What leads to the high capital cost of prefabricated construction in China: perspectives of stakeholders

Abstract

PurposePrefabricated construction (PC) will play a vital role in the transformation and upgrading of the construction industry in the future. However, high capital cost is currently one of the biggest obstacles to the application and promotion of PC in China. Clarifying the factors that affect the PC cost from the perspectives of stakeholders and exploring key cost control paths help to achieve effective cost management, but few studies have paid enough attention to this. Therefore, this research aims to explore the critical cost influencing factors (CIFs) and critical stakeholders of PC based on stakeholder theories and propose corresponding strategies for different stakeholders to reduce the cost of PC.Design/methodology/approachBased on the stakeholder theory and social network theory, literature review and two rounds of expert interviews were used to obtain the stakeholder-associated CIFs and their mutual effects, then the consistency of the data was tested. After that, social network analysis was applied to identify the critical CIFs, critical interaction and key stakeholders in PC cost control and mine the influence conduction paths between CIFs.FindingsThe results reveal that the cognition and attitude of developer and relevant standards and codes are the most critical CIFs while the government, developer and contractor are crucial to the cost control of PC. The findings further suggest that measures should be taken to reduce the transaction costs of the developer, and the contractor ought to efficiently apply information technology. Moreover, the collaborative work between designer and manufacturer can avoid unnecessary cost consumption.Originality/valueThis research combines stakeholder management and cost management in PC for the first time and explores the effective cost control paths. The research results can contribute to clarifying the key points of cost management for different stakeholders and improving the cost performance of PC projects.

Understanding adoption of high off-site construction level technologies in construction based on the TAM and TTF

“…The increasing OSC practices of China have received attention from scholars (Xu et al, 2020;Satola et al, 2020;Wuni et al, 2022b). By using China as a sample, existing research on the macro facilitating mechanisms of OSC also provides useful insights for the global construction industry (Li et al, 2021;Yuan et al, 2021;Liu et al, 2022;Du et al, 2022). On the other hand, the current projects with LOSCLTs are comparatively more, while the adoption of HOSCLTs by firms requires more promotion.…”

“…Trading partners in the OSC industry chain can recommend the firm to adopt innovations, and provide matched support through cooperation (Wang et al, 2019). While the government plays a key role in regulation, supervision and promotion of HOSCLTs (Dou et al, 2019;Liu et al, 2022). Besides, end-users and the public can call for green and sustainable technologies in terms of building demands (Zhou and Ren, 2020).…”

An investigation of how stakeholders influence construction project performance: a small and medium sized contractor’s perspective in the Jordanian construction industry

“…Based on the formative work of Freeman (1984), a stakeholder is defined as any individual or group which can affect or be affected by the performance of a project. From a construction project perspective, key project stakeholders include clients, consultants, contractors, subcontractors, suppliers and the community (Abeysekera and McLean, 2001;Abdulrahman, 2010;Teo and Loosemore, 2017;Cai et al, 2021;Dwivedi and Dwivedi, 2021;Do et al, 2021Do et al, , 2022Liu et al, 2022;Shaukat et al, 2022). Past research shows that project performance is related to a distinct set of factors linked to each of these stakeholders, which in this paper we call stakeholderrelated factors (Duren et al, 2015;Liu et al, 2022).…”

“…Past research shows that project performance is related to a distinct set of factors linked to each of these stakeholders, which in this paper we call stakeholder-related factors (Duren et al. , 2015; Liu et al. , 2022).…”

“…From a construction project perspective, key project stakeholders include clients, consultants, contractors, subcontractors, suppliers and the community (Abeysekera and McLean, 2001; Abdulrahman, 2010; Teo and Loosemore, 2017; Cai et al. , 2021; Dwivedi and Dwivedi, 2021; Do et al., 2021, 2022; Liu et al. , 2022; Shaukat et al.…”