Centres of Excellence

The construction industry is in a state of flux with the demands of changing demographics, housing pressures, economic change and technological developments on an unprecedented scale. A range of facilities across the UK are training and informing new entrants to the industry. Here we feature a few leading centres of excellence and change management.

ADVANCED MANUFACTURING RESEARCH CENTRE (AMRC)

One of the leading facilities in the UK helping manufacturers to become more competitive and attuned to advanced
technologies and processes is the University of Sheffield’s AMRC – jointly founded with Boeing in 2001 and now getting to grips with construction industry. “They realise that the future has to be in smarter, offsite manufacturing where they can exploit digital technologies such as Augmented and Virtual Reality, along with robotics and automation driven by edge analytics and big data,’’ says Allan Griffin Head of Construction and Infrastructure
Strategy at the AMRC. “Our challenge at the AMRC is to help the construction industry get the maximum value out of industrial digitalisation and advanced manufacturing, driving improvements in productivity and quality along with improved health, safety and wellbeing, as we are doing with our aerospace and automotive partners. We may be part of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult but high value does not mean high cost.

Our solutions work as well for small offsite modular manufacturers as they do for the bigger players and need not cost the earth.”

For more information visit: www.amrc.co.uk

THE CONSTRUCTION SCOTLAND INNOVATION CENTRE (CSIC)

CSIC supports Scotland’s construction related businesses to innovate, collaborate and grow by matching innovation requirements with business support and academic specialists. Focusing on business, product, process and service forms of innovation they offer advice, funding, facilitation and access to the appropriate expertise, improving Scotland’s global competitiveness and growing economic impact. They also facilitate collaboration with Scottish businesses, academia (through 13 partner universities) and public sector organisations, enabling businesses to benefit from Scotland’s skills, expertise and fair approach to business in areas such as Infrastructure delivery, offsite construction, low carbon solutions, architecture and retrofit. Its £2 million state-of-the-art 35,000 sq.ft prototype, testing and training facility opened in 2017 and is located at Hamilton International Technology Park in Lanarkshire, near Glasgow.

For more information visit: www.cs-ic.org/innovationcentre

OFFSITE MANAGEMENT SCHOOL (OMS)

The Offsite Management School was launched in March 2015 as an example of new thinking to help bridge the skills gap. A free virtual learning environment for people to sign up, carry out a simple self-assessment and receive an action plan of 10 things to learn, re-assess and get another 10 things, and another 10, and another 10. It is a great way to learn at your own pace, at a time and in a place of your choosing. It’s learning for the’ iPad generation’. The School provides FREE practical support in the form of CPD accredited e-learning modules and training workshops, tailored self-assessment tools and action plans, benchmarking tools, networking opportunities and access to thousands of online resources. Ian Heptonstall, Director of the Supply Chain School, believes that: “To transform the construction industry into one that can crank out massproduced components to be assembled in different ways to make different buildings will require root-and-branch reform of the way we look at skills.”

For more information visit: www.supplychainschool.co.uk/uk/offsite/construction/home.aspx

To view this article in Offsite Magazine, visit: Offsite Magazine Issue 12