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*Winner - Best Tech Podcast - 2025 Quill Podcast Awards*
British Columbia is experiencing an unprecedented housing crisis. While addressing various aspects of the housing supply chain is essential, no single approach can fully solve the challenges we face in scaling housing production. So, what's the blueprint for growth?
In November 2023, DIGITAL — Canada's Global Innovation Cluster for digital technologies — launched its Housing Growth Innovation Program with support from the Province of British Columbia through the Ministry of Housing and Municipal Affairs. The program brings together collaborative teams of industry leaders to accelerate technology-driven approaches that are driving real, tangible growth for British Columbia's housing production sector.
Amy Vilis, Director of Housing Growth Innovation at DIGITAL, chats with innovators doing groundbreaking work within DIGITAL's Housing Growth Innovation Program to develop and implement technology-based solutions within British Columbia's housing sector across the full scale of end-to-end production. These conversations showcase how ideas are making it into the real world where they can become comprehensive, viable and, best of all, achievable solutions to accelerate housing production for British Columbians.
Amy Villis (00:03)
Welcome to Blueprint for Growth, Innovation and Housing. I'm your host, Amy Villis Director of Housing Growth Innovation at Digital, Canada's global innovation cluster for digital technologies.
In today's episode, we're exploring the pre-construction and procurement phase of housing development. This stage has been particularly vulnerable to supply chain disruptions like we saw during the pandemic. From supply chain transparency issues to the need for more sustainable building practices, we'll explore how digital platforms, offsite manufacturing and innovative materials are transforming this critical phase of housing development. Municipal leaders from across British Columbia are joining forces to streamline factory-built homes,
to increase the affordable housing supply.
Mike Kennedy is the CEO of Green Metrics Technology Corp. With a PhD in business information systems and 14 years of experience in software development and consultative engagements, Mike brings a wealth of knowledge to the table. Green Metrics is currently working with digital developing the BuildBlock's platform, a groundbreaking solution for the modular housing construction sector. This platform aims to enhance operational efficiencies and increase supply chain transparency within the housing sector.
In our conversation with Mike, we'll explore various applications of the BuildBlocks platform, its impact on sustainability, and his version of the future of supply chain management in construction.
Hey Mike, let's dive into BuildBlock. This innovative system seems to be a game changer for the modular housing industry. It's not just a lightweight ERP system, but a comprehensive solution that includes design and commissioning tools. BuildBlock appears to be addressing several critical challenges in the modular manufacturing sector. By increasing supply chain transparency and minimizing production delays, it's tackling some of the most pressing issues faced by manufacturers. So hit me with it. Let's hear about BuildBlock. What is it made of?
Mike Kennedy (02:03)
There's really three main components to what we're building and they deal with along the life cycle of the modular manufacturing process. So at the design stage, there is a lot of fragmentation in the sharing of design files. And I know that federally and eventually we're starting to resolve this by moving to housing archetypes. And that's going to simplify and standardize the housing design process. But.
there's still the need to understand and iterate on designs based on new technologies, new information we have about building better, cleaner buildings. So creating what we call a design module was essentially helping those companies that don't have massive AutoCAD subscriptions, they would have access to a tool that would allow them to iterate on designs. And so that was our first component that we're working on. So in the middle component of
Buildblocks is essentially look at it like an enterprise resource planning system. So if you've got just quick books and spreadsheets, we can fill in your vendors and supplier management databases and connect those to your accounts receivable, accounts payable, generating invoices and generating RFP responses for that builder. So integrating them onto one sort of digital platform. But if you're much further along in your digital evolution and you're a much larger company,
You've got a big installation of Microsoft Dynamics. You've got an ERP. Now what you need is supply chain management support. Much like I kind of conceive of it as landing an airplane, a modular manufacturer needs to land all the major components that go into the building and they need to be there when the pick list needs to be pulled to do the construction. So much like the analogy to an airplane building a component that does traffic control for the actual components and materials that are going into the plants.
takes the burden off of the accounts managers and the plant floor operators because they can quickly see, okay, we got inventory of X, Y, and Z. We've got our vendor saying shipments are on their way. We should not expect any major delays or breakdowns in our production. And that will be a huge benefit to the industry that we would have fewer and fewer unexpected delays. And so the last component of commissioning is when the modules are craned into place and the building is assembled.
