Stuart Maggs
Stuart Maggs, CEO of Scaled Robotics, says construction is embracing change and looks forward to more robots appearing on site this year.
What is your New Year’s resolution?
To find more time to read, I have a stack of books pending.
What is your most important lesson learnt from 2018?
That an industry famous for being slow and intransigent really does want to change and evolve.
When I first started working on Scaled Robotics I thought that our biggest problem would be persuading construction to adopt our products, but our experience up until now is that the people, in general, are very open to the right kind of innovation.
In fact, many features we develop have been driven by pilot customers, this leaves me very optimistic for 2019.
What innovative technology are you most excited about finding out more about in 2019, and why?
2019 is going to bring plenty of developments for onsite mobile construction robots, we look forward to hearing the developments made at Dfab NCCR (pictured above) at ETH Zurich.
What consumer tech are you tempted to buy in new year sales?
A Ricoh 360-degree camera. In the realm of non-consumer tech, we have been playing with Lidars made by RoboSense and are excited to play with their solid state models.
My best non-tech purchase of 2018 has hands down been the book A day in the life of Marlon Bundo.
What individual or company is going to be “one to watch” this year and why?
A team that really impressed me in 2018 is the AF Gruppen Bispevika project team I have been working with, led by Lars Petter Fritzsønn.
They have been brave and ambitious in the goals they set themselves and in how they integrated new technologies and workflows into a project. I am really excited to see it all come together and bear fruit in 2019.
Which construction technology do you want to see make the leap into mainstream adoption this year?
BIM – it’s been a long time coming but we still haven’t come close to fully utilising the potential it offers. For us, it’s crucial to have these tools and the single source of truth embedded all the way along the supply chain as it forms the foundations for many further innovations, including ours.
What industry event are you looking forward to attending and why?
We have attended the last two Digital Construction Weeks in London and look forward to being there in 2019. The atmosphere is always fantastic and it’s an event that attracts an audience hungry to move construction forward into the 21st century.
