2025 Judges
With Special Thanks to Our 2025 Judging Panel
Chris Hall – Technical Innovation Manager, NHBC
Chris is the Technical Innovation Manager at NHBC, the UK’s leading independent provider of warranty and insurance for new homes. He joined NHBC in 2015 and is responsible for the maintenance of NHBC’s policy and procedures to address Modern Methods of Construction, and to identify trends to inform risk management in non-conventional construction. He is a member of the RICS Professional Residential panel, and lives in Berkshire.
Chris Knights – Business Manager (Business Performance Evaluation), BSRIA
Chris has worked for the Building Services Research and Intelligence Association for over 25 years and currently leads their Building Performance Evaluation and Instrumentation divisions. He has a strong commitment to ensuring that as-built performance matches or exceeds design intentions and delivers a built environment that delivers for all its stakeholders.
Dan Macpherson – Executive Director, Henry Riley
Dan is a Project Director with 17 years of experience at Henry Riley. Henry Riley is a leading multi-disciplinary property and construction consultancy that delivers PM, QS, MMC Advisory and H&S services. Having been a strong advocate of MMC for several years across multiple sectors, Dan was instrumental in establishing Henry Riley’s National MMC Team (a first of it’s kind in the UK) which has gone from strength to strength. Endeavouring to drive the off-site sector forward, breaking down barriers and upskilling the wider construction industry. Dan has in depth experience across all categories of MMC with particular expertise on Category 1 MMC/volumetric systems.
Darren Richards – Managing Director, Cogent Consulting
Darren is an offsite manufacturing and construction expert – working in the offsite technology supply-chain to improve productivity.
Elaine Toogood – Director (Architecture & Sustainable Design), MPA The Concrete Centre
Elaine is Head of Architecture at The Concrete Centre and has been a qualified architect for 25 years. Elaine provides architectural advice, project and technical guidance related to the use of concrete, with a particular expertise in sustainable and visual concrete. Elaine authors technical guidance which has included Concrete and BREEAM and Material Efficiency publications and is a regular contributor to Concrete Quarterly, of which she is joint editor. Elaine sits on working groups for the DEFRA Property Level Flood Resilience Action Plan and The London Climate Change Partnership as well as the RIBA Sustainable Futures expert advisory group. She is also current Chair of RIBA SE London.
Gary Ramsay – Editor, Structural Timber Media
Gary has edited, managed and contributed to a huge range of B2B publications both print and online since 1998, with specialist knowledge of the timber and forest certification sectors, sustainable construction and the offsite/MMC sector. He was also a regular contributor to leading self-build publication Build It for several years interviewing those on their dream home journey.
Graham Couchman – CEO, The Steel Construction Institute
Dr Graham Couchman has degrees from the University of Cambridge and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne. He is a structural engineer with experience of working on site, in design offices, academia and applied research. He first joined The Steel Construction Institute, a specialist consultancy, in 1995 and returned as CEO in 2007.
Jackie Maginnis – Chief Executive, Modular and Portable Building Association
Jackie Maginnis, Chief Executive of the Modular & Portable Building Association (MPBA) has worked within the volumetric industry for 40 years. Prior to her role with MPBA she worked for a manufacturing and hire company of volumetric buildings, being involved with the design and manufacturing process, supplying buildings to all sectors of the market. With her passion for the industry sector and the help of the committees from within the member companies, part of her role is to promote the features and benefits of the use of offsite volumetric buildings. As Chief Executive of the MPBA, Jackie plays a key role in the connecting of sectors in the modular and portable building industry. The Association collaborates with specialist technical advisors to enhance innovation in the design and manufacture of modular buildings.
Ken Davie – Industry Advisor, BUILDOFFSITE
Ken is a registered architect with over 40 years’ experience in the construction industry having worked on a wide range of public and private sector projects from single buildings to master plans. He currently runs his own small practice, Krozen Design & Consultancy, part time from a home office in North Yorkshire whilst also working as an Industry Advisor for BuildOffsite (BOS) and an Associate of the Supply Chain Sustainability School (SCSS). He organises factory visits and helps with other events for BOS and delivers online interactive workshops for the SCSS covering various aspects of Offsite and MMC including the Fundamentals of Systems, DfMA and Systems Optioneering. Recent work in the field of carbon reduction and net zero has included BOS webinars about the potential of timber for reducing embodied carbon and the use of low carbon concrete in the offsite sector.
Dr Mila Duncheva – Global Business Projeect Manager, Stora Enso
Mila achieves economic growth in the UK & Irish mass timber markets and influences policy decision-making on behalf of Stora Enso. She aids developers, building designers and all construction stakeholders in the technical application of the Sylva™ kit of parts in their multi-million pipelines of projects. Her latest interest area is biodiversity in sustainable construction supply chains. Dr Duncheva helps the wider industry transition justly to net zero carbon with her Governance Board Member appointment at Built Environment – Smarter Transformation & as an Advisory Board Member on an Irish Timber in Construction Regulations Working Group.
Nicola Carniato – Technical Director, AKT II
Nicola is the studio director for the regional offices, and is based in Cambridge. He has led the Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities which is a pioneering example of offsite construction for scale and complexity. With his focus on sustainability, MMC and circular economy he led the design of low carbon reusable cassette sponsored by Innovate UK.
Paul Tierney – CEO, MMC Ireland
Paul is the CEO of MMC Ireland, having taken up the role in May 2023. With over 30 years of experience in the MMC sector, he previously served as CEO of ESS Modular, one of the UK and Ireland’s leading off-site construction companies, until 2022. MMC Ireland is the national representative body for Ireland’s Modern Methods of Construction sector. Acting as a knowledge bridge between industry and clients, it provides leadership, advocacy, and strategic support to drive growth, innovation, and sustainable practices in MMC. Paul has a longstanding passion for advancing MMC adoption. In his current role, he works closely with Government bodies to help shape policy, promote best practices, and support the development of a robust and sustainable MMC ecosystem in Ireland.
Samuel Ward – Operations Leader – Technology & Innovation, Laing O’Rourke
A Civil Engineer, Chartered with the Institution of Engineering and Technology. Sam is passionate about innovation — having worked for Laing O’Rourke for 15 years, spanning operational delivery across a multitude of sectors before transitioning into our Digital Engineering team in 2012. Focusing on growing and industry leading capability across the Group, providing innovative Digital solutions for pre-construction and delivery teams, eventually leading the UK pre-construction Digital Engineering team. Since 2019 he has been working as Operations/Programme Leader for the Technology & Innovation function, responsible for developing, commercialising, and delivering truly transformative technology to the industry.
Tim Snelson – Director, Arup
Tim has 30-years of experience as a structural engineer, based mainly in London, but with a global portfolio of projects incorporating commercial and industrial property, arts & culture, sports, infrastructure, residential buildings and bridges. He leads one of the property teams in Arup’s London office, comprising 30 structural engineers, as part of a multi-disciplinary building design team.
Trudi Sully – Impact Lead, Mott MacDonald
Trudi is the Impact Lead for Mott MacDonald, driving use of DfMA and MMC to improve the whole life performance of buildings and infrastructure. She spent four years as a director at the Construction Innovation Hub, working with government and industry partners to develop tools and approaches, including the Value Toolkit and Product Platform Rulebook, in support of the ambitions of the Construction Playbook and TIP Roadmap. Trudi joined Mott MacDonald to transition this work from research and innovation to adoption, development and deployment by industry – helping to unlock the social, economic and environmental outcomes that DfMA and MMC can deliver.
