Stop Waiting for Better Building Products w/ Zenon Radewych of WZMH Architects

Mass timber projects don't succeed because of one company, but entire ecosystems. 

Most of us working in mass timber design it, engineer it, or build it. A few are inventing the products that will take it to the next level. 

Zenon Radewych is one of them. He's a principal at WZMH Architects, a 65-year-old firm based in Toronto, and the person behind sparkbird, the R&D lab WZMH built inside their own office. 

In this episode, Zenon walks through what's coming out of sparkbird on the mass timber side (TIMBERCLAD™, Pillar & Plank, Speedstac, and ELEVATE), why an architecture firm would take on the cost of running a lab in the first place, and what the industry looks like when more firms stop waiting for better building products and start inventing them.

If you're exploring mass timber for your own projects, one of the first questions is often "who actually makes the materials?"

To help with that, we created a Mass Timber Producer Map featuring 39 North American producers and fabricators. You can explore manufacturers near your project, see the products they produce, visit their websites, and connect directly with them.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

You know, we've been doing the same thing for the last hundred years in terms of, you know, how buildings are kind of constructed, right? We're doing it because we're frustrated with kind of what's been happening. But number two, it's amazing to do this in terms of we have fun. Number three, it actually attracts talent. So we get a lot of people that want to come to work for us because they care about spark work. So they will spend some time in Sparkwork, but then they'll go back into the studio and do the cultural stuff we do every single day. So attracting talent now for us is a lot easier. But then the next thing I want to mention is it's actually, believe it or not, like a marketing business development tool, right? So Spark work really differentiates us from the competition. So when we go for that interview, when we split for that RFP proposal, you know, showing the clients about the Sparkford lab, we believe it's making a difference in terms of us winning projects.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

Most of us working with Mass Murphy, design it, engineer it, or build it. But a few are inventing the products that will take it to the next level. And you can be one of them. Today's guest is Denon Radowicz, principal at WZMH Architect, and the first to behind Sparkwork, an RD lab that they built inside the firm. It helps them win work, it attracts talent, and it's where their team is inventing products that the rest of us will eventually use. Here's what we get into today. First, what's actually coming out of the lab? A timber cladding system aimed at data center delivery speed, a hybrid panel built to make mass timber housing cost competitive, and a housing model built on an innovative approach to location and private partnerships. Second, the business case for building a lab like this. Why Xenon thinks it beats traditional marketing and what running it has actually done for the firm. And third, the bigger picture. What the industry looks like when more of us stop waiting for better building products and start inventing them. If you're trying to push your firm to do more than the status quo, this one's for you. And if you want to stay ahead of what's happening in mass tender industry and grow your network, join the newsletter in the link below. Alright, let's get into it.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

