33rd Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (IGLC 33) - Osaka and Kyoto, Japan - 2025

https://doi.org/10.24928/2025/0115

Strategic Levers for Prefabrication in Construction: an Economic Case Study

Svenja Lauble1, Dominik Steuer2, Helena Großmann3 & Philipp Zielke4

1Research Fellow, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Institute of Technology and Management in Construction, [email protected], orcid.org/0000-0002-0376-1791
2Chief Executive Office, Steuer Group, [email protected]
3M.Sc. Student, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), [email protected]
4Research Fellow, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Institute of Technology and Management in Construction, [email protected], orcid.org/0009-0001-5241-8666

Abstract

The prefabrication industry is expected to grow and offer significant benefits to the construction industry, including improved efficiency, cost savings, quality and sustainability. Despite these benefits, there is a gap in the literature regarding the strategic levers that determine the optimal level of prefabrication. This study aims to investigate three levels of prefabrication (L1: brick walls, L2: brick walls with electrical installations and L3: brick walls with electrical installations and plastering) from an economic point of view. Levers from the literature were validated and supplemented based on an expert workshop with a small to medium-sized supplier of prefabricated elements and construction service provider in southern Germany. The economic feasibility was assessed using sensitivity analysis, focusing on cost drivers for organizational effort and increased efficiency. The results showed that higher levels of prefabrication (L2 and L3) lead to significant efficiency gains, especially in the best-case scenario. Organizational effort increases with the level of prefabrication, but at L3, efficiency improvements outweigh complexity, reducing costs such as material savings and mitigation of weather-related disruptions. Prefabrication, when strategically integrated, not only achieves the same goals as lean construction activities such as workflow efficiency and waste minimization, but the economic benefits increase with the level of prefabrication. This means that, under stable conditions, a high level of prefabrication is economically viable.

Keywords

Prefabrication, Production Processes, Level, Profitability, Case Study

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Reference in APA 7th edition format:

Lauble, S., Steuer, D., Großmann, H. & Zielke, P.. (2025). Strategic Levers for Prefabrication in Construction: an Economic Case Study. In Seppänen, O., Koskela, L., & Murata , K. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 33rd Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (IGLC 33) (pp. 717–728). https://doi.org/10.24928/2025/0115

Shortened reference for use in IGLC papers:

Lauble, S., Steuer, D., Großmann, H. & Zielke, P.. (2025). Strategic Levers for Prefabrication in Construction: an Economic Case Study. IGLC33. https://doi.org/10.24928/2025/0115

 

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