Summit 2017

Autodesk AEC Summit

Autodesk invited the press to the new headquarters of its AEC Division in Boston, USA, for three days of presentations, customer site visits and technology talks on everything BIM. Martyn Day was there to report.

As Autodesk is now deep into ative design and machine learning. developers. It provides a cloud infraits transition to become a Combined, these will revolutionise the structure for all of Autodesk’s technolo‘subscription’ company, the design, construction and Facilities gies and serves them up as building old annual are now a thing of Management of the built environment. blocks for third-party developers to crethe past. The firm’s AEC division is seem- ate new solutions or develop / merge ingly on a biannual cycle of delivering The future of project delivery with their own. All this is made possible major improvements to its core products. Vikram Dutt, senior director, building at because BIM 360 and Forge operate in a These currently happen in March / April Autodesk focused on ‘Connected BIM’. single Common Data Environment and September / October, with perhaps Autodesk wants to use the cloud and (CDE) enabling new ways to process, some other news items coming out in BIM to provide an environment which distribute and see AEC information. November — in time for Autodesk creates a single place to access the right In the past, developers have had to University in Las Vegas. information in the right context on the acquire expensive licences of OEM

Subscription allows software develop- right device, from design to maintenance. Autodesk products, or through APIs ers to be much more dynamic in the deliv- Autodesk has not had a glorious history develop plug-ins for Autodesk’s desktop ery of content and be more open about in document management, against prod- products. Forge is a fundamental and their development objectives. With the ucts such as Bentley ProjectWise for major change to third-party developers. Autodesk portfolio seemingly ever-grow- instance, but when files become redundant ing to deliver on BIM, collaboration and and people are more concerned with model Project Quantum now fabrication, Autodesk held a press sharing and accessing live data, Autodesk With a hectic schedule, a number of event to provide a snapshot of its products sees it has a chance to offer an alternative. issues got passed over relatively quickly. and give some indication of current and BIM models are getting larger, models Unfortunately, one of those issues was future development. Technology trends ‘‘ There has been much speculation as to how far Project Quantum which promises a whole new world of collaboration In an overview of the indus- along Autodesk is with the development of between participants in try, Nicholas Mangon, VP AEC strategy and marketing laid out some interestQuantum... but I think it’s safe to assume that Autodesk is further along than most expect AEC workflows using the cloud. We covered this in great depth in the January ing stats, with predictions that the 3.5 billion people who live in cities today will swell to 10 bil- are being accessed more often and teams ’’ / February 2017 edition (tinyurl.com/quantum-AEC). The main new piece of information lion by 2050. This means there will be a are becoming more geographically dis- that we gathered is that Autodesk huge need to build new homes and infra- tributed. With 20 million AEC profes- expects to have at least a couple of cusstructure to manage this increase in these sionals worldwide and the next 30 years tomers talk / demonstrate their early megacities. However, AEC makes up 6% requiring a herculean effort in infrastruc- experiments with Project Quantum at of the global GDP and is low margin, high ture delivery, the process needs to change. Autodesk University in November. risk and highly fragmented. Autodesk feels it is in a unique place to There has been much speculation as to

Historically the sector has not invested offer this as with Revit market share, it how far along Autodesk is with the heavily in technology but a move to digi- feels it has BIM leadership. Dutt added development of Quantum. Armed with tal constriction could save $1.2 trillion in that Autodesk has developed the only this information, I think it’s safe to efficiency — 10% of the total money spent native cloud platform for AEC, with scal- assume that Autodesk is further along globally on AEC today. ability and a well-established AEC eco- than most expect.

Mangon highlighted several technolo- system. With an eye on industry compli- While collaboration is the primary goal gy trends that are set to revolutionise the ance and now developing a deep cloud of the first tranche of Quantum technoloindustry. High definition surveys, com- portfolio, Dutt proposed BIM 360 as a gy, it is especially important to Autodesk’s pute power (the cloud) enabling sophisti- cloud solution for the AEC space from commitment to try and better connect cated analysis of big data, VR and AR design, to build and operate. modelling with fabrication and to particiimmersive environments, mobile tech- pate in the industrialisation of construcnology, the convergence of manufactur- Autodesk Forge tion. The first realisation of this, is ing and AEC to digital processes and Autodesk Forge is a significant develop- acknowledging that Revit is not best suitArtificial Intelligence (AI) driving gener- ment for Autodesk and its ecosystem of ed to drive fabrication machines directly

but it’s essential that BIM interfaces with digital construction tools.

Digital Construction Sarah Hodges, director, construction at Autodesk took to the stage next and concentrated her talk on a specific area of construction software, collaboration and connectivity - with BIM 360 Docs acting as the central hub, connecting to Glue, Field, the newly named BIM 360 Ops and Project IQ.

