovation
As a business we have made a commitment to continuous innovation to improve delivery and provide measurable, sustainability gains.
Many of the achievements we have realised in recent years have been a direct result of the innovations we have developed and incorporated into the business, namely:
EasyForms – the introduction of this highly accessible online application has enabled greater ease of onsite reporting for all staff and more accurate planning, all of which has led to significant productivity and profitability improvements.
Civilshare – is a resource optimisation tool that has enabled us to not only improve resource use, make savings and run more efficiently, but use of this digital platform has positively impacted our sustainability goals
FleetAgent – through the use of FleetAgent GPS technology, we are now better able to track all ICB plant and machinery, it’s use and by who, all of which has led to major maintenance, efficiency and safety improvements. Because FleetAgent is fully compatible with EasyForms, this also provides additional efficiencies.
The Future
Nothing stands still, so we are fully committed to continuous improvement, upgrading features and adding new functionality regularly:
We have recently incorporated machinery checklists within the EasyForms Application to ensure our plant is regularly checked before work commences and our new FleetAgent GPS system now updates EasyForms with live data.
We are currently working on integrating these applications into our job costings and creating multitude of dashboards so we can see accurately how jobs are performing in real time.
The recent introduction of group sharing functionality on the CivilShare App has better allowed us to share our excess resources within our internal teams.