Written by Peter Daly, a longstanding & active member of the COMIT Community
Those of us who are involved in COMIT share a common
vision – that one day, no one will go in-field without their tablet or
smartphone any more than they would without their hard hat.
But we are quite some way today from such a
dream and on both sides of the Atlantic. As a former vendor of such systems, I have seen
at first hand the benefits that this technology can bring but also its
challenges. This article provides an overview of the promise and pitfalls and
some ideas on where it is going.
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| An early wireless tablet (2005) running Windows CE |
This is an
industry whose origins go back over a decade and a half to the era of expensive,
rugged PDAs and “slate” computers. It has been emerging slowly, notwithstanding
the invention of the iPad in 2010. In the
US the two pioneer vendors were Latista and Vela, both now acquired and
Priority1 in the UK, also now acquired.
Progress in the US has been more rapid but is still at a relatively
early stage - only 26% of firms track the flow of project information to other
firms although 37% have access to data outside the trailer (site office)
according to a 2013 report from McGraw Hill Construction (“Information Mobility
– improving team collaboration through the movement of project information”).
Mobile clients
of collaboration platforms have advantages over SaaS based stand-alone apps
(such as avoiding a duplicate horizontal “silo” of information for instance
where collaboration platforms are being used) but such mobile client use is
also fairly restricted despite the widespread use of collaboration platforms in
the UK at the top end. Of course, mobile
IT here is not confined to vendor offerings - there is also the emerging
opportunity for larger firms to create and curate their own app stores (as in
the promising MobiCloud project from COMIT and partners such as Appear
Networks).
There are many
reasons why mobile IT is not more universal in construction yet; the project
centric nature of buying SaaS solutions which also applies to collaboration platforms;
the lack of perceived ROI due in part to the inability to trial easily; the
cost of mobile devices; inertia and lack of interest in IT; the fact that such
systems have been targeted mainly at Tier 1 contractors to date. But things are changing now under a number of
influences. It is very instructive to
look beyond construction and see what is happening more broadly in other
sectors.
Rise of the Enterprise Apps
In recent years
we have seen the rise of a new type of enterprise software which challenges the
status quo of major vendors in many ways. These include apps for collaboration and
communication across devices and include
such apps as Yammer, Asana and more recently Slack which is taking the
enterprise world by storm.
These sorts of
apps have a number of things in common; their design is driven by great user
experience and the ease of use as in consumer apps; they are easy to trial and
easy to acquire online; their marketing relies heavily on digital marketing and
they have low support costs. They are therefore scalable in a very efficient
manner.
This trend has
also reached construction (especially in the US) where PlanGrid and FieldLens
provides great, easy to use and acquire apps but as yet the early stage US
market is still dominated by the legacy and expensive systems which were
formerly Latista and Vela as independent companies. In the UK, Basestone also shows promise and
is attempting the same approach. I believe that these sorts of simple app hold
the key to the future as described below.
The Promise for Construction
Mobile IT
systems today are mainly used for snagging and mobile access to drawings and a
number of estimates and experience with real case studies indicate that such
technology can save up to 1% of project value (Source: case studies from
PlanGrid, data from various sources from US projects and unpublished experience
with my former apps, SmartBuilder1 and Plan2Finish). That may seem small but is
actually a huge benefit in an industry with thin margins. But there is actually
a lot more that such technology could deliver. Many processes which could and
should be transferred from paper and legacy IT systems to mobile clients or
apps; progress reporting, engineering forms, RFIs (although the latter process
will be extensively modified by BIM) and change orders. The list is as high as
the stack of paper on your desk.
Mobile clients
and apps of course need enterprise level security, granular and configurable
views to eliminate unnecessary fields and context specific access to data where
possible. The use of social media type
“walls” to replace email is a common trend in new enterprise software generally
and could offer a lot in construction where finding out who knows the solution
to something can be time wasting.
