General Systems

In the last few decades, nearly every industry in the world—finance, healthcare, or education—have embraced automation technology to enhance their operational productivity. Mechanisation has significantly improved the potency of the manufacturing and agricultural sector, but the same doesn’t hold true for the construction industry. Elaborating on this, Mukund Nambirajan, CEO of General Systems, adds, “The construction industry has low productivity due to the lack of digital technologies in its on-site operations. This is one of the key reasons why it has negligible profit mar gins and struggles with meeting today’s demand for affordable housing and commercial infrastructure.” To address these severe challenges, General Systems is transforming the landscape of the construction industry by delivering tools that provide sustainable infrastructure development, increased workforce productivity, and reduce the reliance on manual labour.

When Mukund & his co-founder & CTO, Anant, began their research delving into the construction industry’s problems, they first identified the areas that needed the touch of mechanisation. Sharing these findings on masonry, Mukund says, “Masons were lifting as much as nine hundred kgs every day. Such intense labour results in various injuries and long-term musculoskeletal disorders. We address this problem and offer systems that perform repetitive and exhaustive heavy lifting work with higher precision and speed.” Additionally, several construction companies also struggle to maintain financial viability as they are heavily dependent on the human workforce, which is getting expensive to maintain further reducing their diminishing profit margins.

General Systems assists construction businesses in meeting these challenges head-on by improving the mechanisation in their masonry operations. “We expand the man-machine boundaries in the masonry processes,” Mukund adds. The company offers masonry and material logistics solutions that help real estate developers and building contractors improve their workforce productivity, reduce labour injuries, and deliver quality results. General Systems provides the solutions in a collaborative manner where the machines execute the hazardous and heavy lifting part of lifting and placing blocks, freeing up human workers to focus their skills in other aspects of masonry. Explaining the vision behind this, Mukund adds, “By bringing this man-machine combination into the construction ecosystem, we create a new kind of workforce. I call it a hyper fluid workforce, which can be deployed on-demand, and can deliver ten times the productivity of a single worker.” The firm has go-to-market operating models that offer these solutions, not just to construction giants but also to medium and smaller enterprises.

Real estate developers and contract builders who oversee numerous projects can purchase General Systems’ machines and deploy it at construction sites. Since the machines offer ten times higher throughput as compared to labourers, businesses can immediately generate ROI within a year. General Systems has partnerships with leasing companies that facilitate daily, weekly, or monthly contracts at affordable prices. This empowers even smaller builders and contractors to lease the machines and return them when their projects are completed. Despite being a startup, the company offers ground-breaking solutions that have gained significant traction in the construction ecosystem, courtesy of its customer-centric product development approach.

General Systems incorporates the latest technologies to develop highly modular and lightweight solutions that meet clients’ requisites. The machines are compact and perform construction work from the inside of the building, making them ideal for masonry work in multi-story buildings. Describing the intent behind the portable design, Mukund adds, “We built a purpose-crafted machine with custom-made robotic arms and sensors, which is deployable across vertical and horizontal build-outs.” While developing the machine, the company also engages with construction companies who participate in the design process and offer their feedback. “Since we are making a product of this scale, it is important that our prospective clients value what we offer. We have recurring reviews where we run the design and identify, address, and solve problems,” he adds. General Systems aims to complete the product trials by April 2022 and deploy the machine per region-specific site requirements.

General Systems targets construction industries across several regions such as the US, UK, Australia, and the Middle East. As the pandemic struck, the co-founders made the proactive decision to begin development work in India and quickly found companies eager to use their machines. Apart from reducing manual work and increasing productivity, the company also offers sustainable solutions aligned with the global sustainability goals. General Systems provides sustainability for construction companies in three folds. It assures operational sustainability by reducing heavy lifting work and labour injuries. By significantly improving workforce productivity, the firm guarantees higher ROI, profit margins, and business sustainability. To enhance environmental sustainability in the construction industry, General Systems incorporates sensor-driven material handling and a shift to modern materials into its solutions, such as epoxies and eco-friendly adhesives that reduce waste and save money. As Mukund concludes, “We offer a comprehensive solution that is cleaner, faster, and far more efficient than conventional approaches. Companies aiming to go green have to focus on all these aspects and we wish to support them with that.”