I'm Zenon Radowich. I'm one of the principals, one of the owners of uh WZMH Architects. Um we have uh in our office this lab called Sparkbird, which is an RD lab that started around 2017, 2018. Um and when we started the RD lab, the kind of the focus was around IoT, Internet of Things, looking at kind of the smart building uh sector and how to kind of improve uh you know the smarts in buildings. But a big focus too was kind of looking at you know the materials that we used in buildings of components. I'm a big believer that we're laying too many things together, right? To kind of create one thing. And is there a way to kind of create you know one product with fewer materials, right? And and that kind of led to this, our first basically invention, which is called the intelligence structural panel. And that's something we invented, you know, um in our lab in 2017, which is this idea about combining a whole bunch of the building components into call it one component. I call it like the 10-in-one. So that's kind of Sparkbird. Sparkbird is this lab where we play uh in the IoT world in the prefab world. Um and then during COVID, towards the end of COVID, we started playing a lot with uh the digital world in terms of software. And so Sparkbird also develops software solutions. Um, and but because you know that's kind of a very specialized, call it, you know, field, um, we decided to kind of create a spin-off company called Giraffe, okay, where we've tr we were transferred these so-called software ideas. We we initially start in in Sparkbird, transfer them over to Giraffe, uh, and then we have a separate team of computer engineers, software engineers, you know, uh um that basically take those ideas and then kind of build them. Um so there's WZMH, which basically is the architectural firm that has the RD lab Sparkbird, um, and then we have the separate arm that's totally separate financially, separate company altogether that's called Giraffe that deals with all of the software stuff. Inside Sparkbird, how do you guys decide what to work on? It's it's really interesting. I I uh the stuff that we work on, it's kind of like a spark, right? It's like we don't really have like a program of okay, over the next six months we're gonna do the following things. Um, a lot of things that we do in Sparkbird are basically just ideas that that come up, you know, after meeting with a client, or we'll see something or hear something, or we'll we'll be addressing a challenge that's happening in the world, like the housing issues and stuff like that, right? So we don't really have a program. The the Sparkboard lab is very, I would call it, I don't want to call it casual, but in terms of how we operate, it is very casual. Um, you know, there's a group of us that that uh that work in the lab every single day, and the group actually kind of grows and shrinks depending upon you know staffing availabilities and and the projects we're working on. But you know, we don't necessarily pick certain items and say, okay, we're gonna work on this for the next six months. Uh we kind of just pick things, and then those things take sometimes a few months or half a year, year to actually build. And during the course of doing that, we'll come up with other ideas. You know, what I always tell everybody about uh uh like inventing something, like for example, when we started with the intelligence structural panel, when you invent something, and you'll I think you'll hear this from other like inventors, is that as you're trying to call call it solve that problem, build that invention, there's a very, very good chance that that two or three other challenges or inventions will come out of that that are related but could even be totally on their own. And that happens in our lab as we're working on something and developing and trying to solve something or build something cool and innovative, another idea will come out. And so we actually have like a list of a gazillion ideas. We'd love to do them all, but we don't have time, the resources, right? But this is very common uh uh about you know in inventing things. So, in terms of you know, how do we come up with the list or or ideas, they're always happening because as you work on something, I guarantee you five other ideas will come out. So there's never an issue of well, what's the next idea? There's there's we have too many ideas, right? That we just kind of carry on and keep going.

SPEAKER_00 6:12

Uh so this is a mass timber podcast, and I know I've been up and I visited your lab, and people will see footage on screen of that. What are you working on in the mass timber space?

SPEAKER_01 6:21

So we're doing several things. Um, you know, on the mass timber side, we're looking at wall cladding in terms of you know, uh introducing mass timber wood into the building envelope component of buildings. And the reason being that we do a lot of data centers in our office on the architectural side, and a lot of data centers, you know, the wall systems are typically solid walls. They don't have a lot of windows, a lot of openings. They're very tall walls, um, uh, and and they need to be well insulated because of the environment inside. Um, and because data centers are traditionally seen as energy hogs, um, there's an opportunity to kind of look at the building envelope of data centers to kind of you know remove the concrete, uh, remove maybe some of the steel studs and stuff like that, and introduce, you know, products like mass timber, like wood, that obviously are a lot better in terms of the you know lower carbon, call it, you know, scale, right? So we're looking at that very seriously and we're getting a lot of positive feedback from our clients who we thought were gonna say, no way, you know, these are high-tech buildings, you know, keep the wood away, but they're actually very interested in in this idea of a mass timber clad wall. And you know, the studies that we've done so far in the calculations, there's a lot of benefits in terms of, you know, when you have a very thick interior called structural width of mass timber that supports the wall system that takes the wind loads and stuff like that, um, that that thickness of of wood actually has a pretty good R value compared to say concrete or steel. So, you know, if we have some good R value from the wood, we can reduce the amount of insulation that we have between the mass timber and the so-called cladding components. So there's a benefit there. And the next benefit is actually the panel is a lot lighter. So when you think about a lot of data centers that are built say out of pre-cast concrete walls, you know, those pre-cast panels are being shipped from precast plants that are predominantly, you know, in a few locations. Um and so to get them to a data center site could be, you know, 100 miles, 200 miles, 300 miles of shipping these heavy panels. Um and so mass timber panels being a lot lighter, we could fit many more of those on a truck in lighter cranes. So there's a lot of benefits to using mass timber in data centers. So we are looking at that for the cladding systems of of data centers. And then we're also looking at um what we want to kind of solve is really bringing down the cost of mass timber solutions and specifically the residential marketplace, not single family homes, but more you know, multi-story in terms of three to ten to twelve story buildings, and really kind of trying to find a cost-effective solution for using mass timber in these buildings because right now the feedback we're getting from the market is that you know the mass timber is still coming in at a premium. There's not necessarily a lot of competition out there. So, you know, we actually met an amazing company called Newcap through one of our friends, introduced it to Newcap who who who invented this product called grip metal, right? A really cool piece of uh technology. It's a simple you know piece of metal that uh they run through a so-called machine that process that actually rips teeth on one side or both sides of the actual metal. It basically you know changes the so-called form factor of that metal. And and we believe um there's a good opportunity to actually introduce that into mass timber, whether it goes in between NLT plies or in between CLT plies, or what we actually invented um in our office in our lab is actually a hybrid panel of CLT, two plies with grip metal in between. So this so-called sheet of this of with these teeth that's two-sided that then bonds to NLT members. So basically it's a hybrid panel, right? And there's a lot of benefits there, we believe, because NLT is best, you know, in the lower portion of a structural slab in terms of how forces work, and the CLT is better on the top, right? And so now we we use we use basically grip metal, which is not glue, you know, it's basically the so-called mechanical fashion to glue both of those together. And the goal is to kind of you know um uh uh provide a panel that uses less wood than NLT or CLT would use and achieve the same spans, the same loads in a typical residential module of around 20 feet, right? Um in you know, Canada we call it six meters, right? That's kind of our goal, and we also believe there might be a benefit with that grip metal sandwich in between the panels to provide uh a better panel in terms of the the the fire resistance rating of the overall assembly. So we think there's a lot of opportunities there. So that's something we're working on. And then we're also working on another hybrid solution, again, specifically for the for the for the uh uh uh residential sector that we presented at a conference about a month ago or less than a month ago. And that is that is a building that's built with uh um pre-cast uh concrete piers and basically mass timber floor systems. And so why are we doing that? A lot of it's around again reducing the cost, kind of bringing in some concrete that's pre-cast, and and and we're actually working on a green concrete solution. So we could look at a green concrete pre-cast pier um for the walls and any so-called beams, those components basically that you know people could touch, right? Um and and and then the wall systems, sorry, floor systems that are basically mass timber, right? Um that that would have obviously a concrete topping on top, on the underside, they'd be exposed. So the value in all of this is we believe will reduce the costs, might even technically uh uh increase the the speed of construction because of just how how how these concrete piers are made and how they're installed. Um, you know, call it six, seven months ago, um, this would have been a great solution around, you know, dealing with the issue of encapsulation, which is slowly going away. Um, but we also believe that for certain building types and maybe certain uh heights of buildings, though there will be a requirement for encapsulation. So then the concrete will also help in terms of doing a bit of a mix of concrete non-combustible with combustible products like mass timber. So those are the kind of things we're working on right now on the on the mass timber side. We are still doing some call it um um um traditional work on the wood side in terms of using grip metal with traditional wood joists, um, you know, that you would have in a single family home and actually trying to create a an engineered joist made completely out of plywood, you know, that's a rectangle. It's not your typical call it you know structural eye joist that you would see in the marketplace, but a simple piece of plywood um that has grip metal. And then we're we're kind of getting ready to kind of do some testing on glue lamb with grip metal, um, which we think is also a great opportunity in terms of you know, glue lamb made out of you know structural members of certain wood species that are glued together. There could be an opportunity to kind of again increase the span and loads of the say glue lamb beams by introducing grip metal, reducing maybe the amount of wood, but also potentially looking at using uh um wood species or pieces of wood that you that are not really structurally graded, that maybe now in combin in combination with grit metal can be used in a structural application. So, so we're kind of working about three or four things on the mass timber side and the wood side in our lab right now.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

