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To enhance competition in the construction industry, EU policies have created and harmonised functional building codes. Moreover, many actors advocate the construction industry moves towards a lean production, process-based way of working for quality and cost reasons. Here, Timber Framed Engineering approaches are considered to have a competitive and environmental advantage. There is however underlying concerns that conservatism in the construction industry, and lack of timber engineering skills, may be obstacles to change. This paper therefore assesses whether EU construction policy innovation contributed to innovation at the firm level. Timber framed innovators in six European countries were identified, and their sources of innovation assessed. The results indicate that timber framed firms have become actors in the construction industry. Firms have made product, process and organisation innovations. All case firms have similar sources for innovation. The common factor that triggers the firms to innovate is business opportunities that arise from demographic changes in the environment outside the firm, such as environmental sustainability and affordable housing for lower income groups. To address these opportunities, the case firms implicitly recognised that traditional project and site-based construction approaches are an incongruity. The firms have consequently established in-house prefabrication, including developed of lean production processes to ensure quality as well as effectiveness. The firms have all recognised that a fundamental barrier to their business was the lack of timber framed engineering competencies in their customers organisations. Accordingly, a business necessity for the case firms was developing construction design competencies. Firms benefited from governmental policy instruments that support timber framed Randamp;D and knowledge transfer. However, firms also gained new knowledge from their own experiences, which they also use in their operations. Accordingly, policy instruments are not a sole or dominant source for innovation in the case firms. Nonetheless, the change in building codes has been a pre-requisite the firms commercial developments. ; Original Publication: Saana Tykkae, Denise McCluskey, Tomas Nord, Pekka Ollonqvist, Marten Hugosson, Anders Roos, Kadri Ukrainski, Anders Q Nyrud and Fahrudin Bajric, Development of timber framed firms in the construction sector - Is EU policy one source of their innovation?, 2010, FOREST POLICY AND ECONOMICS, (12), 3, 199-206. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2009.10.003 Copyright: Elsevier Science B.V., Amsterdam. http://www.elsevier.com/

The enlargement of EU coupled with harmonization of regulations and standards have opened new market segments and geographical areas resulting in grown market shares and innovative behaviour of timber construction firms. The role of policies aiming at increased competitiveness and innovativeness of the European forest sector through integrating innovation has been studied within a COST Action running from 2006 to 2010. COST Action E51 "Integrating Innovation and Development Policies for the Forest Sector" aimed at increasing our understanding of the role of policies and development programs to improve competitiveness and specifically innovations in the forest sector. One of the sub-groups studied the timber construction value chain and the type and diffusion of innovations. This report presents empirical data of timber construction industries from eight European countries. The data include the general construction environment and the policy superstructure of each country and one characteristic example of innovation and innovation process within the timber construction industry of each country respectively. The description of the construction industry follows the concept that construction is a complex product system (CoPS, Hobday, 1998) relating actors in an innovation system approach manner. The timber construction industry is gradually moving from supplier to system integrators thus modifying the overall system.The results indicate a large difference between studied industries in terms of type of innovation, supportive actions from society and industry organizations, and the effect of the innovation on the overall building process and infrastructure. ; Utvidgningen av EU tillsammans med harmonisering av regler och standarder har öppnat nya marknadssegment och geografiska områden för träbyggindustrin, resulterande i ökade marknadsandelar och möjligheter till innovativt beteende. Påverkan av nationella policies och program på den utvecklingen har studerats inom ett COST Action som löpt under perioden 2006 till 2010. COST Action E51 "Integrating Innovation and Development Policies for the Forest Sector" syftar till att öka vår kunskap om vilken roll policies och nationella utvecklingsprogram spelar för att öka konkurrenskraften och specifikt innovationsförmågan inom skogssektorn. Träbyggindustrin var en av värdekedjorna som studerades utifrån typ och spridning av innovationer. Denna rapport innehåller information on träbyggindustrin in åtta europeiska länder. Träbyggindustrierna beskrivs utifrån den generella byggindustrin, viktiga politikområden i respektive land samt en karaktäristisk innovation och dess utbredning inom träbyggindustrin. Byggindustrin och dess innovationsförmåga ses utifrån ett innovationssystemperspektiv och där byggandet är ett komplext produktsystem (CoPS; Hobday, 1998). Träbyggindustrin uppstår och utvecklas i gränssnittet mellan leverantör och systemintegratör vilket påverkar hela systemet.Resultatet pekar på stora skillnader mellan de studerade industrierna i fråga om typ av innovation, vilka stödaktiviteter samhället och branschorganisationer erbjuder samt effekten av innovationen på den övergripande byggprocessen och infrastrukturen. ; Godkänd; 2010; 20100909 (lms) ; Lean Wood Engineering