We go through and tie up the equipment inventory and the components in the building so that we're conducting long-term measurement verification on the performance of that building. Because I think we can all agree we need to build way more housing in the country, but we need to build good housing. And we need to build housing that is going to meet building codes and meet some of the other values that we hold as a society to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, create clean and safe environments.
Amy Villis (04:53)
You've taken a wonderful holistic approach going out, surveying the sector, understanding all the issues surrounding it. I do hope people that are listening to this podcast hear their pain points and how you're addressing them with the BuildBlock's project. So one of those things when we talk about modular share, we've talked about why everyone's going to live in boxes. We're not going to back to war time and bespoke is what we're all very much used to. But you know, the environmental standards, the quality of these type of products can't be forgotten and the importance of that.
So one of the big things is certification in the modular space. How is your product going to work alongside those guys and meet those requirements?
Mike Kennedy (05:34)
in the early explorations with the industry certification and bottlenecks around having good certification, the costliness of maintaining certification. And so one thing I learned early on, hopefully listeners can appreciate this, CSA kind of has two sides to the business. There's the CSA standard setting side. So A277 is the standard that CSA set for modular construction. And then there's the inspection side. And that's where they come into plants and inspect
that the company is following the standard. And so on the company side, the manufacturing side, they need to be in compliant with A277. And then there's two inspectors that predominantly do the inspection for the CSA277 standard, which is Intratech and CSA. CSA has come in as a partner in our project and they need a digital tool to enhance their inspections.
and that by building the inspection tool for the inspector, we have everything that we need to inform the modular manufacturer of what they need to do to meet and be compliant ready so that we can streamline that inspections are really about checking that all of the boxes and that the checklists are completed and not a scramble by the company to try to meet their compliance and run the risk that they won't meet compliance and just take that sort of out of the equation of as a potential bottleneck.
Amy Villis (06:59)
It's clear, Mike, that you've identified some key stakeholders in the modular housing ecosystem. I'd love to hear a little more about how those stakeholders are going to interact with BuildBlock's and the potential impact. You've highlighted the importance of some small, medium-sized modular manufacturers. And I'm wondering, how do you see your digital tools specifically addressing their needs and challenges compared to the larger, well-funded companies?
Mike Kennedy (07:24)
The first key stakeholder in this is the modular manufacturers themselves. And there is a constellation of small to medium companies out there that can be augmented to be more productive. And so as we narrow in on this, a lot of the majors that are well-funded, that are backed by major other construction companies or developers, they have digital tools and they're moving ahead on the stuff. But it's the rest of that sector that we've got to lift up. So I would even go further to say the small to medium sized manufacturers are
big stakeholders for us. Talked about CSA as a big stakeholder. The designers involved in modular housing design. We've got a situation right now where designs are held like we withhold IP and they're not like data and information that freely flows. And you understand that because the designers spend gets paid to spend their time on it. But in this future where we see more standardized design templates being widely available, still think there's a huge role
for the designers, the architects that are choosing what goes into these housing units. They ultimately are the ones that decide what is going in there. And then the modular manufacturer builds that. so informing them and having mechanisms so that they can always be on top of what is best available technologies and incorporating in their designs elements that will help the manufacturer get further along in their kit of parts development. And so those
CSA, the designers and architects and the manufacturers are really our key stakeholders. I think by bringing them by default, then the project developers themselves and the investors behind those will come in.
Amy Villis (09:04)
Can't underscore knowledge sharing more in this sector. We've seen less than adequate R &D over the years and moving the needle starts with spreading that education and somewhat best practices and some of our other partners in our programs that we're working with like Be Collective and how they're working in the sector to get AEC, the architects, engineers and contractors on board with understanding how they can do designs that downstream impact a better product.
through modular construction, offsite construction pieces is key. And then I love how the gap, you know, filled here for your product. It's one thing to take a hammer and a nail and build out a product in this sector as it's been done for many years. It's like getting that digital transparency and using the information and the data to influence change. So it's pretty, pretty remarkable.
Can you explain how your BuildBlocks application helps modular manufacturers streamline operations and ultimately boost their efficiency? And how does providing this advanced digital tool level the playing field for smaller manufacturers and impact housing production?
