Encouraging innovation isn’t just about buying all the latest gadgets.

It’s about empowering our workforce to think differently about how we deliver value to our customers. With this approach, we have embedded innovative thinking into every part of the business.

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Innovation for everyone

At Fletcher Construction we're right at the cutting edge of innovation.

Innovation for everyone

At Fletcher Construction we're right at the cutting edge of innovation. Our Engineering Services team's got digital skills that give our teams - and our clients - a mind-blowing amount of information about projects of all sizes. Take a look at this video to see what they're capable of.

Snells Beach wasterwater treatment plant
Snells Beach wastewater treatment plant

Our digital engineering capabilities offer a lot of benefits to our customers.

Snells Beach wastewater treatment plant

Our digital engineering capabilities offer a lot of benefits to our customers. One of them is cost savings.

We are currently delivering a new wastewater treatment plant at Snells Beach for Watercare, who says our suite of digital tools has helped to streamline the project, and therefore save a substantial amount of money.

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Custom screed

The Brian Perry Civil team at the Waikanae water treatment plant is making strides in enhancing the facility's seismic resilience, including the construction of a water clarifier tank.

Custom screed

The Brian Perry Civil team at the Waikanae water treatment plant is making strides in enhancing the facility's seismic resilience, including the construction of a water clarifier tank.

Faced with the challenge of completing the concrete placement for the massive tank floor to strict level tolerances and the required finish within just six hours, concrete placing companies were hesitant to take on the task.

Project Engineer Jacob Walmsley and Supervisor Jethro Staite devised an innovative solution by customizing a vibrating screed to fit the size and complexity of their operation. Project Manager Daniel Doyle praised the team's ingenuity, noting that while vibrating screeds are common, their tailored version allowed the BPC site team to self-perform the work seamlessly.

This custom screed not only saved considerable time and labour but also eliminated the need for concrete workers to manually screed while standing in the pour. The team plans to apply these lessons learned to future large-diameter tank base pours.

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Plunged pier reinforcing cages

Innovation and collaboration on Auckland Transport’s Eastern Busway project have enabled the plunged pier reinforcing cages to be constructed on Rā Hihi (flyover) above Reeves Rd.

Plunged pier reinforcing cages

Innovation and collaboration on Auckland Transport’s Eastern Busway project have enabled the plunged pier reinforcing cages to be constructed on Rā Hihi (flyover) above Reeves Rd.

Construction of each pier has required a coordinated and staged construction method. A prefabricated pier reinforcing cage is delivered to site by Fletcher Reinforcing - A Fletcher Steel Company and is then lifted, rotated and plunged into a 3m diameter bored concrete pile, constructed by Brian Perry Civil.

Due to the unique shape of the flared piers, a bespoke plunging jig and steel pier form has been required and designed by the alliance, then modelled and reviewed by the Fletcher Engineering Services team prior to fabrication. The team used the Tekla Structures Building Information Modelling (BIM) platform to provide an accurate and detailed 3D model of the flared piers.

Given the size and scale of the piers, Fletcher Reinforcing chose to build these at Fletcher Steel’s Hunua site. That gave space and opportunity to focus on building each pier using a purpose-built jig and for tying efficiency to be improved. The on-site steel fixing teams used their iPads to access the 3D model using the cloud-based collaboration platform, Trimble Connect. This ensured the high quality of each flared pier and increased the efficiency of the build.

The first flared pier was delivered in June 2024.

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Sprayer innovation

Our Specialised Engineering team is achieving remarkable results in bitumen sprayer technology.

Sprayer innovation

Our Specialised Engineering team is achieving remarkable results in bitumen sprayer technology.

An innovative recent sprayer build for parent company Higgins has produced significant improvements in usability, functionality and efficiency.

The sprayer is designed to allow for automated bar movements for lap joints, road edges, and kerb and channel. Along with surface texture scanning for automated variable application rates, it also features fully autonomous self-driving and spraying.

Greg Dobson, Specialised Engineering Services Manager, and Travis Etheridge, Specialised Engineering Services Design and Technical Engineer, highlight the build as a major leap forward in sprayer technology. “We have been targeting significant maintenance cost reductions, enhanced automation, and precise control of spray bar positions and nozzles, leading to higher accuracy, repeatability, and reduced surfacing defects. With this in mind, we’ve created something exceptional.”

By collaborating with current and former operators, the team incorporated valuable feedback to develop enhancements. These include the ability to control individual nozzles or spray bars as a group, allowing operators to spray complex shapes and back-to-back patches of varying sizes in single passes. This efficiency reduces the number of spray passes, chip truck passes, and lane closures, ultimately lowering the cost of chip sealing patches and seal repairs.

“We aimed to make the operation of a telescopic sprayer simple and intuitive while enabling complex tasks – and we’ve succeeded.”

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Biogenic (plant based) bitumen

Higgins is exploring the wider use of biogenic (plant-based) bitumen for building asphalt and chip seal pavements.

Biogenic (plant based) bitumen

Higgins is exploring the wider use of biogenic (plant-based) bitumen for building asphalt and chip seal pavements.

Adding plant-based biogenic components to binders used in bitumen can help decarbonize road construction by capturing an increasing amount of carbon in road surfaces or other asphalt-based products as they are recycled and reused over time.

Higgins is hopeful of a successful development in this area, which will extend our contribution towards the Fletcher Construction roadmap for a 30% reduction in carbon emissions and a sustainable future "for generations to come".

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Propellor on Ara Tūhono

The Ara Tūhono - Puhoi to Warkworth motorway is not just a fantastic piece of roading – it’s been a perfect case study of how we’re using cutting-edge technology at Fletcher Construction.

