Ideas to improve the construction industry have flooded in from all over the world for the 2019 COINS Grand Challenge, a global competition organised by Construction Industry Solutions Ltd (COINS) to support innovation within the construction industry
The shortlist has now been announced, with 12 finalists from the United States, Sri Lanka, India, Israel, UK, and the Philippines, selected to attend the grand final which takes place in Manchester, UK this June. A panel of 12 judges includes Oliver Novakovic, Technical & Innovation Director of Barratt Developments Plc, William George, CFO of Comfort Systems USA and Charles Lovatt Senior Teaching Fellow in Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Creativity at St Andrews University.
The challenge has two entry categories, professional (Open Competition) or student (Undergraduate Competition), with shortlisted ideas ranging from carbon negative building materials to autonomous land surveying marking drones.
Open Competition finalists are:
· Ali Khaloo, USA / Idea: Bringing Digital Twin Technology and Artificial Intelligence to the Asset Management Community
· Michael Evans, UK / Idea: Carbon Negative Building Materials
· Niran Shrestha and Tim Axness, USA / Idea: Increasing productivity and saving lives in construction using the IoT and Artificial Intelligence
· Pooran Desai, UK / Idea: A digital platform to make sustainability easy – One Planet
· Thomas Fudge, UK / Idea: Decentralised modular wastewater treatment that generates energy and recirculates water
· Tom Yeshurun, Israel / Idea: Autonomous land surveying marking drone with smart stakes
Student Competition finalists are:
· Chathurangi Edussuriya, Sri Lanka – University of Peradeniya / Idea: Soil quality analyser
· Felix Chu, UK – University of Edinburgh / Idea: Transforming Architecture Practice into Automation
· Jeremiah Valero, Philippines – University of San Carlos/ Idea: Computer Vision powered monitoring for onsite construction safety
· Joseph Trujillo, USA – Florida International University / Idea: Integrating drones on the construction site
· Kaushal Shetty, India – Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur / Idea: The Box- Helping refugees build a home and a community.
· Sam Clark, USA – University of Chicago / Idea: Investing in sensor infrastructure and machine-learning technologies
Robert Brown, CEO of COINS, has played a major role in establishing the COINS Grand Challenge, comments:
“Every year the number and quality of the applications for the Grand Challenge gets stronger and stronger. It’s great to see the level of interest in new and emerging technology in the construction industry continue to grow. We are very proud to see the event go from strength to strength and hope that all the finalists enjoy the Grand Final and go on to pursue a career in construction whether they win the competition or not.”
The COINS Grand Challenge winners will be announced at The Gala Dinner and Awards Ceremony on Wednesday 12 June at the Imperial War Museum North, Salford Quays in Manchester.
