Barbour ABI have announced that Willmott Dixon has awarded them a multi-year contract as their exclusive construction intelligence provider following a robust process that included extensive evaluation of the market and a detailed comparison against the incumbent provider. As well as access to Barbour ABI, the market-leading construction intelligence platform,
Barbour ABI has completed its latest snap analysis of construction industry performance for January, finding a mixed result across planning with a strong start for contract awards but slower performance across earlier planning stages. Notably, residential planning approvals and applications fell to just £2.7bn and £3.6bn respectively against £3.4bn and
Oxford City Council have approved plans for three new buildings on The Oxford Science Park (TOSP), totalling over 400K sq ft. Designed by Scott Brownrigg, each building will provide headquarters – office and laboratory facilities – for leading science and technology companies. The Oxford Science Park is majority owned by
The Nemetschek Group, a leading global software provider for the AEC/O and media & entertainment industries, announced today their investment in the start-up Preoptima, a carbon hub for the built environment. This investment further expands the Nemetschek Group’s venture strategy of driving sustainability and innovation in the construction industry. Preoptima’s
Those responsible for the safety of high-rise residential buildings in England have six months from April to register with the new Building Safety Regulator. The Building Safety Regulator was established to protect high-rise residents from unsafe building practices in England in response to the Grenfell Tower fire. Under the Building
The Keystone Group, the UK’s largest steel lintel manufacturer has launched a new and exciting education initiative to help cement the future of brickwork students across the UK and Ireland. Serving as an enterprising response to the current building industry skills shortfall, ‘Keyskills’ showcases a wide range of construction methods
Brick is the traditional building material in the UK and although architectural styles may come and go, brick seems to be a constant. There are however limitations to the use of whole bricks, particularly as they require a lot of energy to manufacture. The increase in the cost of energy
Telecoms business to consolidate its office space within newly refurbished, all-electric 3 Sheldon Square British Land has signed an agreement to lease 83,000 sq ft of space over seven floors to Virgin Media O2 at 3 Sheldon Square, a newly refurbished office building at Paddington Central, which will act as
Hexagon’s Asset Lifecycle Intelligence division, a global leader in digital reality solutions, has today unveiled a new release of its GT STRUDL® 41 software. GT STRUDL is a structural engineering software that offers a complete design solution to create safe and effective designs while managing the complexity of many different
The construction sector is facing multiple challenges – some historic such as low productivity, others more recent such as environmental impact and a lack of lifecycle information. But why is it imperative to think of the ‘end’ right at the design stages to enhance the sustainability value chain? Richard Hipkiss,
Barbour ABI have announced that Willmott Dixon has awarded them a multi-year contract as their exclusive construction intelligence provider following a robust process that included extensive evaluation of the market and a detailed comparison against the incumbent provider. As well as access to Barbour ABI, the market-leading construction intelligence platform, this also includes a new suite of enterprise tools and dashboards providing insights and analysis designed to support the tier one contractor with strategic planning. Andrew Geldard, chief communications officer, Willmott Dixon commented: “Our decision to partner with Barbour ABI was based on a number of key criteria. Firstly, we required an intelligence solution that enabled our business development teams to benefit from the information provided by Barbour ABI’s service. This meant providing detailed feedback from all key stakeholders to ensure we have a bespoke service tailored to our specific requirements from a regional level through to the executive board. “Also, we were impressed with Barbour ABI’s expert support, from the needs analysis through to contract. As we navigate the current uncertain economic conditions, we are looking forward to working with an intelligence partner who will serve our needs now and into the future.” Simon Mahoney, group director at Barbour ABI said: “We are delighted to have the opportunity to work closely with Willmott Dixon. This is a company with such incredible heritage but also one that is ahead of its game in the way they interpret and use big data. “As the UK-market leading provider of construction intelligence and insights, we will provide unparalleled access to a data set providing key insights on their markets, competitors, and trends, and ultimately ensure their strategic planning is based on the highest quality intelligence out there. I am proud of our continued commitment and investment in creating innovative client centric solutions that are so highly regarded by organisations with the pedigree of Willmott Dixon.” Find out more about Barbour ABI at barbour-abi.com. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Barbour ABI has completed its latest snap analysis of construction industry performance for January, finding a mixed result across planning with a strong start for contract awards but slower performance across earlier planning stages. Notably, residential planning approvals and applications fell to just £2.7bn and £3.6bn respectively against £3.4bn and £4.2bn averages in 2022. This highlights the continued impact of the cost-of-living crisis and suggests annual house-building targets may come under threat. Barbour ABI Chief Economist Tom Hall explained: “Contract awards were £7.4bn in January: a positive rebound after December’s disappointing £5bn. The main contributors to the strong performance were the residential and industrial sectors, with £2.6bn and £1.6bn respectively. Only the commercial sector performed below the historical average, falling back by 18% to £600m following a good finish to 2022. However, January is often a good month and there remain many headwinds to contend with. “Planning approvals experienced a weak start to the year, falling 34% to just £6.5bn, driven by large falls in industrial and infrastructure. Meanwhile, underlying activity for planning applications fell at the end of 2022 with notable falls in commercially sensitive sectors, such as residential. however overall activity held up thanks to the £4.1bn Berwick Bank offshore wind farm in Scotland.” Find out more at barbour-abi.com. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Oxford City Council have approved plans for three new buildings on The Oxford Science Park (TOSP), totalling over 400K sq ft. Designed by Scott Brownrigg, each building will provide headquarters – office and laboratory facilities – for leading science and technology companies. The Oxford Science Park is majority owned by Magdalen College, Oxford, and is at the heart of its strategy to support discovery, innovation and entrepreneurship. The project team consists of Architects and Interior Designers – Scott Brownrigg, Project Managers – Bidwells, MEP Consultants – Hoare Lea, Structural Engineers – Campbell Reith, Planners – Savills, Cost Consultants – Alinea and Ecologists – MK Ecology, Landscapers – McFarlane Associates. The strong performance of the office and lab markets over the last six months highlights the potential of science and tech for the UK economy. The expansion plans of fast-growing science companies have been stalled as they wait for available laboratory stock to come forward. The Oxford Science Park’s 86,000 sq ft Iversen Building, due for completion in summer 2023, is the next laboratory building to complete in Oxford versus demand for nearly 2 million sq ft in Oxford and Cambridge, according to Bidwells’ latest research. Plots 23-26 on The Oxford Science Park are part of long-term, ambitious development plans to help meet this demand through the creation of exemplary additional office and laboratory space over the next three years. This additional capacity will support the growth of existing occupiers, providing flexibility with their space requirements, and enabling new companies to join the Park’s unique community. In reinforcing Oxford’s position as a world-leading centre for scientific discovery and invention, the buildings are designed to the highest quality with wellbeing, biodiversity and sustainability at the heart of the design process. Walkable pedestrian areas are key to the design. The four-storey buildings will feature active frontages with cafés and co-working spaces at ground level, and define a range of external working and amenity spaces between them. The below podium parking is screened from the pedestrian realm by active frontages and massing. The landscape design creates a fully biodiverse habitat featuring native species and improving the existing condition, whilst brown roofs where possible are being included on each building. Careful modelling of each building’s orientation and facade ensures excellent levels of internal natural light, with passive design principles that reduce the need for cooling as much as possible. Use of steel and cement based materials within the buildings is minimised while the design itself is highly adaptable, and can be demountable and redesigned for future re-use. Use of stairs is promoted rather than lifts to encourage not only physical wellbeing but serendipitous interactions, critical in research and collaboration. ‘Views out’ from permanent workspaces are encouraged, with designs and internal layouts that support this feature for occupant wellbeing. Rory Maw, CEO of The Oxford Science Park, said, “Following very constructive discussions with Oxford City Council, we are delighted to have planning permission for these three new high performance laboratory and office buildings on Plots 23-26. I’d like to thank our occupiers and the local community for their support and everyone on the project team for their hard work towards this important milestone. With The Iversen Building due for completion this summer and plans for the Ellison Institute on Plot 18 submitted for approval, The Oxford Science Park is securing its position as the leading centre of innovation activity in Oxford.” Ed Hayden, Director at Scott Brownrigg said: “This 400,000sqft laboratory development will provide much needed high specification wet lab space, securing the future of life science in Oxford. Congratulations to the entire team who worked seamlessly in a fully collaborative environment to achieve this design permission in record time.” Richard Todd, Head of Oxford at Bidwells said: “There’s a desperate need to deliver this specialist space in the coming 18 months. Global demand for Oxford labs hit record levels in 2022 with our own research identifying 860,000 sq ft of requirements from life science and technology companies. In response, the team has worked tirelessly to take this transformational scheme through design and an immersive planning consultation process leading to a positive determination in just under a year. We are extremely grateful for the level of collaboration and engagement with both the community and specifically the city council whose support and thorough challenge has led to a much improved scheme and exemplar life sciences offer.” The scheme is due to start onsite in the summer of 2023, with the first stage due for completion in 2024. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