Yeah, that's exciting. And by the time this episode comes out, we'll have footage of that glue lamp testing you guys are doing at TMU, so we'll put it up so everybody can see it. Um so you've got a lot of problems that you guys are looking to solve. Do you Xenin, WZMH, Sparkbird, are you guys the ones taking this all the way to market, or how does that work?

SPEAKER_01 13:43

Yeah, that's a very good question. You know, we we get the question all the time. So the reality is that SparkBird is is about doing the early RD. It's about IP, I tell people having fun, right? It's really interesting because when people come to our office uh to see it, but but more importantly, when people come to work in our office and they work in the Sparkboard lab, you know, I think it's fair to say that they get very excited about working on something that's very innovative without potentially a deadline, without potentially having to make it fully work, right? So so we're playing here in our lab. Um the the benefit is that that we're playing and there's no pressure to take it to commercialization. The problem that we're having though is that the more and more people that see that what we're doing, specific clients, they're asking us, okay, when can we have that? When is that ready, right? And our answer is we don't know because we're not really built to kind of take these things from beginning to commercialization, right? So we've been approaching, call it different industry partners on certain things that we're working on, asking them, hey, do you want to take our idea and kind of take it off our hands and commercialize it? Because we're not built to do that. Um, you know, to do that, we would need a lot more resources and lead a little need a lot more money, right? Uh and honestly, we prefer to kind of play up front, be the so-called early inventors, and then hand it over to somebody else, or potentially shelve it and move on to the next thing. So we're always trying to kind of stay fresh here in terms of what we're working on, not kind of work on the same thing for a long time and and and kind of spend a lot of time on that one thing that may or may not happen. I'd rather we spend some time on something, learn a bit about it, you know, take it to a point where it's a great idea, you know, but maybe it's not ready for the market today, maybe it's ready in the next five years, and that's fine. Shelve it, but let's move on to the next thing. But again, as I mentioned in parallel, we are now talking to different people that are saying, hey, we like those ideas. Do you mind if we take it? And we're saying, yeah, you know, take it, go with it, go around with it.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

Yeah, and I think that's especially like having that long-term horizon in your mind is especially important in the building industry because we all know how fast codes and people are to uh adopt new technologies, if you will. What's uh what's an example of a product that you guys developed that had that longer timeline?

SPEAKER_01 15:49

So one is actually our first invention. So the intelligence structural panel, which is basically this steel plate system that's the like roughly a two-inch thick floor system, it's structural, right? That that that is strong, as strong as like an eight-inch thick concrete floor, right? So we that was our first invention. We built several mock-ups of that in our office, full scale in terms of the real product size. Um, and and when Microsoft actually saw that in 2018 or 2019, um, it was actually I think 2018, they invited us to apply uh to their IoT and AI insider's lab, and we did, and we were accepted. And I believe it's fair to say, you know, even as of today, I think we're the only architectural firm in the world that was accepted into their lab. And they basically helped us kind of understand how to deal with security in terms of digital flow through this so-called intelligent structural panel. But that was invented back then, and we started to invent it. So as of today, it's now been installed in a building, actually a TMU that's going to be completed in the next two or three months. So we're super excited to kind of go to that building and see this structural panel installed as part of the so-called building floorslash roof system. But you know, what I tell everybody is, you know, 20, let's say we started in 20 end of 2017, we're now kind of 2026, you know, it's it's almost like a 10-year window to go from concept to basically having this thing installed in a in a building. So I'm not saying everything takes that long potentially, but that definitely is an example of of something that we actually spent a lot of time on. Um, and and and finally we're seeing it, you know, installed, uh, but it's a long window. So you have to have a lot of patience um and you have to do a lot of testing and and and work with a lot of different engineers and stuff like that. So these things don't happen overnight.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

Yeah, and another thing that doesn't happen overnight is solving the housing crisis, which is everybody's looking at that, but I know Canada right now has a a big push, a big financial investment in that. I know you guys are doing some work in that space. What's that look like?

