The Centre for Digital Built Britain is a partnership between the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy and the University of Cambridge, charged with delivering a smart digital economy for infrastructure and construction for the future and transforming the UK construction industry’s approach to the way we plan, build, maintain and use our social and economic infrastructure.

The UK has a chronic under-supply of housing, with numerous negative social impacts, and there is cross-party governmental support for the need to increase house building rates. Home-building rates are just half of the 300,000 required to replace the housing which falls below Government standards and to provide for the backlog of unmet need. The housing crisis in the UK demands innovative and affordable models of housing production and design. Although innovation has been claimed as the key to meeting the challenge, many researchers into construction comment on the inherent conservatism and lack of innovation in the house building industry.

Building on recent research looking at the need for innovation in construction ,and recent experimentation with new forms of housing delivery such as modular housing, this short project engaged with the innovative sector of the market that is experimenting with modular housing production. It explored how the use of digital tools is part of, or has the potential to be part of, the production and sustainability of these homes for the future.

CCHPR's mini project for CDBB aimed to provide a ‘state of the nation’ report into the opportunities and barriers to the uptake of the digital tools, standards and processes (Building Information Modelling - BIM) in innovations taking place in the UK house building sector.

Project Publications: