2024 Speaker Presentations & Delegate List
Thank you for attending the 2024 MMC Ireland National Conference!
Click here to view the delegate list.
Click on the speaker photos below to access their presentations from the event!
Kevin Masters – Director, Major Projects Advisory, KPMG
Kevin Masters is a director of KPMG’s Major Projects Advisory team and heads up Construction Innovation. Kevin has 20+ years of experience deploying various derivatives of MMC across the private and public sectors. He works with clients to design business cases and delivery strategies to embed MMC into everyday operations. Kevin’s forward-thinking mindset and diverse stakeholder perspective drives his focus on sustainable, future-proof infrastructure solutions.
Tom Gregory – Senior Architect, Bryden Wood
Tom is an architect with demonstrated experience of designing and delivering projects across a range of sectors. He currently leads a multidisciplinary Bryden Wood design team designing and realising a flexible manufacturing facility in Cologne, Germany, as part of a wider client campus.
Tom joined Bryden Wood in 2017 and has worked within and led multidisciplinary design teams across a range of scales, sectors, and work stages. This experience enables a detailed understanding of construction techniques, technology, and materiality to inform the design of truly integrated spaces.
Throughout his time at the company Tom has been involved in several aviation projects, designing elegant architectural solutions that respond to budgetary and time pressures within a restricted airside environment. He has also been involved since 2020 in the design and delivery of a large industrial facility in Cologne, Germany, where he leads a multidisciplinary Bryden Wood design team designing and realising a flexible manufacturing facility as part of a wider client campus.
Trudi Sully – Industrialised Design & Construction – UK & Europe Lead, Mott MacDonald
Trudi is the UK & Europe Lead for Industrialised Design & Construction at Mott MacDonald, where a rapidly growing team is delivering integrated utilisation of industrialisation, DfMA, MMC, and platform approaches to unlock greater social, economic, and environmental outcomes.
Her eclectic career journey spans a broad range of industries, but with a common theme of engaging with leaders – from SMEs to multi-nationals and government departments – to tackle challenges and support transformation.
Prior to joining Mott MacDonald, Trudi spent 4 years as a director of the Construction Innovation Hub, working with government and industry to develop tools and approaches that enable improved productivity, performance, and resilience – including overseeing the production of the Product Platform Rulebook and the Value of Platforms report.
She now champions the adoption and deployment of these approaches to support the efficient delivery of a more sustainable built environment.
Scott Tacchi – Head of MMC, Sir Robert McAlpine
Scott Tacchi joined Sir Robert McAlpine (SRM) in Oct 2022 as Head of MMC. Prior to this Scott was with the Department for Education (DfE) as Head of the ‘Modern Methods of Construction’ programme, the £3bn off site schools’ framework.
His focus is to bring all the benefits of time, quality, safety and cost savings that can be generated through the ‘integrator’ model of offsite construction and manufacture to SRM and their clients .
Prior to joining in the DfE Scott spent 20 yrs. in Consultancy, latterly as Regional Director for PM & QS practices in the Southwest (Ridge, Mott MacDonald and Mace).
David O’Brien – Senior Construction Adviser, Office of Government Procurement
David is the Chair of the Government Contracts Committee for Construction (GCCC) and senior adviser on public works and construction services procurement. He is leading the ongoing review and reform of the Capital Works Management Framework (CWMF) which will move decision making on public works projects away from capital cost to total cost of ownership.
He is a member of the Construction Sector Group established under the National Development Plan to promote regular and open dialogue between the public sector and key segments of the construction industry.
Prior to his current role he worked with the National Building Agency where he was a lead architect on social housing and urban regeneration projects.
James Young – Director of Engineering Services, Evolusion Innovation
James Young has 20 years’ experience in the construction industry, primarily focussing on the MMC sector throughout his professional career. He has pioneered the independent design consultancy offering to MMC manufacturers across Ireland and the UK, working on a significant number of projects in this time. He has worked on MMC projects across the globe, including in Ireland, the UK, mainland Europe, Middle East, Asia and South America, in sectors including residential, commercial, healthcare and education. James has spent the last 10 years working with Assigned Certifiers, Design Certifiers, designers and manufacturers within the Building Control (Amended) Regulations (BCAR) process.
Pia Feeney – Director, Government & Infrastructure, EY
Pia is a Director in EY’s Government & Infrastructure team, focused on real estate and housing. She has 17 years’ experience as an asset-backed financier and strategic advisor during a career that spans the UK, US and Ireland.
Pia’s focus is on improving the quality, inclusivity and sustainability of social infrastructure, working with government agencies, non-profit housing providers, local authorities and the private sector. She is active across different levels of government advising on the use of MMC to accelerate housing delivery. She has broad experience of infrastructure debt structuring in the bank and capital markets across sectors, currencies and geographies.
Martin Searson – National Standards Authority of Ireland (NSAI), MMC Agrément Certification overview
Martin Searson is the Head of Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) with NSAI (National Standards of Ireland) within the Certification Division. The MMC Certification team, specialises in providing inspection and certification services, including technical assessments for Modular Construction solutions, to current Building Regulations under the NSAI Agrément certification scheme. Services include dealing with new MMC enquiries, processing new MMC Applications, reviewing Technical Documentation submitted for assessment and engaging further with MMC Stakeholders for Agrément certification, coupled with both offsite and onsite MMC Inspections, Factory Production Control (FPC) and Surveillance audits.
Martin currently holds a Masters in Quantity Surveying, an Honours Degree in Applied Science from Trinity College Dublin, Diploma in Quality Management and a Certificate in Instrumentation & Controls.
Daniel McCrum – Assistant Professor, UCD & Construct Innovate
Daniel is currently an Assistant Professor in Structural Engineering and Director of the Modern Methods of Construction Research Group (MMCRG) (ucd.ie/mmcrg/), University College Dublin, Ireland. Daniel is a Co-PI of the €5m funded Enterprise Ireland Construct Innovate Technology Centre (constructinnovate.ie), Ireland’s National Research Centre for Construction Technology and Innovation. Within Construct Innovate, Daniel leads the pillar theme challenge on Productivity, Affordability & Cost, which relates directly to modern methods of construction. Daniel is a member of NSAI/TC15/SC3 Eurocode Steel Committee, the newly formed NSAI/TC150 on Prefabricated Buildings and CIRIA P3279 Buildoffsite Performance Specification Guidance for MMC Advisory Group. Daniel’s research focuses on developing structural design guidance for MMC through testing and computational modelling. His research group also focuses on certification, standardisation and perceptions of MMC.
Padraig Boland – MMC Demonstration Park
Dave Quinn – Quality Director, UK and Ireland – BB7 Consulting
David is a Chartered Engineer with significant experience at delivering innovative and practical fire strategies throughout Ireland, the UK and beyond. Currently based in Dublin, David has previously spent a large part of his career leading the fire engineering delivery for a large multidisciplinary firm based in London. David was Group Director of Fire Engineering at Buro Happold in London before returning to Dublin where he is now Engineering Director for BB7.
Celine McHugh – Principal – Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment
Celine McHugh has responsibility at Principal level for the Construction and Enterprise Innovation Policy Unit in the Innovation & Investment Division. The Unit leads and co-ordinates delivery across the Department’s actions in the Government’s Housing for All strategy, which includes a particular focus on construction innovation and productivity enhancement in the sector. The Unit also leads on the development and implementation of the Department’s enterprise innovation policy; represents the Department on the inter-Departmental implementation structures for Impact 2030, Irelands national innovation policy; and is engaged in a number of international innovation policy initiatives at EU level, including the European Innovation Council, and the OECD. The Unit has responsibility for Ireland’s Smart Specialisation Strategy and leads on its implementation through a national level Implementation Group including relevant Departments, Agencies and the Regional Assemblies. The Unit is overseeing the development of a national network of European Digital Innovation Hubs under the Digital Europe Programme which is administered by Enterprise Ireland.
Bryn Griffiths – Director, Head of Cost Management, Ireland – Turner & Townsend
I currently lead a cost management team in Turner & Townsend’s Dublin office delivering a variety of schemes within the residential, commercial, higher education, health and education sectors. Since relocating to Ireland in 2017, I’ve been working on a variety of residential projects including a large scale residential led regeneration scheme, build-to-rent apartment developments and various student accommodation projects in Dublin.
With 19 years’ experience in the industry, starting with a main contractor, I moved to a consultancy role after two years and this is where I have operated since, providing client focused support and advice. My experience includes residential, commercial and mixed use developments for major developer clients.
