The Case for Industrialization of the Construction Industry

This post is an excerpt from the paper, “Industrialization of the Construction Industry,” by Dr. Perry Daneshgari and  Dr. Heather Moore of  MCA Inc.

Like many other industries the construction industry is under constant pressure to improve productivity, reduce cost, and minimize waste in the operation.

While the productivity in the manufacturing industry has improved by four hundred percent (400%) over the last century, the construction industry’s productivity has, in the best case, stayed flat or turned negative.

Click to tweet: “Problem: over the 100 yrs productivity in the #AEC
industry has, in the best case, stayed flat. Solution: industrialization”

One main reason for the improvement of the manufacturing and other industries’ productivity is the “Industrialization” of those industries. Industrialization of any industry will rely on the following five factors:

1. Management of Labor
2. Management of work
3. Lean Operations
4. Modeling and Simulation
5. Feedback from the source

The driver for establishing and applying industrialization in manufacturing was the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Currently no known association is leading this mission in the construction industry.

A marked result of the advancement in productivity of the manufacturing industry is the relative price of an automobile.  Whilst the cost of an automobile has gone from 140% in 1910 of the average national per capita income in the United States down to 33% in 2012, the cost of an average dwelling has gone up from 333% to 619% of per capita income during the same period.

Click to tweet: “Since 1910 automobile production cost decreased
75%. Production cost of a dwelling has doubled. Time to industrialize”

This post is an excerpt from the white paper, “Industrialization of the Construction Industry,” by Dr. Perry Daneshgari and Dr. Heather Moore. Commissioned by Dassault Systemes and prepared by MCA Inc., this whitepaper focuses on industrialization of construction industry. It maps out the construction industry challenges, relates the history of industrialization in the manufacturing industry, and summarizes five critical aspects and approaches.

Download the whitepaper and start accelerating the “Industrialization of the Construction Industry” through lessons learned from manufacturing and other industries.

Click to tweet this article

Related resources:

Lean Construction Industry Solution Experience

Download Lean Construction Solution Brief

White Paper: Industrialization of the Construction Industry

MCA® Website

Categories: AEC, Dassault Systèmes, Industrialized Construction, Lean Construction

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