Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Our first question comes from Barry Bannister from Stifel Nicolaus, please proceed.
Barry Bannister – Stifel Nicolaus
Hi guys, it’s actually Robert Connors in for Barry, how are you? Just real quick, taking the fossil and nuclear ex charges, I noticed the gross profit margin was actually up a 7.6% above the 7.2 in the previous quarter. So you know looking at what the possibility of your bookings in nuclear and the possible RWE, how good is the profitability in contract in terms of those awards and what’s in backlog versus that sort of core 7.6% gross profit margin?
Jim Bernhard
I don’t think we’ve given, that would put us where we would have to give, we’ve never given profit per contract, I don’t think we need to do that at this time.
Barry Bannister – Stifel Nicolaus
Well you are seeing better contract in terms of the environment and I guess more of a shift towards less risk mitigation on the E&C?
Jim Bernhard
Absolutely.
Barry Bannister – Stifel Nicolaus
And then for my second question, when do you think we will start to see the ramp if everything goes according to schedule with those awards by say the end of fiscal 2008 and for those nuclear awards, is that all that’s left or could we see more to come down the pipeline on just those three projects?
Jim Bernhard
Certainly on the awards for nuclear plants, that’s certainly the beginning and the market is very robust, not only in this country but other countries as well and I think the first ones are always the most difficult to get everybody in line to manage their regulated base expectations et cetera on pricing et cetera.
But I think reading through the awards, when we have a company like Southern Company, one of the larger utilities in the United States and one of the fastest growing markets, come in again to nuclear work, I think that that is a bigger key driver than most. And we look for awards not only in this country but other countries for the next decade to come.
Barry Bannister – Stifel Nicolaus
Okay, thank you.
Operator
The next question comes from Brian Chin from Citi, please proceed.
Brian Chin – Citigroup
Hi, good morning. Question on the Southern contract, I was speaking with Southern yesterday and they reiterated to me that they have an in house E&C unit that they expect to do a fair amount of the nuclear work, how do I square that comment with the earlier statement in this presentation that there was $4 billion per backlog per contract, what am I missing here? Because it sounds like this $4 billion per contract in backlog for each of these nuclear awards, then it sounds like you guys are getting most of the work. How do I think about that?
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