The Nemetschek Group, a leading global software provider for the AEC/O and media & entertainment industries, announced today their investment in the start-up Preoptima, a carbon hub for the built environment. This investment further expands the Nemetschek Group’s venture strategy of driving sustainability and innovation in the construction industry. Preoptima’s software is set to drive radical reductions of carbon in the built environment globally. The funding will be used to launch their WholeLifeCarbon API, which will provide uniquely accurate carbon calculations seamlessly integrated with existing workflows and toolsets. This will extend the current products, which use generative design and Artificial Intelligence to optimize carbon emissions from the earliest design onwards. “Worldwide, more than half of all people live in cities. At the same time, buildings are now responsible for 37% of global CO2 emissions. As urbanization continues, this trend will intensify. The construction industry must act and decarbonize its value chain”, states László Vértesi, Head of Industry Solutions Planning & Design Division at the Nemetschek Group. “Preoptima provides real value to our core market, the building design community, by enabling a precise assessment of full carbon impact of projects in the early design phase”, he adds. Since its launch in the second half of 2022, Preoptima has quickly achieved national and international visibility. Preoptima is an Innovative Startup Member of the UK Green Building Council (UKGBC) and has been featured in the UKGBC’s Solutions Library. Preoptima is also one of Tech Nation’s Rising Stars 5.0 City Winners. With pilot projects worldwide, Preoptima aims to accelerate its global growth to avoid carbon emissions through the building lifecycle. “Preoptima’s mission is to radically reduce CO2 emissions from the built environment, which is one of the most impactful levers for reducing emissions globally. By using generative artificial intelligence at the intersection of architecture and engineering, our solutions offer a new approach to tackling the issue of decarbonizing a whole industry,” said Aileen Ryan, co-founder and CEO of Preoptima.” Tanja Kufner, Head of Startups & Venture Investments at the Nemetschek Group, adds, “Preoptima’s cloud-based software platform that predetermines, measures, manages, and mitigates carbon emissions throughout the lifetime by using AI is tackling one of the biggest challenges for the construction industry. Their solution can be used at every stage in the building lifecycle, allowing significant and quantitative carbon discussions between all stakeholders in the built environment.” The Nemetschek Group brings a global reach as an investor in Preoptima and the investment is a perfect fit with their own solutions, such as the Vectorworks Embodied Carbon Calculator or Spacewell Energy Solutions but also with their engagement as one of the supporters of Madaster, the global cadaster for building materials. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Those responsible for the safety of high-rise residential buildings in England have six months from April to register with the new Building Safety Regulator. The Building Safety Regulator was established to protect high-rise residents from unsafe building practices in England in response to the Grenfell Tower fire. Under the Building Safety Act, high-rise residential buildings which are 18 metres tall or higher, or at least seven storeys, with two or more residential units are defined as ‘higher-risk’. Across England there are approximately 12,500 of these buildings and the new regulator will require all of them to be registered from April 2023, with a named person responsible for maintaining their safety. A new campaign aimed at owners and managers of high-rise residential buildings will highlight their new legal duties. It will call on those responsible for the safety management of higher-risk buildings to prepare for a new wave of regulatory change to ensure that they are ready to step up and comply. The registration process is a crucial stage in setting up the new building safety regime. Registering buildings in scope will be a legal requirement and owners and managers who fail to comply by October 2023 will be investigated and may face prosecution. HSE Chief Executive Sarah Albon said: “This registration process is an important step towards building a safer future for residents of high-rise buildings. We want it to be clear where responsibility for safety in these buildings lies. “As the Building Safety Regulator, we will draw from our experience to provide guidance and oversight for the industry and lay the foundation for a world-leading building safety regime, which is a part of our mission to protect people and places.” Chief Inspector of Buildings Peter Baker said: “Our message is clear – industry must raise its standards and residents of high-rise buildings in England must be kept safe. “This is a landmark moment for building safety, the information provided through registration will be an invaluable part of our crackdown on unsafe building practices. Those who are responsible for high-rise residential buildings must register; failure to do so will be against the law.” Building registration is a major step in a package of measures to ensure high-rise residential buildings are safe for residents and users. It follows the introduction of Planning Gateway One in August 2021 and will be followed by more robust building control of high-rise developments, and the certification of occupied high-rise buildings by the new Regulator. A campaign will run throughout March to help owners and managers of high-rise residential buildings prepare for their legal responsibilities. For more information, go to buildingsafety.campaign.gov.uk Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