Propellor on Ara Tūhono

The Ara Tūhono - Puhoi to Warkworth motorway is not just a fantastic piece of roading – it’s been a perfect case study of how we’re using cutting-edge technology at Fletcher Construction. When work started on the project six years ago for our clients NX2 and Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency, we managed to get our hands on the then-relatively new software Propellor.

This allows our drone pilots to take measurements from the sky, then use them to reliably map, measure, and report on site progress. It means they’re able to produce a virtual 3D replica of the site, week to week.

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Rock blasting Ara Tūhono

The Ara Tūhono - Puhoi to Warkworth motorway winds through some pretty rocky landscape.

Rock blasting Ara Tūhono

The Ara Tūhono - Puhoi to Warkworth motorway winds through some pretty rocky landscape. That’s meant in some areas, the easiest way to build the new road was to use explosives.

The project was built by Fletcher Construction Major Projects and Acciona along with a team of subcontractors for clients NX2 and Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency. As a team, we worked with RedBull Powder Company along with Acciona’s International Blasting Specialists to clear a path for the motorway. We filmed the blasting as it happened, which has made for some pretty spectacular footage to look back on!

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Remote control roller
Remote control roller

We used a remote control roller in our work to repair one of the major slips in Coromandel (McBeth-Opoutere). We built a retaining wall to support the road above, backfilled it, and the roller has just finished levelling.

The remote control roller was used in areas where we need to flatten ground near any steep drop-offs. This means if something did go wrong and the roller tipped off the edge, none of our people would be hurt in the process.

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Big Benefits from 4D planning tool

Brian Perry Civil's 4D Synchro presentations are delivering significant advantages in the Tender and Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) stages of challenging infrastructure projects.

Big Benefits from 4D planning tool

Brian Perry Civil's 4D Synchro presentations are delivering significant advantages in the Tender and Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) stages of challenging infrastructure projects. Digital Engineer Jovan Krstic says hazards can be better foreseen and safety risks reduced.

“The increased project visualisation helps discussion and collaboration on complex projects. It really improves project planning and benefits everyone involved.”

Our digital engineers use Bentley Systems Synchro 4D software to prepare animations.

“4D sequencing of works improves project planning and coordination of ongoing operations,” Jovan says. “It identifies lead times to optimise construction duration, improves constructability, and greatly improves monitoring of actual progress against planned progress, which reduces claims by more quickly identifying and resolving issues.”

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Bubble curtain

A ‘bubble curtain’ is being used by Brian Perry Civil to protect marine life around the Seaview Energy Resilience Project being delivered for CentrePort Ltd.

Bubble curtain

A ‘bubble curtain’ is being used by Brian Perry Civil to protect marine life around the Seaview Energy Resilience Project being delivered for CentrePort Ltd.

With environmental protection always a priority for BPC’s teams, the bubble curtain is a way of using technology to maximise protection for marine life in Wellington Harbour.

The bubbles act as an acoustic screen, reducing the transmission of underwater noise generated by the piling works and protecting whales and dolphins from distress and hearing damage. On-site monitoring has shown that the use of the bubble curtain reduces the area of influence from piling noise from over 2km down to less than 10m.

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Cardboard guide wall

An environmentally-friendly cardboard guide wall pilot has proved successful at BPC’s Taranaki Street Pump Station project in central Wellington.

Cardboard guide wall

An environmentally-friendly cardboard guide wall pilot has proved successful at BPC’s Taranaki Street Pump Station project in central Wellington.

Project Manager Jasper Snyder says the team was required to shoot piles to a depth of 17m below ground, so a guide wall was needed to provide the interlocked structure.

Polystyrene former blocks would normally be used, but Engineering Services Manager Brendan Attewell came up with the more sustainable alternative of using huge cardboard tubes, traditionally only used for casting above-ground piles.

Jasper thinks this is the first time the Sonoco tubes have been used for guide walls. “They were more challenging to manage than polystyrene, but well worth using,” he says. “The result was excellent, and they’re an environmentally-friendly and cost-effective option. I can see us using this method on other projects.”

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Concrete sensors

We are embedding special sensors as we pour concrete at Auckland Airport – saving time and giving certainty about the quality of the product.

Concrete sensors

We are embedding special sensors as we pour concrete at Auckland Airport – saving time and giving certainty about the quality of the product. Check out the video for more detail on yet another awesome approach from our Engineering and Innovation team.

 

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The value of digital engineering

We can do some amazing things with our new digital engineering tools – but how can we measure their value?

The value of digital engineering

We can do some amazing things with our new digital engineering tools – but how can we measure their value?

We’ve made a huge investment into digital engineering at Fletcher Construction, and it’s really starting to pay off for our people and our customers. But it’s not always easy to communicate the value of our digital tools. To help get to the bottom of this, we recently hosted a discussion on digital engineering at our Penrose HQ. Beca’s Glenn Jowett, Auckland Airport’s Karl Fitzpatrick and our very own Matt Findlay talked about how we can measure the value of digital engineering from a client, consultant and contractor perspective. The discussion was held in conjunction with our friends at AUT, and facilitated by the Head of Huri Te Ao/The School of Future Environments, Charles Walker.  

The panel shared some great insights, and there were some excellent questions from the audience too. 

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What's next for you?

Join us and we’ll get you all set for what’s next – from the career you want to the lifestyle you’re dreaming of. The size and scale of our operations means we can offer an impressive range of opportunities across the country.

 

Interested? Get in touch