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Yeah, so last year it was around uh probably February, we had this idea, you know, we we we we do also a lot of residential work in our office, a lot of again mid to high rise. And so we have a good idea of of these building types in terms of you know how much they cost, where the money is being spent, and you know, where we could save money. So we started looking at at uh maybe a new formula, right, for for uh for housing, specifically to address the housing, the housing shortage, and and and find sites in this in this in the cities uh you know that are close uh cl in close proximity to public transportation. So the people that live there do not need cars. And if you do not need cars, then you don't need parking. If you don't need parking, then you don't need underground parking spaces, etc. Right. So our first idea was basically looking at uh uh school parking lots. So, you know, in in the city of Toronto and in most cities, including the United States, all schools that and many that are located in the cities, right, have parking lots for the teachers, right? Um and a lot of these parking lots now are actually underutilized. A lot of staff actually come to come to school by public transportation. But the concept really is to kind of take those parking lots, not delete the parking lot, but essentially build a building on stilts, right? So you maintain the parking lot. Of course it'll be a brand new parking lot, but you maintain the parking lot, and on top of that parking lot, you build two, three, four, five, six-story, eight-story buildings, residential buildings above the parking lot. So, why would we do this? So, number one is is um these buildings are in close proximity, they have great public transportation, they're also in good neighborhoods, right? Uh, number two is is it could be a revenue opportunity in terms of the joint venture collaboration with the school board, in terms of you know, schools are also suffering in terms of budget cuts and stuff. So an opportunity to kind of uh uh the school board to receive some sort of other so-called income from the rental property, right? Uh again, we don't build the basements, we save a lot of money. Basements are very expensive, time-consuming components to build for buildings. So we delete all of that, right? Um, and then we kind of took a took it further to and started looking at okay, the mechanical electrical systems, but specifically the mechanical systems. Can we call it uh what I call uh uh decentralize the mechanical plant, right? So remove boilers, chillers, all of that kind of stuff that you have on the roof, get rid of it, and within each suite, we create this thing called the smart utility pod called SUP, which is basically a closet around two feet by around five feet that holds basically a small washer dryer. It holds basically the boiler, um and it holds the uh uh a heating cooling unit with an ERV energy recovery ventilator. It has the electrical panel, it has the small little IT internet panel, everything combined in one called closet that's prefabricated that you install in the suite. So essentially every suite has its own heating cooling system. Um and and and and uh um you know the the owner then kind of controls when they want to heat, when they want to cold, when they want to, when they want to basically air condition, right? So that was kind of part of this whole process, right? Kind of reduce the costs of of these buildings by building them on stilts, no, no below grade parking, uh decentralized the mechanical ethical plants. So we did this concept for the schools, right? And then we realized another opportunity are these rural Canadian Legion halls, and there's thousands, over a thousand of them across Canada. Again, many located in the cities, many located on great pieces of property. Some of them that we found sites that are overlooking the lake, for example, right? Um, and the problem that the legions are having is you know, they have they're they're not not not for profit. They also have financial issues, right? Um, and you know, a lot of the buildings they're in are basically you know falling apart, need to be renovated. So the idea is to go there again on their parking lots, build this new uh rental building um on stilts, or and maybe a portion of it not on stilts, and then rebuild their Legion Hall inside. And a lot of these Legion Halls now, the the what they're trying to do is they're trying to kind of open the doors to the public. So you no longer have to be a veteran to join the Legion Hall. Legion Hall, anybody can join Legion Hall. It becomes a community place, right? And so we came with this idea, and um we were we were contacted by one of the legions actually in Bala, Ontario, it's uh north of Toronto, and and so we're now working with them and and and and a builder and and a financer to basically make this project happen. And we believe this is gonna kind of spark uh and become something that a lot of legions will want to do because they're all kind of in the same situation in terms of you know running out of money, facilities that are old, not very energy efficient, all that kind of stuff. And they will, you know, because the legions are kind of part of communities, they're community builders, they will help build the community in terms of providing, you know, a rental housing that's much needed.

