Building products group Boral has been promising its 80,000 shareholders riches for the past six years from the enormous infrastructure spending underway by governments in Australia and the United States.

But there have been endless disappointments. New chief executive Zlatko Todorcevski, who took over on July 1 and is triggering big structural changes in the overseas operations of the group, is determined to lift returns across the vast network of concrete operations, quarries and building products businesses in Australia.