The task of managing construction data and post occupancy facilities management through the cloud offers Autodesk some fresh markets to address and, with mobile access, the BIM model really starts to leverage the Information component.

Throughout Hodges’ presentation, the new BIM 360 cloud-based User Interfaces really stood out as providing very clear views of multiple data types and worked well on the screens of mobile devices, although these also respected the fact that 95% of all data required on site is still preferred in 2D at the moment.

Infrastructure re-imagined Theo Agelopoulos, director, infrastructure strategy & marketing design and build went through Autodesk’s thoughts on the market and developments within its product portfolio on Infrastructure. Refreshingly, this year InfraWorks was not the only product Autodesk seemed to want to talk about and really pushed the company’s capabilities on Reality Capture with Recap and Remake.

Agelopoulos stated that Autodesk doesn’t want to be a GIS firm (and so partners with the likes of ESRI and others for that component) but it does want to sit at the intersection of BIM and GIS.

Autodesk customers are starting to use drones, laser scanners, even LiDAR for much more than surveying and are building aggregated models for advanced uses such as measuring material removed from site, security, and design optioneering.

Infraworks was demonstrated in advanced bridge design and water services design, all looking very slick and turning civil engineering into the best version of SimCity there’s ever been.

The cloud was the big story repeated throughout the day; cloud simulation and collaboration with BIM 360 Glue were shown and even Civil 3D being able to upload and publish to the cloud.

UK vs US The next session included talks from Phil Bernstein, independent strategy and technology consultant (former Autodesk AEC VP) and Mark Bew, Chairman Autodesk’s Build Space 2011/12 to push a data-driven at BIM Task Group in the UK. features a suite of process to improve program Bernstein is interested in massive fabrication tools and robots for firms to delivery and drive costs down. what factors drive the adop- experiment with CrossRail is the first end-totion of technology. In the UK end project delivered in that and the US, Revit has done well and BIM manner but is only one of 15 worldwide is becoming the normal way of working, projects around the world that is using but he identified that this success was for the UK-derived standard. different reasons. Bew stated that Level 3 focus has now

In the US, where Government man- started, with an estimated implementadates are not particularly liked, BIM suc- tion in 2025, with £15 million in backing ceeded as it’s a highly competitive mar- from the Government (Level 2 had £5 ket. Nobody forced BIM on any firm, the million) but solving the Level 3 problem tool was taken up to ‘bludgeon the com- is much bigger than £15 million and so he petition’. The net result is a market where is in the process of planning how to get no two firms use BIM in the same way. more funds.

Meanwhile, the UK has taken a policy- Level 3 is all about transactional BIM based approach with an alliance of the with much more sophisticated models. supply chain with mutually agreed objec- It’s the move from files to objects, single tives and prescribed common practices. buildings to communities of buildings

While this is perhaps a rose-tinted with infrastructure (could be termed view of the challenges and acceptance of smart cities), and of course, data security BIM standards, the general difference in is a major issue. approach is certainly well observed. Bew thinks we have lost the skill of Americans will fly by the seat of their generating decent briefings, and through pants. In the UK, we are more likely to better understanding of feedback from buy ours from Marks and Spencer, as real world information in space usage, they just work. human interaction wants to focus on cre-

Bernstein finished off with a prediction ating detailed digital briefings for Level 3 that he feels that, as the construction projects. market is high commoditised with low margins and even final costs can’t be Revit and Connect BIM guaranteed, the market may change to Revit is 17 years old and Autodesk has seek engagement for more guaranteed owned it for 15 of those, so has done all outcomes, over lowest cost, as a larger the heavy lifting. Oddly enough Revit policy objective. was originally a subscription-based

Mark Bew did a sterling job of taking product before Autodesk bought it. the audience through the Government’s There wasn’t a lot of time allocated to indrive to improve the UK’s construction depth features but Autodesk highlighted industry’s woeful productivity issues, the updates to the new multi-storey stairs which employs 3 million people and gen- command in Revit. Storeys can be differerates £100 billion a year, of which 40% ent heights and unique edits can be made of the projects are public works. with auto-updates to the railings. The rail-

As the single biggest client, the ings can also be used as fences. Government kicked off a strategy in Navisworks models can now be taken

into Revit and users get the same perfor- Leica BLK + Autodesk ReCap This rapid turnaround has enabled mance. As a test, they took the whole city There is been a lot of hype around the firm to grow quickly in and beyond of Moscow inside for a dynamic fly- Autodesk’s co-developments with Leica the major centres of business. The comthrough. for its new portable laser scanning sys- pany aims to build communities of

Formit and Revit now play better tem the BLK 360. workers in their very funky spaces and I together, so early concept designs don’t The device is incredibly small and will was especially won over by their supplylose information when they move down- fit into a bag and is the first ultraportable ing of free beer! stream. laser scanner ideally suited to scanning

Autodesk Insight is a cloud-based the interiors of buildings. Autodesk and MEP and fabrication energy and daylight performance tool Leica have worked together to create a rel- The Boston Seaport region has become a which can be used through the design atively low-cost combination of portable very busy construction site for office process, from Formit concept models, all scanner with Recap running on Apple’s buildings and condos, but is also a hotthe way to final sign off. It has a really 12” iPad Pro. The combination enables bed for fabrication and industry. We visnice simple graphical interface and it’s firms to arrive at location and quickly ited ‘Building 16’ to meet one of the largeasy to understand the results. carry out multiple scans while collecting est local mechanical construction firms,

Autodesk Revit Live is Autodesk’s first the data and checking scans on the iPad Cannistraro, headed by CEO, John iteration of delivering Revit models to Pro. This helps firms ensure the laser scan Cannistraro, which had acquired the VR. In the past, you had to use multiple data is complete with no holes in the lease on the historic building originally packages to do it; now it can be uploaded model before anyone leaves the site. constructed in 1940 by the U.S. Navy. to the cloud for automatic preparation. To see the BLK 360 and Recap work Cannistraro is in the process of consoli-

The main problem here is that any together we visited wework (wework.com) dating four fabrication units into one, changes require the whole file to be re- in downtown Boston, a company which with this giant 157,000 ft.² building on uploaded and re-processed. I suspect this hires office floors or whole buildings in the waterfront bringing everything will be improved quickly as ‘Revit to VR’ major cities around the world and con- under one roof and close to where a lot of applications from third-party developers, verts them into shared co-working and the building work is taking place. such as Enscape, can already handle hot desk environments. This impressive The first part of the process though, is small delta changes without having to company uses Revit, standardised fit-out to rehabilitate the building and bring it shunt big Revit models around (see our with laser scans to rapidly assess builda- back from decades of neglect. Built by the Revit to VR article — tinyurl.com/revit-to-VR). Build Space One of the key areas in Autodesk’s new offices is ‘‘ Autodesk has technology in both AEC and in manufacturing and is committed to sharing that expertise between verticals US Army Corps of Engineers, it’s impressively over engineered. Cannistraro began utilising BIM in its earliest forms in the early 2000s, and the Build Space, a factory floor with a suite of massive fabrication tools and robots for cus- ble space and return on their investment ’’ expanded its use each year. The use of BIM for off site prefabrication became prevalent across tomers to come and experiment on prior to signing any lease. The company the organisation and on all projects by designs using cutting edge digital fabri- regularly sends out employees with large 2008. The company became known in cation and materials. laser scanners to capture potential new the industry as an early adopter and

There is also a space for industry-related sites with one employee saying they advocates for the use of BIM, early collabincubators to operate in-house and use the made over 200 site visits last year to scan oration and alternative delivery methods machines, while sharing their experiences and collect 3D data. The new Leica BLK such as design assist and IPD. and challenges with Autodesk to help 360 and iPad combination will save con- Today Cannistraro employs over 30 improve software product development. siderable luggage space and effort, and coordinators and designers in its BIM

The area is run by Rick Rundell, they’ve been very happy with their trials group as well as an in-house VDC (Virtual Technology and Innovation Strategist, so far. The accuracy of the Leica is to Design & Construction) group for file / Start-up Mentor and Senior Director at within 4-6 mm, which is good enough for model management, maintaining BIM Autodesk and the facility has really modelling. While it was hoped that the standards, as well as quality assurance. delivered on connecting Autodesk with machines would be available by now, Cannistraro currently uses Autodesk local academia and innovative developers they are still under pre-order on the fabrication CAD MEP, as well as and has become an in-demand space Leica website, so there is still some work Navisworks and BIM 360 Glue, and is where digital and physical design tech- to do. We can’t wait to get hold of one of increasing its training and usage of Revit. nologies can meet and be tested. these to test. The company also owns various tools

We visited the space last year and it wework is a great example of how BIM that supplement its BIM-enabled fabricawas still early days; now there are a can be used to provide tactical advantage tion efforts including Trimble total stanumber of interesting projects being run over competitors. BIM isn’t a technology, tions, 3D laser scanners, a HoloLens in the space, from innovative mould it’s a process and the company has con- headset and manufacturing / scheduling making for large scale forms, using tinued to refine its process to enable tools including FabPro and Touchplan. robots to 3D print / extrude and stretch rapid modelling of potential new sites. While we were in Building 16, Jim tetrahedron-based lattice forms to 3D This not only identifies the buildings Lynch, Autodesk’s VP, BIM product line printing components for historical with the best business potential but also group, gave a presentation on Autodesk’s facades which are being refurbished in brings forward the ordering of compo- commitment to connecting BIM to digital the city. nents, accelerating fit and finish. fabrication. In the manufacturing space

this has already been a great success but that revolution has yet to come in AEC.

