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What is Offsite manufacturing
The Offsite sector, also often referred to as: Prefabricated housing, Modular building, Build offsite and Modern Methods of Construction, is in essence: Factory-built homes.
The sector typically focuses on the efficient production of “high performance steel-framed or timber framed boxes”, but all too frequently then squanders the advantages of factory-based manufacturing, by deploying traditional skills to install services (using “site trades, in a shed”).
The government have formalised the definitions as part of their Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) definitions framework. MEP4 Offsite provide solutions for Category 5 of that framework (“pre-manufactured non-structural assemblies & sub-assemblies”).
The future of Offsite manufacturing
Offsite manufacturing can revolutionise the way we build houses in the UK, improving productivity and quality, whilst reducing timescales and costs, as Henry Ford’s production methods did to automotive manufacturing in the 1910’s.
But that was 110 years ago!
In today’s automotive sector, focused designers and manufacturers of pre-designed assemblies of dashboards, air conditioning controls, NCAP-rated seats and airbags, serve multiple customers across the sector. The evolution of the automotive supply chain since Henry Ford’s time provides a useful roadmap for the way forward for the development of the UK Offsite sector.
