Offsite construction is characterized by an integrated planning and supply chain optimization strategy.
Prefabrication of building components has been ongoing since the industrial revolution, especially with the adoption of the balloon frame construction method in the 1830s.
In 1930, the Empire State building, one of the most famous skyscrapers in New-York City, was built essentially off site, in the record time of one year and 45 days.
[3] After the Second World War, Walter Gropius and Konrad Wachsmann drew a new type of prefabricated single-family house, based on a grid of wooden panels and a seamless metal assembly.
As a result, in 2020, the UK Department for Education announced a 3 £billion investment to build one hundred and twenty off-site schools in four years.
[10] Led by current research drawing attention to the industry’s potential, Melbourne School of Engineering and the Centre for Advanced Manufacturing of Prefabricated Housing wants to grow the prefab market share within the Australian construction industry from five per cent to 15 per cent by 2025.
[13] TopHat is a British start-up born in 2019, it conceives modular buildings made of recycled and bio sourced materials.
[10] In Germany, the largest residential property company, Vonovia, with €33 billion under management, delivered its first modular operation of 38 homes on the outskirts of Wiesbaden, a city of 300,000 inhabitants, in 2018.
Full Stack Modular, an American off-site player with a similar positioning, set up its main factory in Brooklyn in 2016 and has been operating it ever since.