Boosting construction productivity at scale through industrialised construction

Getting one’s house in order as a country is difficult when doing so requires a vast number of new homes – and a grand delivery plan.

Population growth, a nationwide embrace of urbanisation and evolving societal conditions mean demand for housing has reached a critical point. Increasing supply through the construction of new units in a more sustainable fashion is crucial but rapidly expanding the amount of housing stock presents complex challenges for those in its construction sector.

Cost, quality, scalability, sustainability, and speed requirements – all of which at times can be complex or conflicting – risk walling in the most creative of developers’ minds. As if those are not enough to deal with, there are also other factors to contend with, including resource availability, safety, and environmental impacts.

Industrialised construction represented a potential solution to these issues. It is a more efficient and effective production method than traditional approaches as it involves creating standardised components off-site in controlled factory settings. When used in conjunction with traditional methods, the results can be transformative.

Benefits from economies of scale mean costs can fall by as much as 20%, while quality control is also improved. Industrialised construction can also slash building timelines, potentially up to 50%, as prefabricated components can be developed in parallel with traditional on-site work.

Hyphen was tasked to assist the client develop a perspective on how to employ industrialised construction at scale. To do this, we explored the existing vision and looked for opportunities for improvement.

The ultimate end goal: To deliver a robust viewpoint that would clarify the potential of this technology for this organisation and the journey ahead.

One of the big decisions facing construction firms that utilise industrialised construction is the question of which type of components to invest in and produce, with three options commonly open to adopters:

• 2D prefabricated structures – these flat panels are elements of a larger build, such as ceilings, walls and floors, and are pieced together on-site.
• 3D prefabricated volumetric structures – these might include completed rooms or entire sections of a building that are stacked or arranged on delivery.
• 2D/3D hybrid prefabricated structures – this involves a combination of flat panels (2D elements) and 3D units to form a complete structure.

A comprehensive benchmarking exercise revealed best practices elsewhere and lay out the benefits and drawbacks that come with each approach to industrialised construction.

All in all, the review revolved around looking at five key areas in a bid to ascertain whether the client’s ambitious goal of building vast numbers of homes within less than a decade was achievable and what would need to change to realise it. These were:

• Scalability – are there examples of using industrialised construction at scale to produce residential units in the quantities needed?
• Technology – should the client continue investing in 2D panels or would creating more 3D modules deliver productivity benefits?
• Sourcing – could the client develop its own off-site production infrastructure to increase the supply of pre-cast modules and hit cost targets?
• Timeline – how can off-site production meet the nation’s needs and deadline?
• Regulation – would developing 3D modules for residential units comply with national building codes?

A benchmarking exercise looked at production methods and case studies in key markets around the globe. This meant examining construction trends, material usage, strategic decisions taken by industrialised construction-centric companies and more. Doing so painted a comprehensive picture of best practice and what changes could be easily implemented.

The feasibility of the manufacture option was in turn affected by capital expenditure demands, annual build capacity, the area of land needed, construction time and break-even requirements for each factory. Further analysis was conducted to reveal the associated costs, potential profitability and other key financial metrics based on projected annual production.

The work generated over the month working on this project included a review of the client’s existing approach and a useful breakdown of industrialised construction best practice looking at other organisations around the world. We also leveraged several specialists with high-level experience in real estate development, strategy, construction management and process optimisation to ensure that the perspective we presented would be actionable and implementable.

We have continued developing our capabilities around industrialised construction by collaborating with global innovators in this field as we strongly believe this will be a major transformation engine in the wider architecture, engineering, and construction space in the Middle East.