SPEAKER_00 22:43

Is mass timber a part of that equation?

SPEAKER_01 22:46

So it is. So, you know, right now for the job that we're doing in Bala, we're looking at all solutions, you know. I mean, money is always a thing, right? Um, so we are looking at all solutions. We are specifically looking at a pre-fab modular solution for Bala. Um, and so we're looking at it in terms of doing it in steel and doing it in wood.

SPEAKER_00 23:04

Got it, got it. And the way I understand is like, so it's not like the the Legion Hall or the school, they don't have to like sell off part of their land, but they actually just maybe it's a long-term lease or or whatever it is, but that becomes a funding mechanism for these underfunded organizations. Is that fair?

SPEAKER_01 23:21

Exactly, exactly. So they don't have the money now. The the the government of Canada have created this program called Build Canada Homes. Um so they're very much supporting ideas like this. So they very much want to see these so-called not-for-profit groups partner with developers, right? Where the developers will kind of provide the financing or or backstop the financing uh with amazing rates say that the Build Canada Homes provides. So, so you know, these so-called not-for-profit groups, they're not looking to go out and make a ton of money. They're they want to basically help, but they also in return for this, will receive, for example, you know, this new Legion Hall, right? And then a traditional developer that understands residential development will kind of take the lead and get this project done, right? Um, so that's kind of how these things are kind of rolling out and how the government kind of wants to see them roll out.

SPEAKER_00 24:09

So you've you've identified like a lot of really interesting and helpful solutions in the building industry, mass timber or otherwise. Why would an architecture firm want to take on the additional cost and time and personnel equipment to build their own Spark burden? Like, what would you say to somebody that doesn't have that right now but might be looking at it?

SPEAKER_01 24:30

So look, I think it's really important because for a few reasons. Number one is is, you know, we've been doing the same thing for the last hundred years in terms of you know how buildings are kind of constructed, right? Um, this is definitely one industry when you kind of look at, you know, the 20 cult industries in the world, you know, with you know, called aerospace and maybe healthcare being at the top. Construction, I think we've all heard the stories near the bottom. So there's a lot of opportunities right now, um, I think, you know, in our industry to kind of make that change. And I I was actually speaking at an AI conference at a university a few weeks ago, uh specifically architectural students. And I kind of told the students, you know, you guys right now are graduating at a time where things could be super exciting for you if you see this, right? Uh because, you know, with the AI tools that are coming out, there'll be a lot of opportunities for you to kind of look at figuring out how to fix the problems that that that not even problems, but just kind of how to accelerate kind of innovation in our industry, right? So getting back to why are we doing this, the cost, that kind of stuff. So we're doing it because we're frustrated with kind of what's been happening. But number two, it's amazing to do this in terms of we have fun. Number three, it actually tracks talent. So we get a lot of people that want to come to work for us because they hear about Sparkbird. So they will spend some time in Sparkbird, but then they'll go back into the studio and do the called traditional stuff we do every single day. So, so you know, attracting talent now for us is a lot easier. But then the the next thing I want to mention is it's actually, believe it or not, like a marketing business development tool, right? You know, that that that you know, when when we go and we compete for a project, what I tell everybody now is when we compete as when WJH competes, say, with H O K with another firm, right? All of us have very similar portfolio, right? Of past projects. We all have called various very similar expertise in terms of the people. So SparkBird really differentiates us from the competition. So when we go for that interview, when we submit for that RFP proposal, you know, you know, showing the clients about the Sparkbird lab, we believe is is making a difference in terms of us winning projects. I'm not saying we're winning just because of this, but we believe it's helping us win projects because it is a differentiating factor. Now, it doesn't mean that when the client hires us, you know, Sparkbird is working on that project. But what it's telling our clients is that, hey, these people are thinking outside of the box, and I like that thinking process to be done, you know, to be used on my traditional project, right? So, so you know, from that perspective, it's really helping us. And then, you know, what I also tell a lot of people is hey, we could spend business development dollars, marketing dollars on taking clients, you know, out for golfing and for dinners and stuff like that, or we could spend that money in the lab here. And honestly, I think the the results that we're getting for spending that money in the lab here are way better than taking a client out for lunch or dinner or or or for golfing, right? So so that's kind of how we look at it.