Mike Kennedy (10:13)
My hope is that as we're building up this product and doing our beta testing and validation, effectively the bill blocks application, the teams running it become the back office of some of these modular manufacturers that are not necessarily struggling. Well, they're struggling. Like they're trying to increase their production. And so they're challenged with how do you keep people working on the floor and following their processes and standards. And then meanwhile, they have all the other struggles of running a business that we all know about. And so
Essentially by wrapping those modular manufacturers in a digital hug, if you will, it's a design modules, a lightweight enterprise resource planning system and the commissioning tools that they can focus on their business and that we could effectively help them have all of the digital workflows that Google, that large companies running massive scale up operations have. And I think that's something that we're desperately missing in this country. And that's why digital exists.
bringing basic digital tools to this industry. And so you could see a situation where for environmental performance benefits, local job development and others, that we could partner with existing manufacturers, help them straighten out their supply chain challenges, source from lowest cost local producers that provide some of the important components, but then know that they're sourcing the best available technologies and just lift them with these digital tools. That's where I'm hoping.
It will go and it's not going to break their bank.
Amy Villis (11:47)
It sounds like you've developed a unique approach to bringing digital solutions to the modular construction industry. Can you elaborate on how your company is addressing specific challenges faced by construction firms, particularly when it comes to implementing new technologies? And why do you think construction sector has been slow to adopt digital innovations compared to other industries?
Mike Kennedy (12:07)
think it's super important because without the support of digital, we would be going to these companies who are running tight margins, who are running tight teams, and they don't have the ability to shift their focus. But they want and need what we can give them. So the fact that we can come in and figure out what they need, design to their, and this isn't, we're not creating bespoke software, we've got a standard software that gets adapted to their.
what they have already and without that major upfront cost to that. That's huge. You getting a $200,000 enterprise resource planning system, a smaller monthly fee becomes viable here and is the only way that this would work in the construction sector. I always make a joke. There's two places in our economy where it seems like technology forgot, which was agriculture and construction. We can't say that about agriculture anymore. So we got to fix construction. And I think this is the beginning.
Amy Villis (13:06)
thinking five, ten years, where do you see technology innovation, know, either way you want to look at those words, having like a really cool impact.
Mike Kennedy (13:18)
I think I would like to see that housing becomes even more commodified, that it's more accessible to everybody. And that is a scary prospect when you think of the number of resources that have to go into it, but a very uplifting prospect for people that are struggling right now. I hope we see a future where if I'm a developer or I'm looking to build my home, I'm ordering it online. I'm iterating on designs. I'm picking the components.
that I want and need. And it's shipped to my site and permits and approvals become as quick as filing your taxes, if not faster, because designs have been set. And so we cut down the timelines from really just the physical capability of assembling the parts and shipping it to site and not these huge bureaucratic delays and process delays in the industry. And I think digital tools, standardization, and then bringing back data off of
how buildings are performing and continuing to bring forward like a reinforcement learning approach to this industry will get us there. You you could be ordering your multi-unit apartment building with your condo board group all online and it's shipped with a set date and away we go.
Amy Villis (14:35)
love that. I love and I can't take credit with someone indicating construction is dead. It's all about assembly and parts. And I definitely am well impressed with the work that you guys are doing. It's really is changing the narrative and moving the needle on housing production. So thanks, Mike. You're awesome.
Mike Kennedy (14:53)
Thanks, Amy. And I really appreciate the support of digital because like I said, we could not pull this off without that support.
CLIP
Rahib Zahnan is the managing director and senior vice president of construction at West Group Properties based in Vancouver, Canada. Rabih's focus on technology and innovation in construction reflects his ambition to disrupt the construction industry and real estate sector. West Group is currently working with Digital on an exciting project involving offsite prefabricated steel studs and wall panels for cost-effective and sustainable housing construction.
Our discussion with Rabih will delve into the impacts of offsite digital manufacturing within the construction industry, exploring how these innovative methods are reshaping the way we build homes. Given your extensive experience in the construction industry, how has the traditional design bid-build approach contributed to the industry stagnation? And how could technologies like prefabrication and digital design tools revolutionize the sector while addressing the housing shortages and affordability?
