Taylor Wimpey has set itself the bold vision of becoming the world’s first digital house builder. Earlier this month the company, one of Britain’s biggest homebuilders, announced a multi-year partnership with global digital transformation firm HCLTech to modernise the former’s IT landscape. This will include data services, AI capabilities, application and infrastructure management, network services, […]
Taylor Wimpey has set itself the bold vision of becoming the world’s first digital house builder. Earlier this month the company, one of Britain’s biggest homebuilders, announced a multi-year partnership with global digital transformation firm HCLTech to modernise the former’s IT landscape.
This will include data services, AI capabilities, application and infrastructure management, network services, cybersecurity and workplace solutions.
By using GenAI – including AI Force, HCLTech’s patented service transformation platform – the housebuilder hopes to accelerate its software development cycle to enhance productivity, improve quality and elevate customer service.
While AI-mature industries like banking, healthcare, and travel have recently made headlines with their AI strategies and use cases, Pankaj Tagra—corporate vice president and head of manufacturing and allied industries in Europe at HCLTech—asserts that traditional sectors such as manufacturing and construction can also adopt AI rapidly, cost-effectively, and with minimal risk, even while working within the limitations of legacy systems.
Central to this transformation, says Tagra, is HCLTech’s AI Force, a generative AI platform designed to embed intelligence across the digital backbone of Taylor Wimpey’s operations.
“We are embedding GenAI across different elements of service through our platform,” says Tagra. “It will expedite the software development cycle, reduce manual workloads and increase responsiveness across functions.”
Although specific use cases are under wraps for now, Tagra points to a range of opportunities that are already emerging. These include enhancing user interactions, automating service management, and deploying machine learning models to analyse building regulations or optimise planning permission workflows.
Pankaj Tagra corporate vice president Europe & Africa HCLTech
On the customer side, chatbots and recommendation engines could guide homebuyers more intuitively through their options, creating a more personalised experience.
“Taylor Wimpey is a very customer-focused organisation,” Tagra notes. “They want to enhance the user experience, but also free their employees from internal admin to concentrate on high-value, customer-facing work.”
Yet according to Tagra, this vision for the future is not just about AI. It’s about how AI interacts with a broader ecosystem of enabling technologies, such as robotics and 5G.
“In property and real estate, it’s not just GenAI,” says Tagra. “Robotics and 5G are critical, particularly on construction sites where they can enhance productivity and safety, especially in hazardous environments.”
Modernising a traditional, bricks-and-mortar company for this kind of transformation is no small feat—particularly when much of the existing infrastructure is based on outdated legacy systems.
While Taylor Wimpey only publicly announced its partnership with HCLTech earlier this month, work has been underway for nearly a year.
“We signed the contract around nine months ago,” explains Tagra. “Since then, we’ve migrated their data centres and modernised infrastructure. That groundwork is complete. Now we’re focused on the next phase—AI, robotics and 5G, all being brought together through our Innovation Lab.”
A hub for disruption
This Innovation Lab—set up exclusively for Taylor Wimpey in the UK—is the epicentre of the property developer’s transformation, according to Tagra.
Designed to accelerate the testing and implementation of new technologies, it brings together HCLTech engineers and Taylor Wimpey business users to rapidly iterate and deploy technologies.
“The lab gives us the freedom to focus away from the day-to-day,” says Tagra. “Innovation often loses out to the ‘urgent’ in business. By separating it into its own entity, with its own KPIs, we’re creating a space focused purely on disruptive change.”
The process is deliberately hands-on. Taylor Wimpey staff present real business challenges, which HCLTech engineers prototype solutions for in the lab. Those prototypes are then reviewed and refined by Taylor Wimpey’s own users, ensuring relevance before scaling to production.
This collaborative model has a clear strategic purpose. “Innovation can’t be generic,” Tagra explains. “We’re not just doing service delivery—we’re building domain-specific solutions. That’s why this partnership stands out. It’s not about implementing off-the-shelf tech—it’s about inventing the tech Taylor Wimpey needs.”
Early infrastructure focus
While the Innovation Lab represents the future, the last nine months have been about laying a solid digital foundation. Infrastructure transformation—often overlooked in tech narratives—was a prerequisite.
“Many property firms are still using outdated systems that don’t integrate well with AI,” Tagra says. “That’s one reason Taylor Wimpey chose us—we have the capability to modernise infrastructure, data and applications, which is essential for AI to work seamlessly,” he adds.
Data fragmentation was another hurdle. Like many traditional organisations, Taylor Wimpey faced siloed data across departments, making it difficult to harness AI’s full potential. The early phase of the project therefore involved data centre migrations and restructuring, ensuring the business was AI-ready before innovation work could begin in earnest.
But the transformation goes beyond IT. In industries like construction, operational technology (OT)—from machinery to on-site sensors—is just as critical. Integrating these environments is complex but essential to unlock real value.
“OT is becoming a major part of the new operating model,” says Tagra. “Traditionally, IT and OT operated in silos. Now, with technologies like 5G, we need target operating models that bring them together.”
This requires more than just technical change—it’s also a transformation of processes and mindsets. “Customers understand the need, but they’re trying to figure out how it applies to their world,” he adds. “That’s where we collaborate to co-create solutions that work for their specific context.”
For HCLTech, a successful partnership with a traditional player like Taylor Wimpey isn’t just about the technology—it’s about delivering outcomes.
“It’s about helping them shed legacy systems quickly, move to a modern set-up, and then use that to deliver better user experiences and service quality,” Tagra explains.
Another key focus is around sustainability – an important factor as housebuilders face increased pressure to reduce their environmental footprint. “Sustainability is very important to Taylor Wimpey—and to us,” Tagra says. “By using AI, businesses can reduce their carbon emissions by as much as 8%. That’s a real lever for positive change.”
For instance, he adds, AI-driven planning tools can optimise material usage and logistics, while robotics can minimise waste on-site. And as systems become more predictive, preventative maintenance can extend asset lifespans and reduce unnecessary interventions.
What’s next?
Looking ahead, Tagra sees GenAI evolving from experimental pilots to deeply integrated operational systems across the sector. “We’re already moving beyond proof-of-concepts in labs,” he says. “With Taylor Wimpey, we’re identifying real business use cases that can scale—and once that happens, adoption will accelerate.”
In the next three to five years, he expects a wave of maturity in “agentic bots”—autonomous systems capable of handling customer queries or internal processes with minimal human oversight. “We’ll see more commoditised work done by AI, allowing humans to focus on creative, high-impact work.”
For now, the focus is on building the future, one layer at a time—from data centres to digital twins, from cloud platforms to construction sites. It may be a digital journey, but it’s grounded in the physical realities of the built world which Taylor Wimpey and HCLTech hope will become a blueprint for an entire sector.
