Collaboration is Key to BIM Success — and the Cloud is Key to Collaboration

The nature of building projects is changing, requiring greater interaction among geographically dispersed specialists.

The building and construction industries are realizing, literally, the benefits of building information modeling (BIM) — from improved project timelines to stronger bottom lines. And the more a company employs BIM, the higher the return on investment, according to the recent Autodesk whitepaper, Maximize Your Profit Margins with Design Collaboration.

Just as optimizing BIM has become key to successful business, optimizing collaboration has become key to successful BIM. As AEC project teams become increasingly dispersed, effective information sharing will make or break the holistic, project-centric BIM process. Social BIM — collaborating with external partners and suppliers — reaps greater rewards than lonely BIM — collaborating with colleagues only.

Newer technologies such as the cloud are facilitating social BIM, connecting teams and providing essential access to project data and stakeholders. The cloud liberates files from in-house servers and takes communication beyond e-mail to create a unified space where team members can collaborate in real-time. Improved collaboration, in turn, improves accuracy and efficiency in the design phase, and better design data leads to improved decision-making, project timeliness, costs, and quality.

These are not the only benefits to cloud-based BIM. According to Maximize Your Profit Margins with Design Collaboration, an optimally connected BIM process also supports working from any location, increased project acquisition, and improved talent retention — among many other significant perks for project participants and their companies.

As the AEC industry plunges into this era of connection and project delivery becomes increasingly collaborative, companies cannot afford to maintain the traditional, silo-ed design and construction process. As BIM-based projects become the norm, so must the cloud-based technologies that support optimal, social collaboration.