LEADERS' OUTLOOK
Digital Adoption is an Evolution, Not a Revolution BY THEO AGELOPOULOS
Senior Director, Architecture & Engineering Design Strategy, Autodesk
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ur customers have been on a digital transformation journey from CAD to Building Information Modeling (BIM). BIM is a digital process and the foundation to enable efficient delivery, from planning all the way through to operations and maintenance. To digitally transform the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry, one must adopt BIM.
ANNUAL EDITION / JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2022
There are various phases of the BIM process, beginning with digital planning and design, digital construction and ending up in digital operations. At the core of the BIM process is a rich and intelligent 3D model, CAD still plays a role in the BIM process except now it’s a 2D documentation derivative representing a point of view at a single point in time. COVID saw an uptick in the demand for remote working and connecting different disciplines together through the project lifecycle. The Cloud has allowed us to better connect different processes and people, both in offices and in the field. This demand has accelerated the next wave of adoption and digital transformation. In the past two years, we have seen significant ramp in the adoption of Autodesk’s Cloud technologies because many of our customers had to rapidly distribute their workforce in a coordinated manner while managing their project risk.
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There are several independent industry reports that claim digital transformation of the AEC industry has accelerated by three to five years because of COVID, I believe it and see that happening before my eyes. The pandemic served as a forcing mechanism in accelerating the AEC industry’s adoption of remote working leveraging digital collaboration technologies. Even post-pandemic it has permanently changed the way AEC professionals work and collaborate forever.
Adoption of Digital Twins
In the development of a capital asset, from planning to design to operations, most of the digital maturity has primarily happened in the digital design and
engineering over the past 20 plus years. Over the past five years we’ve witnessed rapid adoption in the construction space, there continues to be a tremendous amount of capital invested in digital construction. Now we are entering the next phase of innovation in digital operations, which is why we are seeing the emergence of Digital Twins. This is one of the primary reasons Autodesk has been working closely with Esri over the past five years to connect our asset scale Digital Twins with their macro level Digital Twins from a geospatial perspective. If you digitally transform the way capital assets are delivered — using a BIM process — you should always end up with a derivative Digital Twin, which then optimizes the way you operate and maintain that capital asset through its lifetime. As you operate and maintain that asset in the Digital Twin environment, and look towards renovation and retrofit, the collected data and insights should re-feed the BIM process for future renovation and retrofit. We will finally close the loop of moving data and information through the capital asset lifecycle to drive knowledge and better outcomes.
Stimulus measures and tech adoption
Governments around the world, including those in the United States, Germany, Japan, Australia, India, and China, to name a few, made major stimulus investments in their infrastructure, primarily to create jobs and keep their economies moving forward. This has only further accelerated the digital transformation of the infrastructure industry. In the United States alone, the infrastructure bill uplifts infrastructure spend by USD 500 billion, with key investments in roads and highways, rail, water infrastructure, water storage, public transit, and airports. We should all be excited about the infrastructure stimulus bill, not just because of the amount of money that is being put into these different markets. What is very encouraging is the current