By making a move to creating accurate models, the downstream benefits have yet to be realised. Autodesk has technology in both AEC and in manufacturing and is committed to sharing that expertise between verticals. The obvious meeting point for that is in MEP fabrication, modular construction - any job that requires complex shapes, material cutting or shaping.

Through Project Quantum the data will be made available in whichever application is applicable to the task, with the data seamlessly moving between trades providing the level of detail required at each development stage.

Perkins + Will The final session was given by Dr John Haymaker, director of research at architecture and design firm Perkins + Will (P+W) who evaluates new technologies and heads up its incubator program, along with 9 research labs around the world.

Haymaker feels that we are at a watershed moment for architecture and data is changing everything. It’s not just helping P+W better refine and design towards objectives like cost and schedules, but also water and energy consumption. It’s becoming performance-based design and the risk is being shifted to contract and delivery.

Haymaker said, “We have to decide if a building is the best it can be along many different performance metrics. We are reaching the human cognition, we are at our limit of how many objects we can consider - alternatives, systems, materials. We need computational assistance. We aren’t using computational design to replace any of our 2,000 designers, we want to enable cyborg super designers and design teams! ”

P+W has built up in-house research labs with experts in process, efficiency, material performance, urban water issues, design resilience, mobility (transport), society, and human experience.

The many competing issues which face designers fascinate Haymaker. Performance-based design needs to trade off these competing issues to maximise the best outcome that meets the most important criteria. The traditional route is to come up with various resultant designs which are then analysed for how best they trade off against the competing criteria.

Today’s methods are just not good enough at defining what all the alternatives are, or how well we measure them up.

Haymaker thinks in terms of Design Spaces, which he started while Tall Wood, a proposed 80 ment – collaboration and at Georgia Tech. He defines storey timber skyscraper powerful simulation / mobile them as being BIM models plus for Chicago, which focuses on modular design, access and lots of compute the environment around them material sourcing and power – having data on a and multiple BIM models that onsite fabrication desktop is not going to cut it. might fulfil the brief, as well as However, for customers the stakeholders and decision makers that are not happy with a subscriptionand the objectives, preferences for trade- only option or having to rely too much on offs, the constraints. a single vendor, this could be less than

After formulating the outlying param- brilliant news – as Autodesk won’t just eters, it is easier to derive computational own your design weapon of choice but algorithms which can then create thou- will own your company’s design process. sands of alternative designs within the The question will be if the benefits prodefined trade off. vided outweigh the concerns. I have to

P+W is also experimenting with new admit that Autodesk’s vision of BIMfabrication technologies, such as compos- cloud-utopia does sound compelling and ites, 3D printing and robots, using CNC it has seemingly identified the key probmilling to make moulds for complex geo- lems. The devil will be in the details and metrical panels. The idea is to show con- one wonders how generous an eco-systractors the design intent to provide guid- tem will be in adapting to different proance. Thermoplastics are another area of cesses of customers. Then there’s also the interest where, after heat is applied, robots fear of future price hikes and no way out. can pull and stretch the material to pro- While a lot of BIM is about software duce precise deformations - meshed pan- development and usage it’s clear that, with els with structural characteristics. advances in mobile computing, the cloud

On the subject of materials, Haymaker and big data, software and hardware are talked about ‘Tall Wood’ structures and a becoming better integrated and seamless. project that’s intended for Chicago. It’s For such a long time we have been conled to experimentation with modular cerned with moving from 2D drawings to designs, material sourcing and onsite making models and enjoying the advanfabrication. P+W has spent some time in tage of co-ordinated output of drawings Autodesk’s Build Space to create test when edits are made. This truly pales into modular components for the building. insignificance when one considers the revolution of a move to true, end-to-end digiConclusion tal construction and fabrication – design At the event, the message was consistent construction firms are driving this develand strong: while Autodesk is improving opment forward at considerable pace. its desktop tools, all destinations for that Out of all the software developers, data will be on Autodesk’s cloud and that Autodesk is perhaps best placed to delivis where a huge effort is being placed. er on that digital / physical connection,

Third-party developers are being being the only significant AEC developer encouraged to develop for Autodesk’s with feet in both the construction and the cloud and for customers to get the prom- manufacturing sectors. ised benefits of a common data environ- ■ autodesk.com