Technology and sustainability

EurobuildCEE: How has the Design & Build model affected delivery times and cost optimisation on your recent industrial projects? Małgorzata Kałuża, Harden Construction: The defining feature of the Design & Build model is that one organisation assumes full responsibility for both design and construction. This directly reduces the number of interfaces and limits communication risk. Crucially, design and preparatory work can be carried out partly in parallel, significantly shortening the overall project schedule. Importantly, from the outset we test design decisions against construction realities and the budget. Bringing the contractor in early allows us to eliminate solutions that are unnecessarily expensive or technically difficult before work starts on site. Information no longer has to pass through several stages between the architect, investor and construction team, which speeds up decisions. It is worth stressing that, for us, optimisation is not simply about cutting costs, but