AECCafe Industry Predictions 2020 – Part 4

We are winding down our Industry Predictions 2020 series now, with one more week to go. The commitment of industry professionals to what lies ahead in 2020 is demonstrated in these informative views.

This week we cover topics such as digital adoption maturity in construction, VR/AR, drone capture and laser scanning, and cloud adoption. CMiC, Autodesk, Trimble and Workspot are our featured voices.

Jeff Holek, tech consultant and product leader

“Construction is a complex and highly competitive industry that has started to rapidly adopt technology as margins grow tighter, labor becomes more expensive, and new entrants constantly push boundaries. Construction’s productivity challenge—exacerbated by low profit margins, ongoing labor shortages and high administrative costs—makes data more valuable than ever for firms looking to stay ahead of the curve. The good news is that digital adoption in construction is on the rise, although the industry “still trails broader digital adoption maturity,” according to Deloitte’s 2020 Engineering and Construction Industry Outlook. Like Deloitte suggests, 2020 may not be the year when the industry reaches full adoption maturity, but it is very likely that many firms will be turning to digital tools to increase their bottom line. As project management software unicorn, Procore Technologies, is rumored to be preparing for an IPO this year, construction technology will undoubtedly be a major theme in 2020.

Based on what we’ve seen in other industries, my prediction is that digital adoption will give rise to the need for these new systems to communicate with one another. In order to make real time decisions, companies will need real time data from across all business systems. Considering the many silos that exist within any operations tech stack—from back office functions like payroll, contract management, and finance, to field systems like project management—finding a way to ‘bridge the gaps’ will be crucial.

There are many solutions available, most of which need to be integrated; however, firms should consider the benefit of moving to an enterprise construction platform that supports multiple business systems natively, as economies of scale can help drive efficiencies when all information is readily accessible. Platforms like CMiC are making it easier for firms of all sizes to deploy an enterprise-class system, substantially reducing implementation and ongoing costs.

Naturally, as firms transition to digital environments, there will come opportunities to better measure and derive insights useful for decision making. Tools that can accurately ingest and forecast project cost information, as well as connect field operations to the office, will likely make strong appearances in 2020. Being able to easily map and forecast true project costs that include overhead and productivity will provide executives with the foresight they need to plan and continue growing their businesses predictably.

Likewise, as resources become costlier, making sure those assets are as productive as possible can bring a good return on time spent, keeping projects on schedule and on budget. In addition, being able to easily share project data with the field, such as drawings, changes, or feedback from consultants, will speed up decision making and boost morale on the jobsite. Timely and accurate communications across teams—enabled by digital platforms—will be key this year.

While 2020 may not be the year BIM completely replaces 2D drawings, or artificial intelligence and augmented reality replace workers on-site, it will be a year where the value of bridging construction and technology will be noticed. The early adopters of past years are beginning to reap the rewards of their efforts in the form of streamlined operations, complete visibility and improved communications.

For those who are waiting for the stage to be set for a company-wide digital transformation, now is the time, as those who have the benefit of unified business systems will be the ones to profit most.”

Jeff Holek is a tech consultant and product leader with expertise in fintech and construction. He is currently helping CMiC—industry pioneer in complete and unified ERP and FIELD solutions for construction and capital projects firms—design innovative solutions for project controls. He looks forward to developing strategies and capabilities that bridge construction and technology in impactful ways.

“In 2020, urgency is increasing around the need for connected construction and functionality that increases collaboration between every part of the construction team — from design through to operations. Construction teams are tired of the miscommunication and rework that has become a common place and unfortunately accepted part of the building process.

* More fluidity of data going between design engineers, office and to the field. We’re seeing strong adoption of functionality that allows the same data to flow through all phases of construction.
* More integrative workflows with Building Information Modeling (BIM). BIM is more accessible and becoming increasingly important to field construction as well as the owners team, and functionality needs to support and enable the growing role of BIM.
* Connecting assets for operations. Functionality is needed to deliver data that’s rich enough to flow seamlessly into operations for long-term building maintenance.

