UK-based modular specialist TopHat announced yesterday its plans to open a new factory in Northamptonshire.
The site in Corby, due to open late next year, will be 650,000 sq.ft — about the size of 11 football pitches — making it the biggest modular housing factory in Europe.
The new facility will bring together the latest robotics and TopHat’s proprietary technology to manufacture and distribute up to 4,000 new homes per year, the company said in a social media statement. This turnover – equating to one house per hour – would establish TopHat as one of the UK’s biggest housebuilders.
Its current factory in Derby is capable of building 800 homes per year.
TopHat believes the new facility will help to address the chronic undersupply of new houses in the UK.
Jordan Rosenhaus, CEO and Founder of TopHat, said: “Our new facility will increase our capacity to over 4,500 homes a year.
“Our homes are designed to be beautiful and green, being low-carbon to build and much cheaper to run.
“We are also delighted to be creating 1,000 new jobs in Corby supported by a major investment in training through the TopHat Academy.”
TopHat, founded in 2016 by the American entrepreneur, is 70%-owned by Goldman Sachs, the Wall Street bank.
TopHat’s new factory will be on Magna Park, a manufacturing and logistics hub being built by GLP, the Singaporean logistics group.
Charles Spicer, the industrial and logistics director at Savills, which brokered the lease for TopHat, said it was the “largest manufacturing deal to complete this year”.
The new factory is expected to offer 1000 new and permanent jobs.
Image: TopHat’s current factory in Derby (credit: TopHat)
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