Insights from Outside of the Industry 

With so much activity happening across the Irish and UK construction market at the moment, it would be easy to focus all of our innovation efforts and business ‘future-proofing’ on responding to these immediate and visible trends. However, from our island base, it is important to raise our collective heads every so often and take notice of trends emerging from other continents and, most interestingly, from other industries.

Second only to the healthcare industry, all of the functions that contribute to the built environment (or the planning, construction and property industries) have the greatest level of impact on the world’s population. Given the sheer scale of the problems and the subsequent scale of opportunity, innovation is inevitable. It might be helpful here to point out the two overarching sources of innovation, these are (1) endemic, meaning that they are solutions designed specifically for this industry, like BIM technologies and (2) non-endemic, which refers to solutions that are designed for other industries yet can be readily applied to the built environment, like virtual reality and augmented reality.

One of the greatest shifts that we are seeing in construction at the moment is the move towards offsite manufacturing. The UK industry is, perhaps, the world leader in this, well ahead of the US. Of course, some of the most impactful innovations have come from the Middle East and Asian countries. While we refer to the UK as being a world leader in offsite manufacturing (OSM), it is noteworthy that the foremost offsite technologies consultants are, in fact, based in Ireland – as are several of the top manufacturers, however, their solutions are being deployed primarily across the private rented sector (PRS) in the UK. This is a clear example of non-endemic innovation, where the principles of manufacturing – processes and systems for consistent outcomes – are being applied to revolutionise traditional construction activities.

Earlier this week, Amazon (the online bookseller-turned-retail behemoth we all know, love and, more importantly, use) announced its investment in Plant Prefab, a startup company focused on modular homes and smart home technology. Amazon’s artificial intelligence, or AI-enabled voice product Alexa has already started to infiltrate homes all over the world. This latest development suggests a potential new avenue of smart home development, experimentation and global expansion. It is telling that this multi-billion dollar business, with a credible history of predicting (creating?) trends and causing transformational consumer shifts around the globe, believes that factory-built homes can address the challenge of affordability, construction delays and labour shortages with online technology, new building systems, and automation. As always, we would love to hear your thoughts on how you see the industry progressing.

Ian Lawlor
086 3625482

Director / Business Development
Lotus Investment Group