SPEAKER_00 27:20

You said earlier when you were talking about speaking to students, you mentioned something about some AI tools and capabilities that are enabling them to look at this kind of stuff. So if you're speaking to like maybe a younger generation of architects or maybe even students themselves, not there's well, to my knowledge, there's not very many spark birds that exist, right? So, how can they get involved in this process without space in a limited lab like this?

SPEAKER_01 27:44

So here here's what what I would say is I I think, and I might be going a bit off topic here, but in general, I think a lot of people are afraid about AI, I think. You know, a lot of architects and they're afraid about it. So my position is don't be afraid. I think it's actually gonna be a huge benefit, okay? And a huge benefit actually to the very small firms, the one, two, three-person firms. Because when you think about it, when you have access to AI tools and you can do your work a lot faster, more accurate, and you know, improve the quality of your work, do all of these things, you can now compete against the bigger firms. You can now compete and chase those projects that you could not compete against before. So I think AI is going to be an amazing thing for smaller firms, right? I also believe that AI, in terms of the Sparkbird lab, because we're already seeing it here, we're using it to kind of help us kind of call it the move a lot quicker in terms of our so-called innovation that we're working on. Using AI to kind of help us understand how we build things and the things we need to build things, how to solve certain problems. We're using AI. So it's actually helping us in our labs. So I think somebody that doesn't have a lab, right, they could start off by by by but by using AI tools and some limited call it, you know, tech equipment and actually start building things very, very quickly. You know, one thing I mentioned too is that, you know, and people I think are kind of forgetting about this, but the the the the the value of 3D printing, I think people I think are underestimating where 3D printing is going. And when you think about now the AI AI tools that we have, you know, these large language models that result in chat, GPT, all that kind of stuff, in combination with basically 3D printing, right? I think it's gonna be a huge game changer. So, you know, we're all worried about looking at all these products, where is it made? Made in China, made in China. Well, I think the future, actually, for architects, for example, is going to be when the 3D printing technology is at a point where we could print very quickly, good quality, basically mass-produced, but customization. Architects could now start designing everything in a building. We could design the the plate covers that go over light switches. We could design the housings around light fixtures, we could design all these components, exits, we could design everything, right? You know, even certain fasteners that could be all designed and 3D printed locally in Canada or the US or wherever it is, right? Uh because you know, uh 3D printing costs will eventually come down and we don't have to worry about shipping costs, etc. So again, I know I'm talking all over the place here, but this is an example where AI with 3D printing will create more work for architects and engineers because now you'll actually be doing more design work than you were doing before. Because before you relied on the catalog to pick things. No, now you have the option to actually design that component, have it 3D printed, have it 3D printed in our backyard, and not rely on other countries to kind of produce this stuff and ship it to us here. So I think it's gonna be a big, big, big game changer. Once kind of the the two are kind of married together um and the technology and 3D printing side really evolves, we'll see a big change.