Rabih Zahnan (16:22)
We're actually kind of confronting a hard truth right now. The construction industry is stagnating, has been stagnating, unlike manufacturing or technology sectors that have revolutionized their processes over the past century. Construction productivity has barely budged. In fact, the construction industry has seen some of the lowest productivity gains of any sector in the last 100 years. Part of this inefficiency is based on the traditional design bid-build approach, which is system that
causes contractors to race to the bottom margins and it stifles innovation and pushes everyone involved to take on more risk and just to stay afloat. Regulatory complexities, the unpredictable labor market, and outdated building methods have all compounded these challenges, which results in bloated timelines, spiraling costs, and fewer affordable homes being built.
This broken model isn't just an inconvenience. It's a critical barrier to us solving our global housing shortage. If we're to provide safe, affordable, and sustainable homes at scale, we have to break free from this cycle. This means embracing new technologies like prefabrication and advanced digital design tools to reimagine how we plan, finance, and execute projects. And by reframing this construction project and adopting lean methods, offsite manufacturing, as you mentioned, and integrated design, we can truly unlock long overdue productivity issues in our industry.
Amy Villis (17:42)
We've been hearing a lot about innovations in construction methods, particularly in the offsite manufacturing of building components. Can you tell us about your project involving prefabricated cold-formed steel components and how this differs from traditional construction methods and what benefits you anticipate?
Rabih Zahnan (17:59)
Our project is to bring prefabricated cold form steel components into our building environment. So what that really means is we've been framing for years using cold form steel like H steel in our buildings, both interior framing as well as structural framing. However, this has been a very labor intensive process. It's not very accurate. All the measurements and the cuts are done on site. There isn't a tie in between digital design. It's more of
the traditional method of construction, which really slows down our construction process and then also reduces quality and cost control. So what we're doing is we have sourced technology that allows us to produce these framing components, these cold form steel framing components directly from rolls of steel and be able to gauge steel and be able to form them into the different gauges that we need for different parts of construction, as well as cut them
accurately to the length required for design with all the notches and bends or anything that might be required in this construction process. So the key to this is these machineries allow us to prefabricate all of the framing structures that would go into a building offsite in a controlled manufacturing environment and allow us to deliver pre-built walls to our project sites. So what does this mean? It means basically an accelerated construction timeline.
by producing in a controlled environment offsite, reducing on-site labor and cutting overall building time significantly. And foster project delivery means lower financing costs, less exposure to market volatility, and the potential to bring affordable units online more quickly.
Amy Villis (19:43)
The construction industry is often criticized and labeled one of the dirtiest sectors. It's due to the significant environmental impacts being one of the largest contributors to carbon emissions and waste. How is your project addressing these sustainability challenges?
Rabih Zahnan (19:58)
I'm actually excited about this, Amy, because Coldform Steel allows for major impact on sustainability and on environmental impacts. So when you're building in a controlled factory environment and you have precise design integration with building information modeling systems, we minimize material offcuts and construction waste. Lower waste disposal costs combined with an eco-friendlier footprint, and we can help secure incentives and community support, which are essential factors in affordable housing projects with tight margins.
This is on the pre-construction side. On the construction side, what you get with steel is precision in the framing makes it easier to incorporate advanced insulation and energy efficient building system. This reduces utility costs for residents, which is a critical aspect of ongoing affordability and also makes the project more appealing to community stakeholders and regulators in regards to the environment.
Amy Villis (20:51)
So we're all aware the construction industry is facing many issues. No one's deaf to the rising costs. There's been lots of talk about labor shortages. So how's technology like prefabrication addressing these issues?
Rabih Zahnan (21:03)
biggest issue that we have right now in controlling our construction environment is there are three factors in construction. Budget, quality, and scheduling. In today's world, it's very difficult to control the budget aspect. Prices have gone up significantly through inflation over the last five years. Labor costs have gone up, material costs have gone up. So what we have been focusing on are the two other parts of our triangle, which is quality and schedule.
And there are major issues with labor currently in our market. And with this project, you get reduced skilled labor requirements. So prefabricated components will arrive on site ready for straightforward assembly. That's lowering the need for specialized and expensive skilled labor. When there are fewer specialized trades are required, the wages and labor overhead remain manageable and directly influencing the final cost per unit. Additionally, reducing that onsite labor, we're cutting that overall build time significantly.
