Forum for Platform Design and Mass Customisation in Construction

Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust (YAS) is the region's provider of emergency, urgent care and non-emergency patient transport services.

We serve a population of over five million people across Yorkshire and the Humber and strive to ensure that patients receive the right response to their care needs as quickly as possible, wherever they live. The catchment area for our NHS 111 service also extends to North Lincolnshire, North East Lincolnshire and Bassetlaw in Nottinghamshire.

We employ 5,853* staff, who together with over 1,100 volunteers, enable us to provide a vital 24-hour, seven-days-a-week, emergency and healthcare service.

Our main focus is to:

• receive 999 calls in our emergency operations centres (Wakefield and York)
• respond to 999 calls, arrange the most appropriate response to meet patients' needs and get help to patients who have serious of life-threatening injuries or illnesses as quickly as possible
• provide the region's Integrated Urgent Care (IUC) service which includes the NHS 111 urgent medical help and advice line
• take eligible patients to and from their hospital appointments and treatments with our nonemergency Patient Transport Service (PTS).

Our Estate plays a major part in ensuring our staff have facilities that aids them to meet the needs of the organisation, and it needs to be flexible to meet the changing needds of our patients, so Platform design and mass customisation would allow us to be able to meet those needs effectively.

MAC Construction Consultants are dynamically engaged across a broad range of projects and services offering complimentary and partnering skills in support of their public and private sector clients. Operating nationally across six regional offices we emply a professional team that offer consultant services including:

• Cost Consultancy including employers agent
• Project Management
• Prinicpal Designer, Health and Safety
• Building Surveying, land reclamation and development

With a business income of £6.5m, we successfully deliver an annual client focussed project turnover of £250m value of mixed new build, major/minor refurbishment and site development.

We recognise the qualitative benefits of engaging in leading edge research as we work on several innovative projects that test the 'norms' of the construction industry. We are excited by the clear commercial development opportunities our association with the University of Huddersfield will bring as we offer emerging services beyond the standard practical solutions to the linear process of construction.

Walker Simpson Architects have been developing off-site building solutions since 2002. This includes collaborative strategies with manufacturers and developers for a range of clients and buildings including sero carbon prototypes. Experience of various construction systems includes panel and volumetric, factory-engineered pre-cast concrete, timber frame and light-gauge steel. We see Platform Design and Mass Customisation as a further step along this journey.

Our studio is digitally literate. We combine this expertise with our longstanding experience of manufacturing buildings. Our knowledge of off-site processes and parameters (compared to traditional on-site construction methodologies) enables projects to be developed with a deep understanding of the interface and sequencing required between the design, manufacturing and assembly stages. Alongside this, we act as a bridge between the built environment and emerging technologies exploring software VR and AR applications with gaming and tech companies including AutoDesk and BIMstore.

Throughout this period of our development, we have focussed on key themes including zero carbon, waste reduction, improving quality, upskilling, and adding value. We are committed to exploiting a digital tech offer to drive down cost and enable the transformation of building delivery, lifecycle and maintenance. Our ambition is to effect change in the built environment in order to improve and support people’s social, mental and physical health and wellbeing.

We believe new thinking and collaborations are required to respond to radical changes in design and construction protocols, material technology and assembly processes to provide more for less.