Foster + Partners wins €4M EU grant for SWIFT-Build robot timber construction

A €4 million grant has been awarded to Foster + Partners and seven academic institutions by the European Innovation Council’s Pathfinder programme for a three-year endeavor called SWIFT-Build. This project, which stands for Swarm-based Inverted Fabrication for Timber Buildings, seeks to create an autonomous robotic construction system that utilizes ground robots and aerial drones to assemble modular timber structures from the top down. The robots will build the upper levels on the ground before elevating them for subsequent layers, while drones will oversee the construction process. Partnering institutions include the University of Bristol, University of Southern Denmark, Technical University of Munich, University of Pisa, Delft University of Technology, University of Birmingham, and Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. The initiative focuses on sustainability and will feature a full-scale timber pavilion demonstration.