Scottish construction firms will gain access to more than £2m-worth of 3D printers, robotic devices and virtual reality kit following the launch of a major new centre for construction innovation next month.
The £9m Construction Scotland Innovation Centre (CSIC) aims to connect 31,000-plus businesses in the Scottish building industry with researchers at 11 Scottish universities in an effort to drive innovation and improve efficiency in the sector.
The venture is funded by the Scottish Funding Council with support from Scottish Enterprise and Highlands & Islands Enterprise and launches in Glasgow on 7 October at the Construction Scotland annual conference. Edinburgh Napier University will carry out the administration of the centre.
CSIC will give firms that are short on capital a chance to develop their ideas, said Bill McBride, interim chairman: “We have around £2m of prototyping equipment available to projects that receive funding, some of which will be placed in our own building – the location of which is still to be announced – and some in universities. The plan is to enable innovation ideas to be realised much faster using technologies that companies need but don’t necessarily have the financial support to afford.”
McBride and his colleagues are currently in the process of assessing innovation project ideas from firms.
The Centre has a total funding pot of over £9m, which it expects to be matched by investment from other funding agencies, such as Horizon 2020 and the Technology Strategy Board, and funding from the construction firms taking part.
“We are looking to leverage the investment we have, at a ratio of 1:2.5 or 1:3, by tagging into other funding agencies and employer funds. For example SCIC might put in £300,000 for a single project, but the overall project value might be £750,000. Our overall £9m funding might leverage £22.5m to £25m investment in total,” McBride explained.
Projects already approved for funding include an advanced offsite fabrication research project that will look at developing techniques to produce large sections of buildings in factory conditions. “We want to take offsite to a whole new level, and look at the construction of large 11-13 storey buildings offsite, this isn’t about just tweaking current processes by a few percent,” McBride added.
The SCIC is likely to be housed in a leased premises in Scotland, or share a building with one of eight other innovation centres being set up by the Scottish Funding Council.
“Our vision is that, in a number of years, we will build innovation into the DNA of firms, for example companies will employ an innovation manager and see this role as just as important as an HR manager,” said McBride. “This will be a challenge because the construction industry in Scotland is very fragmented, there are numerous building bodies and over 130,000 employees, but it is worth £9bn to £10bn a year, so the possibilities for innovation are huge.”
There are four areas of innovation research being funded: “People” will fund MSc and PhD programmes on innovation in construction at universities; “Process” will focus on how building projects function and methods of streamlining processes to create a better product with either lower cost or higher quality, or both; “Products” will cover construction product innovations.
A fourth category will aim to combine the other three as part of a long-term effort to change the way the industry thinks about innovation and harnesses available resources.
One research partner, Glasgow Caledonian University’s School of Engineering and Built Environment, has said it hopes to support industrial partners with the adoption of BIM, improved energy efficiency and material testing through the use of its unique Environmental Chambers.
