With digital technology, making is easier, efficient, and pocket friendly to manage building and infrastructure Building Information Modeling (BIM) is being widely adopted.

Fremont, CA: BIM helps to make the digital replicas of physical assets, processes, and systems, also known as 'digital twins' of buildings. Using such digital models, which draws vast amounts of data in one place, complex calculations can be done. Similar to how analytics is used to provide insights to financial data, companies can now use analytics to interpret the vast amount of data contained within building and infrastructure project models. Many organizations are developing and maintaining digital models throughout the full lifecycle of an asset, from early design via construction and then into ongoing operation and maintenance.

Here are a few reasons why BIM analytics must be adopted by building and infrastructure owners.

Easier compliance with data requirements for an audit

Digital project models must adhere to either a global data standard or an organization's custom data standards for the owner-operators. To ensure that these requirements are fulfilled in the design phase, BIM consultants are usually engaged to conduct an audit on the model to validate compliance. This ensures that models meet the project-information requirements specified in the contract and are compliant for audit purposes.

Technology can be used to automate the compliance process, providing more time for consultants to analyze the results and work on solutions to identified problems.

Geometric clashes are resolved more efficiently, earlier on in a project

The advancements in digital design tools and fabrication technology have led to increasingly complex model geometry, especially in building architecture. To a lesser extent, this is also the case across roads, bridges, and rail projects. There is a myriad of clash detection tools available, which thankfully makes the construction and fabrication processes more efficient. Suppose we take this one step further and apply BIM analytics tools. In that case, this allows project owners, suppliers, and designers to identify clash relationships earlier in a project's design phase, reducing the likelihood of costly on-site delays.

Automated dashboards make communication and collaboration easier

Significant building and infrastructure projects hold regular stakeholder meetings to enable the various design disciplines, owners, and project management teams to communicate and collaborate. These meetings are essential to delivering a large design project. In the past, supporting information raised during these meetings was typically manually collated, added to a pdf 'dashboard', and distributed to teams. Whilst this was once cutting edge, it can now be automated and distributed online, reducing the time spent collating data and allowing more time to be spent on collaboration and stakeholder engagement.

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