As such, putting data at the center of the project and the business will continue to become increasingly important. As firms continue to get their hands around capturing, organizing and analyzing their data, there will be an intensified focus on transforming those data points into
actionable intelligence — takeaways that can help a business make better and more accurate decisions. We will see increased use of dashboarding tools, increased development of new analytics capabilities, and the desire to create new KPIs where once there were none.

Additionally, as technology adoption grows and 5G connectivity helps reduce latency, we’ll continue to see more firms add technology and innovation services like VR/AR, drone capture and laser scanning to their list of in-house capabilities as they become more standard
practice.”

Allison Scott, Director, Head of Construction Thought Leadership & Customer Marketing, Autodesk Construction Solutions

Content-enabled Data Will Drive Repeatable Processes and Transform the Supply Chain

Eric Harris, Strategic Communications Manager, Trimble

“Driven by the need for greater productivity, true collaboration and more connected and efficient workflows, new technologies and processes will be more widely adopted.  While every project is unique, there are several aspects that remain consistent and can be easily standardized across all projects. Using a data-centric approach provides construction stakeholders with analytics and business intelligence that can be used to not just build with confidence but also optimize their entire business process and operations. It allows companies to create constructible models faster through reuse of digital components. Designers and engineers will save time developing detailed and comprehensive models by incorporating digital content that mirrors the physical world, along with metadata that provides important contextual information such as cost, weight and sourcing. It will also help reduce the need for training and enable better resilience with an aging workforce, and more collaboration and file sharing between the office and the field.”

Eric Harris, Strategic Communications Manager, Trimble

Michele Borovac, Workspot CMO

“The architecture, engineering and construction industry has an unprecedented opportunity to modernize IT operations by taking advantage of innovative new SaaS services offered on top of a global public cloud like Microsoft Azure. We predict that 2020 will be a year of transformation, as these firms recognize the value of centralizing data like CAD and BIM drawings in the cloud, and giving users access from cloud desktops. As a result, they will see faster project delivery, as stakeholders improve collaboration and can take advantage of the unlimited processing power of the cloud. Rework costs will go down as design and build components stay in closer sync. Employees will gain the ability to work from anywhere – including the job site or home, which will increase employee satisfaction, and their firms gain the ability to hire the best resources regardless of location.

Cloud adoption will transform other aspects of the AEC industry. We are already seeing the adoption of drone technology to provide better aerial visibility, but processing and storing this data is compute-intensive. 2020 will bring increased use of cloud computing resources to speed time to value for this important data. Similarly, the adoption of augmented reality and virtual reality tools to visualize design will accelerate, especially when the cloud is used for the necessary horsepower.

Michele Borovac, Workspot CMO brings 20+ years of marketing leadership to Workspot. She has deep experience building brands, generating demand and driving growth for technology companies. She is passionate about BtoB marketing and connecting the right technologies to the right people. 

Prior to Workspot, Michele was vice president of marketing for Velostrata, where she opened the US headquarters and established the brand and marketing engine which led to an acquisition by Google. Before Velostrata, she built the marketing organizations for HighCloud Security (acquired by Hytrust) and Wanova (acquired by VMware). Additionally, she has held marketing leadership roles with Decru (acquired by NetApp), EFI and Oracle.  

Tags: 3D, 3D cities, AEC, architects, architecture, Autodesk, Autodesk University, BIM, building design, building information modeling, CAD, Cloud, collaboration, construction, design, engineering, engineers, generative design, infrastructure, laser scanning, mobile, point clouds, printers, reality capture, Revit, Trimble, visualization

Categories: 2D, 3D, 3D PDF, AEC, AECCafe, apps, architecture, Autodesk, BIM, building information modeling, civil information modeling, Cloud, collaboration, construction, construction project management, drones, engineering, field, field solutions, file sharing, infrastructure, integrated project delivery, Internet of Things, IoT, lidar, mobile, plant design, point clouds, project management, reality capture, rendering, simulation, site planning, sustainable design, Trimble, UAV, video, video surveillance, visualization, wearable devices

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 23rd, 2020 at 10:24 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.