Engineered Wood Products: ITI’s journey to become a serious player

How a measured, compliance-first strategy turned ITI into one of Australia’s top four EWP suppliers. By Campbell McInnes

The way Australia builds is changing. As the construction industry responds to demands for greater efficiency, design flexibility and more sustainable building solutions, timber is entering a new era, one where advanced engineering unlocks possibilities far beyond what traditional timber products could achieve alone.

The rise of Engineered Wood Products (EWP) reflects a fundamental shift in how buildings are designed, engineered and constructed. By combining timber’s natural advantages with modern manufacturing, engineered products enable longer spans and greater structural performance, while supporting the industry’s move towards lower-impact materials. Solid timber remains essential and trusted, but engineered timber delivers the consistency and dimensional stability many modern projects now require This shift has been building internationally for years, with engineered timber now established across Europe, North America and beyond. Australia is experiencing the same drivers: sustainability expectations, manufacturing advances, and rising demand for innovative building solutions.

It is within this landscape that ITI Australia has strategically expanded its focus on EWP.

After almost four decades building its reputation as a leading supplier of structural and decorative timber, ITI recognised that the future of timber supply would require more than quality products alone, it would require complete solutions backed by technical expertise, reliable supply chains, compliance capability and customer support.

ITI’s journey into EWP has been a measured, deliberate evolution rather than a rapid expansion into a new category.

Beginning with its partnership with Metsä in 2018, and followed by significant investment in product development, technical capability and supply infrastructure, ITI has positioned itself as one of Australia’s four major EWP suppliers; built around a simple principle: engineered timber must meet the same standards of quality, reliability and responsible sourcing that customers expect from the ITI name.

As the industry evolves, engineered timber is set to play an increasingly important role — not as a replacement for traditional timber, but as an expansion of what timber can achieve. It’s a story CEO Germano Tomassetti and EWP Category Manager Hayden Slatter know well, having lived every step of it. Here, in their own words, is how ITI built an EWP business it’s prepared to put its name behind.

A MEASURED ENTRY, NOT A RUSHED ONE

For many years leading up to 2018, ITI was a small player in the EWP space, operating in just two states. That smaller footprint was deliberate.

“It gave us the chance to properly understand market dynamics before deciding whether a national push into such a technical category actually made sense.” ITI Australia, CEO Germano Tomassetti advised.

In 2018, the company made its move, partnering with Metsä as their premier partner in Australia, the first step that has since positioned ITI as one of the “big four” EWP importers in the country. But getting there wasn’t about speed.

“It was about making sure every step was the right one,” Tomassetti says.

CHOOSING QUALITY OVER THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE

When the market saw a surge in low-cost Chinese LVL product, ITI chose a different path, focusing instead on European product. Tomassetti explained, “This decision, like every decision at ITI, came down to one question: does this meet the standard we’re prepared to put our name behind: not simply, is this the cheapest option available.”

That didn’t mean writing off China altogether. ITI kept visiting and watching the industry evolve, and over time identified a small core group of producers genuinely committed to compliant manufacturing and ethically sourced forestry, the standard it requires from any partner.

WHY BUILD A BRAND OF ITS OWN?

The decision to develop the Spec range under its own name, rather than simply importing whatever product was available, goes back to ITI’s history of building solutions where the market had a gap, according to Hayden Slatter, Manager of EWP at ITI Australia.

“ITI has a history of developing solutions for gaps in the market, brands such as Design Pine and Ezitrim Plus are evidence of how we go beyond what is accepted and improve and innovate,” Slatter says. “With the huge surge in, let’s say sketchy, Chinese LVL hitting the market after COVID, we knew if we wanted to source EWP products ex-China then we were going to have to control the process for the product to meet the standard required by our business.”

The Spec range was developed with that principle in mind. “We went about creating a range that would not only complement Metsä’s Kerto range but also equip the Australian construction sector with an engineered wood product for every application,” Slatter says.

Because construction requirements vary from state to state, ITI carried out extensive market research before finalising the range, weighing the strength required in each region, the appropriate density for each application, and which raw materials and production methods best suit each product.