SPEAKER_00 30:43

Yeah, I like that perspective a lot. And I think you know, the the fear of AI just depends on how you're looking at how you can use it, right? So if you're just sitting on the sidelines, yeah, probably gonna be a little scary and disruptive for you. But if you're leaning into it and you're embracing it, lots of opportunity. Um exactly. What type of clients and people do you reach out to or do that reach out to you to work with, whether that's in Sparkbird or at WCMH?

SPEAKER_01 31:07

So we we our client mix is is is quite broad in terms of, you know, because we do a lot of data centers, so those so-called tech companies, the cloud providers, you know, we're working for most of them, as well as the called big data center companies that that are kind of directly below them, you know, that are not those called big three or four names that we all know about. So we we have a good mix of very high-tech clients. Uh we have a good mix of government clients, both at you know, the municipal, provincial, and federal level. Um, then we have also a lot of private sector clients um, you know, that do everything from office buildings to residential buildings to industrial buildings, etc. Um, and I would say from all three kind of you know categories of the tech, the government, and the private sector clients, you know, all three have actually reached out to us to kind of come to us and ask and ask us to either to help them or show them how Sparkboard or some of our software solutions can actually, you know, make theirs make their day-to-day businesses a lot better, right? So it's interesting how you know it's not just one group, it's actually all three groups that that have come to us um, you know, and and have asked us to kind of you know look at look, you know, they've they've wanted to look at our solutions, and and some are now asking us to uh implement our solutions into their so-called day-to-day business running in terms of, you know, for example, we have this, we have this app we developed in Sparkbird called called Parrot, that's a digital standards uh uh uh uh uh uh app that kind of you know tracks and organizes all the components of of a building type. So let's say you know it's a hotel company that has a typical standard for how they how they build all their hotels. All that information is located in one of our apps, right? Um and you could easily kind of go through the app and find everything you want to find out about that so-called hotel standard, right? So that's a very popular app right now that we're getting a lot of basically uh um uh attention from different clients, private sector, government sector, high-tech sector, to use it to basically help organize their so-called standards, right? Um, so you know, all three kind of client groups are kind of approaching us uh and and wanting to kind of see what we're doing and learn. You know, we're we're probably once a week we have a group walking through our lab that are contacting us and saying, hey, can we come and see what you're working on? Please explain it to us and all that kind of stuff. So it's it's pretty exciting.

SPEAKER_00 33:26

And if somebody from those groups that you talked about wanted to reach out and talk with you, how would they do that?

SPEAKER_01 33:32

Just email us. They all have to do is just email us and uh and you know, we we we we don't really kind of you know say, hey, these things are top secret, you can't look at them. We're pretty open. You know, the things, if there are certain things that are super top top secret, we won't show them. Um, for the ones that you know we've already called applied for and received provisional patents, we'll show those. But in general, look, at the end of the day, we believe collaboration is kind of key to kind of uh success. You know, that if we try to hold it all within ourselves, it's not gonna go anywhere. So the more partners we could collaborate with, we actually think is better and it'll even benefit us, right? And you know, for example, we were at this conference a few weeks ago, and uh one of the chaps in our office was presenting um also the same system we talked about um in terms of that hybrid uh modular solution. And there was an architect in the audience who said, Hey, listen, can I come to your lab? Can I see it? We'd love to collaborate with you guys. And we're we're totally open to that. You know, if we could bring in with some more brain power and and and and get some of these things solved sooner, then then then we know that's gonna benefit us. It's not like us giving away our secrets.

SPEAKER_00 34:35

Yeah, I like that that mindset because you're right, if if we're all working in isolation and got our our walls up, like the the industry itself isn't gonna move forward, which is a detriment to all of us. So I I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_01 34:45

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 34:46

Um, so I'll link I'll link that contact info down below for anybody that wants to get a hold of Zen in. Um and thanks for coming and chatting with me. I'm always excited to learn what you guys are working on. I think the work you guys are doing is is moving the industry forward in a meaningful way. So thanks for being here.

SPEAKER_01 35:01

Thank you so much for inviting me.

SPEAKER_00 35:03

This was an amazing chat.