The Keystone Group, the UK’s largest steel lintel manufacturer has launched a new and exciting education initiative to help cement the future of brickwork students across the UK and Ireland. Serving as an enterprising response to the current building industry skills shortfall, ‘Keyskills’ showcases a wide range of construction methods through free training support and materials. The initiative, involving Keystone Group’s IG Masonry Support, IG Lintels, Keyfix and Keystone Lintels brands, focuses on relieving financial pressures on education establishments to allow extra funding for the development and recruitment of bricklaying training courses. Owen Coyle, Divisional CEO within the Keystone Group, said collaboration with colleges and training facilities will be crucial to Keyskills’ success. “This is a fantastic opportunity for places of education to offer first-class training programmes and ‘skill-up’ a new generation of bricklayers,” Owen Coyle said. “The shortage of skilled tradespeople throughout the building sector as a whole is a well-known, long-standing issue. With this shortage, we want to collaborate with education establishments to relieve financial pressure and enable funds to be reallocated back into the development and recruitment of these training programmes.” Keyskills has a range of gratis benefits to support the recruitment and training process including training rigs and free product to support installation education, tours of Keystone’s manufacturing facilities, training presentations from Keystone’s technical experts, awards and event sponsorship, free merchandise and equipment and more. According to the Construction Skills Network, the UK needs to recruit 1,450 more bricklayers per year over the next five years to keep pace with building demands. But building to the requisite standard is more than a numbers game, particularly as poor brickwork has been the foremost issue on new-build inspection reports for the past decade. Therefore, instilling the right skillset in youngsters aiming to take-up this most traditional and vital of trades will be essential to delivering properties that perform as-designed. Owen Coyle continued: “In the months and years to come, we hope Keyskills will have played a meaningful part in supporting the recruitment and training of the bricklayers we need to meet our future building needs. We look forward to hearing from education partners who are keen to join us on this exciting journey.” Don’t miss out on this unique training opportunity, click here to find out how you can take part in the Keyskills initiative. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Brick is the traditional building material in the UK and although architectural styles may come and go, brick seems to be a constant. There are however limitations to the use of whole bricks, particularly as they require a lot of energy to manufacture. The increase in the cost of energy as a result of the war in Ukraine has had a dramatic impact on brick manufacturers and led to some significant price increases. In addition, the need to improve sustainability in construction means alternatives to whole bricks are being sought to reduce the embedded energy of projects. One such alternative to whole bricks is extruded brick slips. Made from natural clay and fired like traditional bricks, extruded brick slips are manufactured as thin slips or tiles requiring only 30-40% of the energy used to manufacture whole bricks, which is quite a substantial reduction in energy consumption. Furthermore, manufactured brick slips are usually around 15mm thick and are packed up to 3000 slips to a pallet as opposed to up to 600 whole bricks to a pallet. This means fewer pallets of brick slips will be required to cover a given area compared with traditional bricks, reducing associated transport costs. Eurobrick Systems have been supplying brick slip cladding systems for over 30 years and have witnessed first-hand the growth in the market for brick slips. Their Britannia range is a selection of kiln fired natural clay brick slips that provide excellent quality and great value, offering a wide range of colours and textures to choose from. Suitable for both exterior and interior projects, the smooth finish and clean edges of some brick slips in this range complement contemporary designs while others offer the more traditional aesthetic that is always in demand. With this wide-ranging collection, there is something to suit all projects. Manufactured in standard UK metric sizes, the nominal size of the Britannia range brick slip is 215mm in length by 65mm height with a thickness of just 14-15mm. Corner pieces are also available and nominally measure 215 x 65 x 100 x 14-15mm. Eurobrick also have a specially formulated pointing mortar called Europoint which is designed for bag or gun injection into the joints of its brick slip cladding systems. Europoint is available in 8 colours to contrast with or complement the brick choice. Eurobrick’s systems and brick slips provide a low maintenance, durable finish that is virtually indistinguishable from traditional brickwork. If you would like to discuss your project or brick slip requirements in more detail, please call them on 0117 971 7117 or you can find out more about Eurobrick’s systems and products at www.eurobrick.co.uk. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Telecoms business to consolidate its office space within newly refurbished, all-electric 3 Sheldon Square British Land has signed an agreement to lease 83,000 sq ft of space over seven floors to Virgin Media O2 at 3 Sheldon Square, a newly refurbished office building at Paddington Central, which will act as the telecoms company’s new headquarters. The deal takes the building to 60% let, ahead of its opening in February 2024. 3 Sheldon Square is currently undergoing a full refurbishment, significantly reducing the embodied carbon in the development through retention and reuse of the existing structure and materials. The building will be all electric, including the installation of air source heat pumps, which will reduce operational energy demand by over 40%, well ahead of British Land’s 2030 target to improve building energy intensity by 25%. In addition, new terraces, improving the façade and amenity of the building, will be installed overlooking Sheldon Square. The refurbishment will deliver a BREEAM Excellent certification and is targeting an EPC rating of A. An extensive upgrade to the public realm at Paddington Central is also underway to enhance the landscaping across the site, while works are ongoing to comprehensively update the amphitheatre, revitalising the central part of the campus for all visitors to enjoy. Darren Richards, Head of Real Estate at British Land, said: “As businesses re-evaluate their workspace requirements in the wake of the pandemic, demand is clearly moving towards high quality, sustainable space in central locations with excellent amenities. Virgin Media O2’s decision to consolidate its team at the newly refurbished 3 Sheldon Square reflects this trend, and underlines the appeal of Paddington Central and our London campuses to innovative businesses.” David Walker, Chief Operating Officer at British Land, said: “This is a fantastic example of our sustainability strategy in action, limiting embodied carbon through retaining the original building while delivering best in class space and improving energy efficiency. This fully refurbished scheme is well ahead of our 2030 target of a 25% improvement in whole building energy efficiency and lowers operational costs for our customers.” Rodney Hogg, Director of Property, Facilities, Fleet and Energy at Virgin Media O2 commented: “By investing in a brand new, connected and state-of-the-art office space, we’re creating even better opportunities for our people to come together, work and collaborate. This purpose-built space, just a short train ride from our other major site in Reading, offers brilliant connectivity and impressive sustainability credentials helping us deliver for both our people and the planet.” 3 Sheldon Square is a 140,000 sq ft office building located at Paddington Central, an 11 acre London campus. Situated next to Paddington Station and the Grand Union Canal, the campus benefits from a central London location, proximity to excellent transport links including the London Underground, mainline rail, Heathrow Express and the Elizabeth Line, as well as exciting cafes, restaurants and bars. Virgin Media O2 has a major office in Green Park, Reading, just a short train ride from the new location in Paddington, meaning staff will be able to move quickly and easily between the two core sites when Sheldon Square opens. British Land owns Paddington Central in a Joint Venture with GIC. Prior to this partnership, British Land invested £100 million into transforming the campus including upgrading the public realm, developing an additional office building and boosting the retail and leisure offering. It is home to leading global businesses across technology, telecoms and pharmaceutical industries including Microsoft, Visa and Prudential, as well as restaurant and operators Vagabond Wines, Pergola Paddington, Wagamama and London Shell Co. Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
Hexagon’s Asset Lifecycle Intelligence division, a global leader in digital reality solutions, has today unveiled a new release of its GT STRUDL® 41 software. GT STRUDL is a structural engineering software that offers a complete design solution to create safe and effective designs while managing the complexity of many different scenarios across a range of industries, including power, civil engineering, marine, and infrastructure. To meet structural steel and concrete design requirements, structural engineers need to comply with applicable codes and regulations. While the ASCE 7-22 Code is the latest published version, many engineers are still required to comply with the requirements of ASCE 7-16 or ASCE 7-10. With this new version, engineers can build, assess and report on structural systems of any size in accordance with more than 25 international structural code standards, including: This new version fully integrates Smart 3D, ISIP, CAESAR II, CADWorx Structure, Dimensional Solutions MAT 3D, and SDS/2. Learn more If you wish to see the new release in more depth, you can watch this on-demand webinar or to see the solution and capabilities in action, our YouTube ‘How To Design with Hexagon’s Asset Lifecycle Intelligence division’ playlist which has 10 different videos on how to leverage GT STRUDL. “This new release of GT STRUDL has been designed to help engineers deliver unparalleled safety across a range of critical industries. It will help them improve the accuracy and reliability of structural systems and ensure compliance with all codes and regulations while enhancing collaboration between structural engineers, designers, and pipe stress engineers,” says Ravindra Ozarker, Senior Product Owner at Hexagon. “The new version also includes updated internal tools, greater integration with popular design software, and expanded functionality, making it more user-friendly than ever.“ Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals
