Open Innovation for timber construction !

Metsä Wood has long understood that the timber & wood sector needs a collective approach to stimulate innovation. For several years now, the Finnish company has called on interested parties the world over to participate in an unconventional collaborative initiative called a hackathon. The last one took place in March, 2019 at the Nancy School of Architecture

A hackathon is a creative process used quite often in the world of software and digital solutions. Teams compete in an original way of solving concrete programming challenges. Metsä Wood began running these competitions in order to spread the word about its “Open Source Wood” collaborative platform, which connects local timber construction to worldwide knowledge.

Its ambition is to develop collaborative use of its tool. 

Various parties involved in timber construction—students, engineers, architects, industrial companies–join forces. Mixed teams are formed and are given one day to tackle a subject concerned by timber construction. And because the competition leads to a concrete contribution uploaded directly to the “Open Source Wood” platform, other participants can discover it, explore it, use it, and improve it! And as a bonus, these encounters are also known to give rise to business opportunities.

Imagining projects for sharing !

France has already hosted several Metsä Wood hackathons. The first was held upon the launch of the platform at the end of 2017 at the Upper School of Wood, Nantes. And the Nancy School of Architecture was the venue of the 6th hackathon, held on 21st March this year. It attracted student architects as well as student engineers from Epinal ENSTIB and various engineering offices. The rules: four teams compete in a 5-hour, 3-stage challenge on one subject: the design of 200 student accommodations, off-campus and repurposable. First, after an hours’ initial perusal, the teams gathered round the table to formulate their general ideas on the physical layout of the project. Then two more stages followed in which thoughts were focused on the design of one element of their project.

The result of this process? It works! Team shuffling and time limits stimulate the emergence of ideas, while the presence of engineers means the imagined paths can be immediately materialized. The judges had a tough job splitting the two teams whose projects were especially relevant !

The final winners of the competition were the team that provided a technical solution for the execution of its project. And because it’s already available on the “Open Source Wood” platform, a designer of, say, wooden kiosks can very easily take it and use it. That’s the open innovation principle for you !