Kirby Group Engineering recently became the first company in Ireland to invest in and roll out a fleet of four HP SitePrint Robots. The small, high-spec devices punch well above their weight when it comes to their contribution to intricate and valuable projects.
Irish Building Magazine speaks with Henry McCann, CEO, and Mark Danaher, Digital Construction and IT Director, at Kirby Group Engineering.
The robots will be used to streamline the setting-out process on major Kirby projects. With ultra-precise sensors on board, the units’ printing will deliver improved accuracy and significant time savings on-site.
Thanks to the cloud-based management software used by the robots, each of the project teams involved will have access to real-time tracking as well as the latest geospatial co-ordinates to make sure they’re working with the most recent information.
Freshly kitted out in Kirby colours, the four robots, nicknamed Gridzilla, CTRL+P, Kirbinator and AutoCADabra are being deployed to sites across Ireland, the UK and Europe.
The HP SitePrint Robots are the latest demonstration of Kirby’s commitment to adopting technological advancements best suited to their needs as they emerge. If a new method or approach seems like it could offer benefits, Kirby’s Digital Construction team will take the lead with rigorous examination, testing and validation before it is introduced to the company’s processes.
The next step is to ensure the project teams see and feel the full benefit of any new innovation. Like any investment, technological advancements can fail without a dedicated training plan, consistent guidance and support. For this reason, Kirby’s Digital Construction team works closely with operations teams across the business to fully exploit the potential of all new tools and processes.
While the newly acquired robots are a small-scale illustration of Kirby’s dedication to innovation around its projects, the company’s commitment to digitisation and off-site manufacturing (OSM) is also clear at the other end of the spectrum. Its dedicated OSM facility in Portlaoise – spread over 10,000 sq. m – is now more than two years in operation with its capabilities continually expanded and upgraded.
A team of 50 people is based full-time at the OSM facility, providing fabrication, welding, engineering and digital construction services. The site also features a dedicated cleanroom to facilitate high purity pipework, as required by many of Kirby’s clients. Components manufactured at the Portlaoise plant are transported to sites across all of the company’s national and international sites, ranging from mechanical and electrical service modules to full packaged plantrooms and electrical rooms. Each plays a vital role in projects across sectors including Data Centres, Life Sciences, Industrial, and Power and Renewables.
The most recent upgrade to the Portlaoise facility saw the installation of a cutting-edge digitisation and training hub that provides the highest level of detailed scrutiny on Kirby’s project planning. Co-locating the hub with the OSM also aids collaboration between the various project teams at each point along the construction process.
CEO of Kirby Group Engineering Henry McCann says the OSM approach is in high demand:
“Our Portlaoise facility has been a game changer for accelerating progress on our projects. Two years in, the verdict from our colleagues and clients is clear – OSM offers incredible advantages in the areas of increased safety, reduced costs on specialised heavy machinery and labour hours and ultimately faster completion times with a top-quality finished product.”
“The industry is committing more and more to prefabrication. Recent reports about Amazon’s Houdini project showed how this global e-commerce leader is investing more and more in the prefabricated approach, and where they go, others will follow. Kirby is ready for this trend to develop further in the years ahead”.
Kirby’s expansion in the OSM space was a natural evolution from its earliest days investing in Digital Construction services. Today, the company has more than 100 specialists in the department, drawn from diverse backgrounds such as ship building, architecture, reverse engineering and MEPF (Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing, and Fire Protection) engineering.
Mark Danaher is Director, Digital Construction and IT at Kirby and has been with the company since 2012. He led the early development and promotion of off-site manufacturing and modularisation of Kirby projects and has overseen the integration of digitised methods into large parts of the company’s work.
In recent years Danaher and his team have worked to centralise all of Kirby’s digital information. The data lake, known as Kirby Kore, hosts project and process information, including quality checklists, drawings and areas of concern into a centralised area. Applications like ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), Lessons Learned and Autodesk Forma have been centralised into a unified system that gives people the relevant access to every aspect of the business in real time.
Running parallel to Kirby Kore is KAI – the company’s custom-built AI agent – linked directly to Kirby Kore. The vision is for a personal assistant for each employee at Kirby as it gathers information and makes it available on demand. Danaher points to a recent report from the AI Institute, which he says validates Kirby’s approach to AI adoption. Entitled ‘GenAI Adoption in Built Environment Firms’, the research showed the firms enjoying success with AI now are those who invested early in “Clear governance and policy, AI-literate teams and Custom or narrow AI solutions”.
The report concluded that “The early movers are already benefiting, saving time, winning bids and redefining productivity. The gap between them and the rest of the market is no longer theoretical. It is measurable”.
Mark Danaher says this reflects how Kirby’s forward-thinking approach to technology and its overall operations continues to pay dividends:
“We have been charting our own path with digital innovations for well over a decade, following the most relevant advancements and identifying where they can bring benefits for the company. We really are seeing the benefits, first for ourselves and most importantly for our clients. We know from the feedback we have received that our approach is having a positive impact on our projects and other companies that we work with. Our systems and processes are more efficient than ever, and that streamlines everything we do”.
Kirby Group Engineering has recorded strong sustained growth in recent years. With turnover of €930m in 2025 and a headcount of 1900 direct employees, Henry McCann says focusing on its core values of people, safety, quality, delivery and value is an approach that has paid off for decades:
“Kirby has always been a forward-thinking organisation. Our leadership has consistently promoted learning and development, and this has brought us to a point where we are ideally positioned to benefit from the convergence of two powerful forces in the future of construction and engineering – AI and off-site manufacturing. It’s a thrilling time to be working in our sector and I’m delighted to be leading an organisation that’s building a very bright future for its customers and colleagues”.
Read the full article in the Irish Building Magazine.
