IN Brief:
- PERI UK has expanded AI-enabled bespoke formwork fabrication from pilot use to nationwide contractor access.
- The workflow turns 3D design models into CNC-ready formwork components and assembly instructions.
- Its first UK deployment on HS2 foundations points to faster delivery of complex geometries with lower manual detailing effort.
PERI UK has launched a nationwide AI-enabled fabrication service for bespoke formwork, extending a digital workflow that has already been used on infrastructure works in Warwickshire. The offer is designed for projects where concrete geometry falls outside standard system formwork, including box-outs, void formers, and multi-faceted units that would usually require time-intensive manual detailing and workshop programming.
The service is powered by dataform.work, the custom formwork joint venture established by PERI and Austrian software specialist DataB in January 2025 on a 50:50 basis. Its core function is to take a contractor’s or designer’s 3D model and convert it into production-ready data. In the delivery workflow now being offered in the UK, PERI engineers upload the model, the software generates cutting files and assembly instructions, and the components are then precision-milled from plywood using five-axis CNC equipment before final assembly in a PERI production facility.
That matters because bespoke formwork is often where design ambition and site buildability begin to diverge. Non-standard shapes can drive up detailing time, extend procurement windows, and introduce avoidable dimensional risk during fabrication and installation. PERI says the automated route can take the process from concept model to component production in less than half the time normally associated with traditional bespoke manufacture, while reducing the amount of remedial work caused by tolerance errors or late-stage manual interpretation.
The first UK deployment came on foundations for an HS2 footbridge in Warwickshire, near Coventry, where the structure required a geometry with 13 different facets and angles. The design was intended to optimise structural load paths while reducing concrete consumption, and the automated process was used to manufacture the internal void former. For temporary works specialists, that project is a useful proof point because it shows the system being applied not to a cosmetic architectural feature, but to a structurally demanding infrastructure component where accuracy and programme control both matter.
PERI says the joint design of the fabricated units reduces the need for screws and removes glue altogether, while integrated striking elements improve removal and lower the risk of damage during striking. That has implications for reuse as well as speed, particularly in repetitive high-rise and infrastructure applications where the economics of bespoke formwork depend on how quickly units can be fabricated, installed, stripped, and turned around. Contractors looking for the UK service can access it through PERI’s fabrication service offering.