The construction sector is facing multiple challenges – some historic such as low productivity, others more recent such as environmental impact and a lack of lifecycle information. But why is it imperative to think of the ‘end’ right at the design stages to enhance the sustainability value chain? Richard Hipkiss, Development Director of the Modular and Portable Building Association (MPBA) explains. Progress has been slow but now with the advances in digital technology and new construction techniques such as design for deconstruction (DfD), design for reuse (DfR) and the one gaining most traction – design for manufacture and assembly (DfMA), we are finally making great strides in modernising the construction industry. These three disciplines can be difficult to implement in site based approaches however the stringent management and digital protocols within volumetric modular design and manufacturing processes create the ideal environment to optimise their use. The UK government has been promoting volumetric modular construction as a method that can improve productivity, but modular technology can help deliver sustainability gains throughout the entire construction value chain. At present the focus is concentrated on using volumetric technology to improve resource efficiency upstream at the design, manufacturing, and construction phases. This appears to be detached from the need to promote resource efficiency and productivity at the stages occurring downstream – disassembly and end-of-life management. Such divergence could hamper the construction industry’s efforts to reduce its long term environmental and economic impacts and points to the need of an integrated, holistic approach to improving the sustainability value chain as an end-to-end concept. What are the benefits throughout the entire construction value chain? Volumetric modular construction does indeed offer multiple benefits upstream, including ease of constructability, increasing quality and reducing time of construction as well as the capacity to cope with skilled labour shortages and creating much safer working environments. Most importantly, it can substantially reduce construction waste generated onsite via promoting resource efficiency at the manufacture and installation stages. But the efficacy of this construction method to yield benefits downstream at the end-of-life has received comparatively little attention. Advances made in the UK towards improving productivity in the construction sector via the application of volumetric modular technology and digitalisation are well documented, however as the trade body for the sector, the MPBA also needs to shine a light on the opportunity to improve sustainability performance throughout the value chain from concept to end-of life. Design for manufacture and assembly, design for deconstruction and design for reuse protocols are an exemplary way of connecting upstream and downstream construction stages and can be used as a means to actively apply sustainability principles. The digitally enabled volumetric construction model has the potential to capture and record this valuable lifecycle data. The rise of digital technology offers an opportunity to bring business transformation in the construction sector and promote a new way of doing things; effectively enabling transformative change which will enhance the sustainability credentials of volumetric manufactured buildings. Implementing smart modular regimes to mitigate the impact of climate change As the construction sector develops and adapts to meet changing government strategies to enhance sustainability credentials, I firmly believe the upward trajectory of volumetric modular buildings will continue and we need to act now to help mitigate the impact of climate change. A smart volumetric modular construction regime can operationalise the collection and storage of components’ lifecycle information, and help the sector build the capabilities needed to support the maintenance, recovery and reuse of modular components, and reduction of waste. For this to take precedence it is imperative to think of the ‘end’ right at the beginning of the design stage and foster improved collaboration between all construction partners involved in the supply chain. MPBA The Modular and Portable Building Association plays a key role in supporting all sections of the industry. Leading best practice principles and specialist training schemes, the association is represented on many committees for the benefit of members. Most importantly, the MPBA ensure evolving government policies and decisions are not made on behalf of the construction industry without due consideration for the impact they may have on the volumetric modular sector. Founded in 1938, with an in-depth understanding of the industry, the MPBA has represented this advanced and highly innovative sector for over 80 years. www.mpba.biz Building, Design & Construction Magazine | The Choice of Industry Professionals