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Chef Cúán Greene shooting the first episode of ‘Sussed’

SUSSED ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Clean energy supplier Pinergy launched a new online show called ‘Sussed’ in December with the aim of highlighting businesses and individuals leading the charge in helping Ireland transition to a more sustainable future. Run across social media platforms, the first episode featured Irish chef Cúán Greene, who explored the steps that three business founders working in the food and drinks industry are taking. Amongst other things, Karl Purdy, Founder of Coffeeangel, discussed his choice to use recyclable rather than biodegradable cups. Fergus Halpin, Founder and CEO of Harvest Day, explained his zero-waste business model in bringing local and organic produce to subscribers all over Ireland. Meanwhile, Shane Murphy, Co-owner of Neighbourhood Wines, spoke about changes he has noticed in the wine industry, such as the acceptance of wine in alternative packaging and a growing preference for local wines with a lower carbon footprint.

McDonald’s has launched a free guide designed to help its customers understand the most confusing climate change terminology. It follows research that revealed that 60% of people think the amount of jargon being used to describe climate change is increasing, while 19% say they’d be more likely to do something to protect the environment if simpler, less confusing language were used.

Co-Founder Christine Jones and Director Mark Fallon of Coopman Search & Selection

GREEN TALK

First B Corp in recruitment

Coopman Search & Selection has become the first recruitment company headquartered in Ireland to become a Certified B Corporation (B Corp). Established in 2019 by Andrew Murphy and Mark Fallon, it is just one of seven other companies – Danone Dairy Ireland, Strong Roots, Cully & Sully, Earth’s Edge, Urban Volt and Vagabond Tours – to achieve the certification in Ireland. B Corps are businesses that meet the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency and legal accountability to use business as a force for good. Coopman Search & Selection is a partner of the Irish Youth Foundation and supports One Tree Planted, planting trees for every placement made in financial services (around 400 trees planted to date). “Our aim in establishing Coopman is to build a sustainable business with sound frameworks that has a positive impact for our clients, partners and employees,” said Murphy.

Modubuild has gone from being a small business on the side to manufacturing entire turnkey buildings for data centre and biopharma clients in its factory in Co Kilkenny. Co-founder and Managing Director Kevin Brennan was an EY Entrepreneur of the Year 2021 finalist.

Q: How did things start out for Modubuild as a business?

Kevin Brennan (KB): I set up the business in 2006 with John Comerford primarily to focus on the opportunity we identi ed in modular construction. At the time, we were both working as directors for another company, Asgard Cleanroom Solutions, and we could see that the construction industry had not evolved as much as others in terms of modernisation. Our vision was to apply manufacturing e ciencies to the construction industry and work on high-tech projects. e recession hit when Modubuild was in its infancy. But, we managed to bootstrap the business and things ticked over in the early years without me taking a salary. We started picking up projects, growing organically and reinvesting back into the business.

Q: What was the turning point in terms of international expansion?

KB: From an early stage we knew that to grow a signi cant company we would need to look internationally and work in multiple countries. Our rst data centre job in Ireland was in 2012 and in 2015 we won our rst international contract – a data centre project in the Netherlands for the same client.

Kevin Brennan, Co-founder and Managing Director, Modubuild

From there, we dipped our toe in different countries, doing a few smaller projects in Denmark and Finland. But the main thrust of our strategy has been to follow our customers as they expand across Europe. We built up a reputation for being able to fast-track and deliver high-tech, hyper-scale projects, which has meant we keep winning repeat business. To date, we have delivered projects for global biopharma and technology companies across 11 countries and have regional offices in the Netherlands, Belgium, the UK, Sweden, Finland and Spain. We have trebled our turnover in the past three years, along with achieving an average of 50% year-on-year growth over the past six years and expect to reach €50m in turnover within the next year.

Q: What would you say is the secret to the success and growth of Modubuild?

KB: Our main competition is the traditional way of constructing. We can take a project right through from design to a commissioned and operational building, whereas the traditional approach would involve several different parties and contractors. What makes us unique as a design and engineering business is our specialist subject-matter experts who can design technically complex buildings – combined with the fact that we own and control one of the largest offsite manufacturing facilities in Europe, which we purchased in 2015. Inside our 140,000 sq ft state-of-the-art factory in Castlecomer, we are actually constructing entire buildings fitted out internally with all the required systems. The technology inside buildings such as data centres or laboratories is where the real value-add is. Everything from ventilation systems to incubators is installed in our factory. Other companies in Ireland do the design and contracting part of modular construction, but we are the only ones doing the internal fit-out. The big thing for our clients is that our approach de-risks their projects, the outcomes are more predictable and the timeline is on average 50% quicker than with traditional methods.

Q: How important have skills and talent been in building the business?

KB: Recruiting great people has been a key part of our growth strategy. In 2015 we had 12 full-time staff and a small number of contract staff. Today we have 110 direct staff and 350 contract staff. We recently announced plans to recruit at least 100 additional staff across all parts of the business over the next two years as part of our plan to grow capacity to meet client demands. The roles will be in design, engineering, project management, IT, research and development, trades and support roles. While the market is very competitive, so far we have managed to attract the best of talent as people see an exciting change from the norm in what we’re doing, they like the international footprint and Kilkenny is a nice place to live. Last July, we launched our first-ever apprenticeship programme for manufacturing technicians and look forward to bringing on more apprentices across all departments into the future.

Q: Looking ahead, what potential do you see for Modubuild?

KB: We expect to achieve €100m in turnover within the next three years and to be on two other continents within the next two years. We’re looking at South East Asia at the moment. We are still a small player in a very big market and are confident the opportunities are there. The large biopharma industry is spending €1bn a year on building projects while upwards of €20bn is being invested in data centres in any one year. The combination of design and engineering expertise and people, our own manufacturing facility and international footprint means we can demonstrate future capacity.

ACCELERATED PROJECT DELIVERY

Modubuild delivered a multimillion euro vaccine laboratory for Chinese biopharma company WuXi in eight months during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic. The entire two-storey biosafety vaccine laboratory facility was designed and constructed inside Modubuild’s Castlecomer factory at the same time that planning permission and site preparations were happening. The building was then shipped to the site in Dundalk, Co Louth in large modules and assembled in nine days. “Biopharma clients producing life-saving drugs put real value on service, product and certainty of outcome. Using Modubuild meant WuXi could bring a vaccine to market two years earlier than it could have done otherwise,” says Modubuild Managing Director Kevin Brennan. The project was named as the Large Pharma Project of the Year at the Pharma Industry Awards 2020.

“THE BIG THING FOR OUR CLIENTS IS THAT OUR APPROACH DE-RISKS THEIR PROJECTS, THE OUTCOMES ARE MORE PREDICTABLE AND THE TIMELINE IS ON AVERAGE 50% QUICKER THAN WITH TRADITIONAL METHODS.”