The NSW government is backing an Orange‑based off‑site housing manufacturer that uses robotic technology to assemble flat‑packed timber panels—like IKEA furniture—to help close its housing gap. It comes as the Minns government awarded a $4.8 million grant to Green Timber Technology, the ambitious prefab manufacturer partly owned by Pentarch Forestry, which can produce wall, floor, and roof panels in less than two days.
“This investment is a major vote of confidence in regional manufacturing and modern construction,” according to Pete Morrison, CEO of Green Timber Technology, who revealed that the grant, awarded as part of the $480m Net Zero Manufacturing Initiative, will see 32 social and affordable houses built in regional NSW. “With the support of the NSW Government, we’re scaling a low-carbon manufacturing hub in Orange that’s designed to deliver the structural systems for more than 1,000 homes a year, so we can create NSW homes faster, with greater certainty and using renewable timber.”
The latest investment comes months after Green Timber Technology struck a partnership with White Picket Fence’s Brooklyn Homes, which will see 100 prefab timber homes built in 2026. Produced in a controlled facility, the panels use locally sourced Australian pine timber and are designed using Design for Manufacture and Assembly principles, arriving on site ready for rapid erection and turning months of work into weeks.
According to Penny Sharpe, NSW’s Minister for Energy, in addition to Climate Change, Heritage and the Environment, the new investment will deliver economic and environmental benefits for regional NSW: “This is a real win for Regional NSW with over 50 direct jobs created, and a real boost to adjacent workforces like transport, timber and trades. These homes are airtight, which means it’s going to be cheaper to heat and cool your home all year round.”
“We’re not just funding sustainable homes, we’re funding sustainable homes that you could build in a weekend. In the middle of a housing crisis, this is an opportunity we couldn’t miss,” Minister Sharpe said.
Designed to support housing at scale, the model could be deployed for regional housing, community housing, disaster relief, school infrastructure and private dwellings. “We’re thrilled to be partnering with Green Timber Tech to build 32 new, sustainable social homes for people who need it most,” said Rose Jackson, NSW’s Minister for Housing.
“This is another example of how innovation in modern manufacturing is supporting the delivery of more homes, more quickly, right across New South Wales,” she said. “By building homes in a factory environment, we can reduce the risk of weather delays and speed up delivery – that means more people into safe housing sooner.”
The grant comes as prefab has emerged as an industrial response to bottlenecks in Australia’s housing supply chain, including fragmented subcontracting, labour shortages and volatile material pricing. By transferring much of the work to a factory setting and implementing automated assembly, Green Timber Technology aims to reduce uncertainty for buyers and developers while improving predictability in finance and construction schedules.
- To learn why Australia “must go its own way” in using modern methods of construction (MCC) to solve its housing shortage, click here for Wood Central’s special feature last month.