We have predictability and cost efficiency by standardizing our components and automating this fabrication process. And the CF Steel systems minimize both that waste and labor intensive on-site work. And we are expecting about a 10 % decrease in waste, as well as significant increase in the timeline to construct these projects.
Amy Villis (22:21)
what you're seeing innovation showing up on the construction sites to date, like where what you've seen and then maybe where you think we might be going.
Rabih Zahnan (22:29)
We are significantly behind other industries. For example, the FinTech sector is a very mature sector in technology. The construction tech sector is pretty nascent, new as far as the availability of projects. The main focus of construction tech over the last 10 years has been about the digital transformation.
So basically taking manual workflows and turning them into digital workflows, which we've adopted and many companies today have adopted. We are definitely haven't been leading the field that way, but where we are leading the field and where I'm very excited about is the use of robotics, the use of drone and camera technology with AI working alongside of it, but to try and make a difference, like you said, in the field. So the biggest impact, return on investment that technology innovation will have will be in the field.
which are things that are easily measured that will make a difference to our workers on site. So some of the examples that we're excited about is West Group has recently launched robotics on our sites that are autonomous robots roaming around our building sites that are with their cameras, they're measuring productivity and progress on the project. So they are able to view framing and see how much of it's complete, view drywall, flooring, electrical, HVAC, plumbing assemblies, and be able to track
the completion and that what's amazing about that is that ties into our schedules directly. Using artificial intelligence and machine learning, it's able to measure how much has been completed and tie that into our schedule and let us know beforehand if projects on time or if it's delayed. By having that ability not to react, to be proactive on this, we're able to go back to our contracts and ask them to increase their crews or increase their productivity to meet our schedule.
And those are just one of the ways that we're looking for efficiencies using innovation field. Another example that we're using is a technology using RFID trackers that we have put on our hard hats for both our people and our trades as well on site. This allows us to track for safety, make sure that everybody is where they're supposed to be. If there are any issues, we can do mass communication to everybody using those tags.
and we're able to maintain productivity by making sure the right people are the right place at right
Amy Villis (24:49)
What do you see in the next like five, 10 years in reality? Where do we see this moving?
Rabih Zahnan (24:54)
I don't think robots will replace us. And I don't also think that artificial intelligence will replace us either. I heard this once that I wouldn't call it artificial intelligence, but rather IA rather than AI, which is intelligence augmentation. And I think that's where artificial intelligence is very helpful in our field today. It helps reduce some of those tasks that take time away from our project managers and our field leaders instead of them solving problems. And that's what we want them to do, to be problem solvers rather than to be
contract administrators in the field. I'm very excited to be working with Digital Innovation Cluster to bring this type of solution to the market. It is very important that we start looking at all the stakeholders involved in building to start looking at different ways to build, different materials, different workflows, different delivery methods. The key is the more that people implement and follow new building technologies, the more common they will be, the more affordable they will be, the more impact they will have in the market.
Amy Villis (25:54)
I'd like to thank my guests Mike and Rabih for their insights and their time. Today we've seen how innovations in supply chain management, sustainable materials and digital manufacturing are transforming that pre-construction procurement phase. These advancements are not just improving efficiency and reducing costs, they're also promoting sustainability and streamlining the construction process, accelerating housing production in BC and beyond. In our next episode, we'll be moving along the end-to-end housing production framework
to explore the construction phase. We'll examine how new technologies and innovative approaches are answering the question, am I built safely, on time, and on budget? Join us as we continue to uncover how innovation is shaping each stage of the housing production, bringing us closer to more efficient, sustainable, and affordable housing solutions for British Columbia. Thank you for your time, and especially for being interested.
This podcast is just one way Digital and folks you hear in these episodes are working together to accelerate housing production and position British Columbia as a leader in housing innovation. But there is so much more that we're doing. Digital's Housing Growth Innovation Program invests in mission-driven projects targeting key housing issues, as well as encouraging collaboration and information sharing through workshops, events, and more. We'd love to hear from you. Reach out through our website at housing.digitalsupercluster.ca for more information.
This podcast and Digital's Housing Growth Innovation Program are made possible with the financial support of the province of British Columbia through the Ministry of Housing and Municipal Affairs.