Mobile BIM is at
a relatively early stage but holds much promise and already we are seeing
mobile clients of collaboration platforms allowing access to their BIM model
servers on browsers. Being able to access the model in-field and to initiate
BIM enabled work flow assignment from in-field will deliver powerful
productivity benefits as will in time, use of Augmented Reality as well. These benefits will also extend to asset
owners as well during subsequent building operation.
Another trend is
the trend towards real time working and real time mobile collaboration. The use of the sort of technology involved in
messaging apps along with video as well as images is going to allow much more
real time working while also providing a secure audit trail of all communications.
Some construction and design processes will always be asynchronous but there
will be an increasing trend towards real time collaboration over tablets and
smartphones (which are larger now days). Many issues which used to need
meetings or even worse, trips to meetings to resolve, can be sorted out through
use of this sort of technology from individuals or teams in different
locations.
Finally”
gamification” or including game like elements in software is an important trend
in corporate training in a number of sectors. This could potentially have great
benefits for construction in relation to induction, on-going training and very
importantly, safety.
So what is
needed to realise all of this promise within the construction industry and
deliver the real productivity gains that other industries have seen from
enterprise mobility?
Mobile Access for Everyone, Everywhere.
Mobile IT in
construction will only realise its potential if four things happen – firstly if
it is deployed enterprise wide by the large companies; secondly if its use
extends down the value chain; thirdly if such software is made much easier to
use, trial and acquire and finally if it all ties together through
interoperability.
As in
collaboration platforms in the UK, mobile apps are not normally deployed
enterprise wide. In the case of the collaboration platforms that reflects a
lock out effect of clients deciding which one to adopt so that even if a
contractor has a favoured system they must change as required on a project by
project basis. In mobile IT the causes are different although there are some
similarities; procurement is also project to project; project experience is
often lost so that even if value has been obtained key decision makers to do
not know that; top management do not see mobility as a priority; the cost of giving
everyone a tablet is too high and what to do about tablets for the
sub-contractors? Finally the price of vendor offerings has historically prohibited
enterprise wide use.
In relation to
the device issue, there is really no alternative in the UK but to bite the
bullet and accept Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies as is happening in
other industries. This solves the issue of how to get the entire project team
using mobile software. Given the availability of excellent Mobile Device
Management (MDM) software from companies such as Citrix for apps and the
security built into collaboration platforms, there is really not much excuse
for rejecting this solution. Of course,
BYOD on its own will not solve the pricing issue – it also needs to be combined
with software which is affordable across the enterprise and not just for a few
projects.
Deploying a few
individual mobile IT licenses per project as has happened in the UK is not the
best way to get efficiency on a project. It needs the entire supply chain to
get involved. That means project pricing and also software and pricing and
policies which are attractive to sub-contractors so they can buy it themselves.
There is a big untapped opportunity in the sub-contractor space. An example of this from a different sort of
technology is the US public company Textura Inc. which is growing a very fast
rate as a result of its own financial offering to construction
sub-contractors. There is also a huge
base of smaller main contractors who would benefit from mobile IT.
A key part of
the solution here is giving people easy to use and easy to trial software. If
software needs set up and training, then by definition it cannot be trialled
easily. If on the other hand users are
delighted by beautiful, simple software that makes their life easier and needs
no training, they will flock to it. This is the trend that PlanGrid and
FieldLens are backing.
Finally there is
the issue of interoperability. If major firms are using say, the mobile clients
of collaboration platforms and smaller firms are using apps, they need some
ways to work together unless the system of the top contractor can be driven
down the value chain. I see the future as being a mix between collaboration
platforms and apps. The cloud based back
end of the enterprise apps will increasingly offer simpler and less costly
solutions for “a collaboration platform” for smaller companies. All that is needed to make everything work at
every level are APIs and the will to implement them but in the era of cloud
computing that is not the barrier it once was.
The biggest challenge
is not technical, it is cultural. This challenge is for construction managers
to get with 21st century ways of working.
Peter Daly (LinkedIn) is the former co-founder and CEO of
SmartBuilder Software Ltd, later rebranded as Plan2Finish