BUILDING THE SPEC RANGE THE RIGHT WAY

Rather than rushing to market, ITI took 18-months to do the work properly, setting up rigorous testing programs, bringing in independent Australian auditors, writing detailed product specifications, and verifying every species against the Illegal Logging Prohibition Act.

“It was slow, deliberate, and resource- intensive, because with structural products, there’s no substitute for getting it right the first time,” explained Tomassetti.

Slatter is more specific about what those 18 months involved. Before any LVL product is qualified for production, it must pass through a broad range of testing conducted by ITI. Each LVL product type and grade undergo 505 individual destructive tests per width, ensuring it can be used safely across all load applications, from beams to wall plates. Across the full Spec range, there are 13 different LVL width and grade combinations; more than 6,500 individual tests completed before the range reached market.

“Once testing is completed and qualified locally by ITI’s engineering department, the factories are subject to a pre-production audit to ensure the appropriate QA systems and recording methods are in place,” Slatter says. “Each manufacturing partner is then audited twice a year, in addition to providing production records on a regular basis.”

The final step before launch is supporting documentation, technical statements, warranties and specification guides with span tables, tailored to each product’s exact specifications. That work culminated late in 2025 with the release of ITI’s Chinese-manufactured EWP range under the Spec brand. ITI now offers the full suite:

Spec Frame — E10 and E12.1
Spec Beam — E13.2 and E14.5
Form Spec
Edge Spec
Spec Floor — E12.1
Spec Chord — E14.5
Spec Joist

Combined with its existing Metsä LVL range, this gives ITI one of the most comprehensive EWP offerings in Australia, and the response has confirmed it was worth the wait. In the range’s first six months, sales have already outstripped the company’s initial targets.

MORE THAN A PRODUCT RANGE

Being a genuine EWP distributor takes more than a product catalogue, it demands specialist people, engineering capability, design software, machinery and serious warehousing infrastructure. Alongside developing the Spec range, ITI invested heavily in building the team behind it: under Slatter’s leadership, the company has brought in Hundegger saws across NSW, Queensland and Victoria, added a full-time engineer locally and a second overseas, built a local design team of eight supported by six more designers employed internationally, and appointed experienced state Business Development Managers in NSW, Queensland and South Australia.

COMPLIANCE: THE WORK CUSTOMERS DON’T SEE

The technical demands of EWP mean a business must invest properly if it intends to do the category right, nowhere more so than in compliance, an area most customers never see. Behind the scenes, ITI has five full-time staff dedicated solely to FSC, PEFC, Chain of Custody and Illegal Logging compliance, ensuring every product the company brings in has been legally and sustainably sourced.

Tomassetti explained, “they are the gatekeepers of our supply chain — and if they say no, we walk away, no matter how attractive the alternative looks.”

It’s an area, he argues, the broader market doesn’t yet understand well enough. There are producers across China who fail to meet ITI’s compliance standards, yet their product still finds its way into the country through smaller, unnamed importers less rigorous about who they buy from.

Given how central compliance has become to ITI’s EWP strategy, it’s worth letting Tomassetti expand on exactly why it matters so much in this category, and what it should mean for the customers buying it.

WHY IS COMPLIANCE ESPECIALLY CRITICAL IN EWP?

“Engineered wood products are structural components: they carry real load in real buildings, which puts them in a different risk category to decorative or non-structural timber,” Tomassetti explains. “Unlike solid sawn timber, where a customer can often visually assess grade and quality, EWP is manufactured: multiple layers of wood veneer, bonded together under controlled conditions.” That means the product’s integrity depends entirely on what happened during manufacturing, the species used, the adhesives, the process control: none of which is visible once it reaches a building site.

“All they can rely on is the branding on the side of the product,” Tomassetti says. “Some of these imports aren’t even branded correctly, which should be the first warning sign. If compliance isn’t verified at the source, there’s no way to catch it downstream.”

THE REAL RISKS OF NON-COMPLIANT PRODUCT

The risks, Tomassetti says, sit on two levels. For the importer, there’s direct legal exposure under the Illegal Logging Prohibition Act, reputational damage, and the risk of selling a product not fit for purpose: one branded E13.2 being used for an application it was never tested for. A non- compliant EWP product may not perform to its stated grade or span rating, which in a load-bearing application is a safety issue, not a cosmetic one. There’s also a traceability gap: if something fails, there’s often no paper trail back to origin.

Tomassetti shared, “while the customer doesn’t normally face the legal exposure, selling an unknown cheap product does expose them to structural failure risk, resulting in potential losses if they can’t claim on the supplier when a failure occurs, which is a bigger risk than they tend to understand.”

THE COMPLIANCE TEAM AS GATEKEEPER

ITI’s compliance team functions as the gatekeeper before any supplier or product enters the range, ensuring all regulated timber imported into Australia is sourced responsibly under the Illegal Logging Prohibition Act 2012 (ILPA), administered through a due diligence system that reviews supplier documentation, verifies species and country of harvest, and maintains compliance records for every product entering the business. “We don’t rely solely on paper certification,” Tomassetti says. The process includes on-the-ground facility visits, independent Australian auditors, and structured testing over an extended period: for the Spec range, around 18 months before product came to market.

“Critically, they have veto power, if they’re not satisfied a supplier meets our standard, we walk away, regardless of price or availability,” Tomassetti says. “That’s a deliberate structure: compliance isn’t a sign- off at the end of a commercial decision, it’s a precondition for one.”

WHAT CERTIFICATION REALLY MEANS

Independent forest certification schemes such as FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) and PEFC (Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification) provide assurance that timber has been sourced from forests managed to recognise environmental, social and economic standards. Certification alone doesn’t replace ITI’s due diligence obligations under the ILPA, but it provides valuable supporting evidence in assessing the risk of illegally harvested timber entering the supply chain, and only where a low-risk determination can be made is a product approved for import.

“It’s not a marketing label, it’s a documented chain of custody, audited at each stage of the process. For customers, it means they can stand behind what they’re specifying or on-selling, and demonstrate that to their own clients, regulators or certification bodies if asked.” Tomassetti, on FSC and PEFC certification for consumers further down the chain, certified timber offers greater confidence that products come from responsibly managed forests, reducing the risk of contributing to illegal logging.

WHAT SHOULD CUSTOMERS ASK THEIR EWP SUPPLIER?

Tomassetti’s advice to customers assessing EWP suppliers is straightforward: ask directly for certification, not just whether it exists, but whether the supplier can produce it without hesitation, ask about their track record rather than comparing price per lineal metre alone, and ask what happens if something goes wrong.

“A supplier with a genuine compliance program will have a clear answer; one without will often avoid the question,” he says. Because EWP is a structural product, customers should also require test data demonstrating conformance with the relevant Australian Standards for the stress grade being sold — verified independently rather than relying on overseas test reports alone.

TRACEABILITY: FROM COMPLIANCE NICETY TO COMMERCIAL NECESSITY

International timber supply chains are long and complex, and illegal logging remains a real global problem. As regulatory scrutiny increases and builders, developers and their financiers face growing pressure to demonstrate ethical sourcing, traceability has shifted from a compliance nicety to a commercial necessity.

“Customers increasingly expect it, and regulators increasingly require it, but few want to pay for it. Until the industry understands this level of compliance cost, ethical sourcing companies will continue to battle with low-cost, non-compliant product.” Tomassetti explained.

A COMPLETE SOLUTIONS PROVIDER

Compliance is one part of a broader philosophy that now defines ITI’s EWP business: a complete solutions provider: a phrase used often in the industry, which Tomassetti is careful to defi ne in practice.

“Being a ‘complete solutions provider’ isn’t just about having a large catalogue: it means eliminating complexity and introducing ease for the customer. Instead of a customer having to stitch together products, technical support and logistics from multiple vendors, a complete solutions model consolidates the entire workflow into a single, reliable point of contact,” Tomassetti said.

That aim breaks down into four practical commitments. The first is single-source procurement: by supplying the full spread of a customer’s EWP needs, ITI reduces the number of purchase orders, invoices and delivery coordination points a customer has to manage. The second, arguably the most important, is unified technical support and compliance: expert guidance and certifications such as FSC® or PEFC coming directly from the same partner supplying the physical goods, rather than being chased down separately.

The third is consolidated logistics and inventory security. Every additional vendor in a customer’s supply chain brings its own freight run, its own handling and its own administration — costs that compound with each extra supplier involved. Backed by substantial distribution networks, undercover storage capacity and one of the largest stock profiles in the category, ITI can stage, bundle and dispatch a customer’s full order on a single truck, rather than several partial ones.

“Consolidated deliveries reduce freight costs and mean fewer trucks in customer yards, which is less disruptive and lets our customers focus on their customers,” Tomassetti says. “More broadly, it strips duplicated cost out of the whole supply chain — freight, handling and admin that would otherwise be repeated with every extra vendor. Removing that duplication is what lets our customers stay competitive on price, without having to absorb that overhead themselves.”

The fourth is single-point accountability: one point of contact for any specification query, performance question or delivery change, so problem resolution is fast and straightforward.

GETTING MORE FROM EVERY TREE

Beyond compliance and logistics, ITI’s EWP push is part of a broader shift in how the timber industry thinks about resource efficiency: engineered products, Tomassetti says, are designed to extract more structural value from less raw material.

“Rather than requiring large-diameter, often slower-growing logs the way solid structural timber can, engineered products can be manufactured from smaller-diameter, faster-growing plantation timber, using veneers, strands or fibre that would otherwise go to lower-value use,” he says.

“That means more of each tree, and more of each forestry rotation, ends up in a high- performance structural product rather than as waste or off cuts.”

It’s a case that resonates with a construction sector under growing pressure to reduce its environmental footprint, and Tomassetti expects that pressure to keep building.

“We expect sustainability to become less of a differentiator and more of a baseline expectation. Green building rating tools, embodied carbon considerations and corporate ESG commitments are all pushing timber, as a renewable, carbon-storing material: further into favour over steel and concrete in appropriate applications.” Says Tomassetti.

Within that shift, Tomassetti expects demand to increasingly favour suppliers who can prove their sustainability credentials with real documentation. “That plays directly to the compliance investment we’ve made over the past several years,” he says.

WHAT’S MOVING IN THE MARKET RIGHT NOW

With the Spec range now well established, Slatter says the trend is unmistakable: engineered wall framing is winning share fast, with Spec Frame 10.0 LVL and Spec Frame 12.1 LVL in extremely high demand.

“These products are becoming the first choice for many timber yards, truss and frame fabricators, and builders when selecting an LVL framing supplier,” Slatter says. “Spec Frame performs well, looks great, has been appropriately tested for use as wall studs and plates, and is supported by all the required product documentation.”

That last point is one Slatter returns to when asked about smaller businesses looking to import their own LVL framing directly: an ambition he’s seeing more often, and one he urges caution around.

Slatter explained, “they need to be mindful that most products being offered to them are not fully tested for use as both wall studs and plates, and that any third-party certification should be cross-referenced against the appropriate Australian standards. They should also understand that an FSC certificate does not automatically mean compliance with the Illegal Logging Prohibition Amendment Act 2024, and that their liability exposure should be assessed against the ABCB’s position on non-conforming and non-compliant building products.”

It’s a timely warning. As compliance obligations tighten, the gap between a certificate that looks reassuring and a product genuinely fit for purpose is exactly where risk tends to hide.

BUILT ON A STANDARD, NOT A SHORTCUT

The growth of ITI’s EWP business isn’t the result of one product launch, it’s the product of a long, considered strategy: build the right partnerships, invest in the right people, and never compromise on compliance, even when it would be easier and cheaper to do so.

That’s the standard that built ITI’s reputation over 39 years, and, on the evidence of the Spec range’s first six months in market, it’s the standard now carrying the company’s EWP business forward. As Australian construction leans further into engineered timber, the businesses that earn the industry’s trust won’t necessarily be the ones with the biggest catalogue or the sharpest price: they’ll be the ones customers can rely on to have done the work no one sees, long before the product reaches the job site.