Category: Features
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Construction Suicide Prevention Week: Addressing the Mental Health Crisis in Construction
The construction industry builds our communities, but too often the people doing the building are struggling in silence. September 8 – 12 is Construction Suicide Prevention Week, and we’re shining a light on the darkness far too many men and women face in the industry. Construction workers face tough conditions every day — long hours,…
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From BIM to Site: A Digital Chain for Takt Production
How do you measure the performance of a takt construction project? That was one of the research themes presented at the Building 2030 summer seminar in Espoo, Finland. The Finnish Building 2030 consortium held its summer seminar last Thursday and Friday. The event was the culmination of Building 2030 Week, which my company had helped…
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Making Volumetric Modular Construction Work
Is volumetric modular construction on the verge of a breakthrough, or will it remain experimental or occasional, as it has so far in many countries? Finnish contractors have used concrete prefabricated building frames regularly since the 1960s. Now, we’re seeing growing interest in volumetric modular construction, especially for certain types of spaces. My early experiences…
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Building New Data Bridges in AEC
The AEC sector’s longstanding problem is the lack of data flow among processes and project participants. We’ve tried to fix it with shared file repositories, shared BIM models, and APIs that enable software data exchange. Despite new AI tools, the issue remains. But there may be a solution. Anthropic released MCP (Model Context Protocol) in…
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The Timber Tech Playbook: Lessons from Greg Howes
In this episode of the AEC Business podcast, I sit down with Greg Howes, co-founder of CutMyTimber and the AEC Hackathon, and the founder of Oregon Mass Timber Network. Greg’s journey spans from Silicon Valley tech to high-precision timber fabrication. We talk about: Why the U.S. could become the world’s biggest mass timber market The…
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From Data Mess to Market Edge
What do 3,503 construction leaders from 27 countries think about the industry’s tech future? Autodesk’s latest global survey reveals the trends shaping GCs, owners, trade contractors, and designers. You can read the results in the 2025 State of Design & Make – Spotlight on Construction report. Data is key, but poorly utilized The report demonstrates…
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Best 40 Construction Technology Podcasts
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Construction Estimation: From Manual Takeoff to the AI Future
Quantity takeoff (QTO) is the foundation of construction cost estimation, another critical task. For decades, professionals have sought to streamline QTO through technology, aiming for greater speed, consistency, and accuracy. Yet despite advances in digital tools, the profession is still in flux. A 2023 global study by RICS and Glodon found that only 39% of…
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Building a Successful AEC PoC
“Can a robot navigate on a construction site and collect information for situational awareness?” “Does a construction process ontology help combine information from multiple sources to support construction management?” “Can a digital twin platform serve for visualizing 3D zoning data?” These are some of the questions our clients have answered through Proofs of Concept (PoCs).…
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From Fluff to Framework: Finland’s MEP BIM Revolution
As I’ve written previously, Finland will start implementing BIM-based building permitting in 2026. The national RAVA3pro project laid the groundwork for the new process by creating the necessary IFC data definitions for BIM models, including those for building services. A recent article in the Finnish Building Services Magazine (Talotekniikkalehti) featured the groundbreaking work of Markus…