Dynamic Prototyping: The United States Air Force Building Information Modeling Initiative

Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Industry Foundation Classes (IFC), which is another key concept of BIM, are becoming globally-recognized standards. Although BIM education in schools is important in order to advance the adoption of BIM in the industry, such education has yet to be achieved. This study examines the degree of awareness and acceptance of BIM and BIM education among architecture students in Asia. A survey was conducted to measure recognition, interest, and experience with BIM and IFC among students participating in a design workshop in Busan, Korea. The students were moderately aware of BIM itself, yet had no familiarity with IFC. The more they know about BIM, the more likely they are to have an interest in it. Korean students are more aware of BIM than students from other Asian countries, and ′Upper class′ (3rd year and higher) students are more aware than ′Lower class′ (1st and 2nd year) students. This difference in awareness may be due to the strong government led initiative in Korea. Although for effective adoption of BIM and IFC, they should be introduced earlier to raise an awareness and interest in them.

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to identify and analyse the key measurable returning factors, value drivers and strategic benefits associated with building information modelling (BIM) return on investment (ROI). The findings of this study provide researchers and practitioners with up-to-date information in formulating appropriate strategies to quantify the monetary value of BIM. The suggested research agenda provided would also advance what is presently a limited body of knowledge relating to the evaluation of BIM ROI.Design/methodology/approachTo fill the identified gap, this study develops a comprehensive systematic review of mainstream studies on factors affecting BIM ROI published from 2000 to 2020. A total of 23 academic records from different sources such as journals, conference proceedings, dissertation and PhD theses were identified and thoroughly reviewed.FindingsThe reported BIM ROI ranged greatly from −83.3% to 39,900%. A total of 5 returning factors, namely, schedule reduction and compliance, productivity improvement, request for information reduction, rework reduction and change orders reduction were identified as the most commonly reported factors that influence BIM ROI. Four quantification techniques including general assumptions-based theoretical model, perceived BIM ROI based on survey, factors affecting BIM ROI with no reported ROI and quantified BIM ROI based on a case study were observed and pointed out in the review, together with their limitations. Finally, three major gaps were raised as the lack of consideration on the likelihood of BIM assisting in a construction project, intangible returning factors influencing BIM-based projects and industry standards in benchmarking BIM ROI.Practical implicationsThe outcomes of this study would assist practitioners by providing the current evaluation techniques that address the limitations with BIM investment and present issues relating to the economic evaluation of BIM in the construction industry. It is also expected that presenting a deeper and wider perspective of the research work performed until now will direct a more focussed approach on productivity improvement efforts in the construction industry.Originality/valueThis study identifies and analyses the key measurable returning factors, value drivers and strategic benefits associated with BIM ROI on an industry scale rather than a particular organisation or a project scale.

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is the current trend in the construction industry globally, and Malaysia, is not an exception too. BIM has been in Malaysia for the past ten (10) years, and in the future, BIM will be an industry standard, instead of an optional service. Even though BIM is already in the industry for ten (10) years, many developers are still reluctant to implement it because they could not see the benefits of BIM especially in monetary terms. This paper aims to explore the understanding developers of BIM and its impact on Return on Investment (ROI). A literature review is carried out to review the linkage between BIM and ROI. The study engages qualitatively with four (4) respondents who held the title of BIM managers in their respective companies that have experience in BIM. Data was collected through face-to-face semi-structured interview sessions and was analysed using qualitative content analysis techniques. From the findings, the respondents do understand BIM and that BIM is not a tool for visualisation only. It is, in fact, able to help them in project control. The findings show that BIM had impacted on the ROI of both the project and organisation. At present, these findings support the argument that BIM does have an impact on the ROI both positively and negatively. However, the findings prove that BIM is worthy of its pricey initial investment. It is, therefore, suggested that Malaysian developers invest in BIM though the initial investment may seem pricey.

Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a digital view which represent the functional and physical of building in construction project. BIM has become a necessity in today’s construction industry from the point of of providing digital representation and integration between project stakeholders, as well as providing the possibility of processing and storing the project information in a common database. Despite these advantages, the acceptance of BIM remain at a marginal level. Sarawak construction industry itself has fallen far behind on BIM implementation. Moreover, as construction projects in the state of Sarawak become increasingly diversify and complex, the need for BIM in Sarawak becomes increasingly important. Therefore, this paper has explored the awareness of BIM in the Sarawak construction industry. To realize this, a structured questionnaire survey form was distributed to 300 construction stakeholders through simple random sampling method. Out of the 300 questionnaire surveys, a total of 133 were returned and analyzed using descriptive, mean and factor analysis. The results were tabulated and ranked in descending order. Findings of this paper revealed that awareness level of BIM is gaining its momentum and the implementation of related software in Sarawak construction industry is still low. Factor analysis procedure for awareness of BIM has been conducted and this has extracted two distinct components which is awareness on knowledge and software with eigenvalues exceeding 1.0. This paper therefore encourages and recommends BIM implementation in the Sarawak construction industry, derivable through BIM awareness to increase productivity, better coordination, and minimized errors and repetition of works in the construction operations.

PurposeAlthough there has been a surge in the adoption of building information modelling (BIM) in the construction industry, the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are still struggling and perceive its adoption as risky. The SMEs in developing economies are especially on the disadvantaged side of the digital divide. Extant studies have focused on large firms and there are scanty studies on the influence of the external environments on BIM adoption in SMEs. Thus, this study espouses institutional theory (INT) to examine the influence of coercive, mimetic, and normative pressures on BIM awareness and adoption in SMEs.Design/methodology/approachA quantitative approach was employed, and data were collected from the Nigerian construction SMEs via an empirical questionnaire survey using a sequential stratified and convenient sampling method. Hypothesized relationships between the coercive, mimetic, and normative pressure and BIM in SMEs were empirically tested using the partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique and the model was validated with the “PLSpredict” procedure.FindingsThe results revealed that coercive and mimetic pressures significantly influence BIM adoption in SMEs while normative pressures have the strongest influence on BIM in SMEs. Also, BIM awareness is an important predictor of BIM adoption. The findings also shed light on the influence of firmographics on BIM awareness and adoption in Nigerian SMEs.Originality/valueThe study empirically validates the applicability of INT and highlights that BIM adoption is not only influenced by internal responses to the need for efficiency but also by external pressures. It implies a clear need for intentional isomorphic pressures in driving BIM adoption in SMEs. The study employs the INT to explain a phenomenon that has not been theoretically explored in the context of SMEs in developing economies. Lastly, the study provided valuable insights into driving BIM adoption, together with the effective practical implications for implementation and potential research areas for further studies.

The importance of technical disclosure in construction of project is described and the necessity of application of BIM (Building Information Modeling) technology used in technical disclosure is analyzed correspondingly. Many actual cases of technical disclosure in construction used BIM technology in our company with its application are discussed subsequently. The results show that the BIM technology can simplify the procedures of technical disclosure on the construction phase, and multi-software work together based on BIM provides a guidance for different types of projects. Many advantages of BIM such as construction simulation, 3D roaming can improve the quality of technical disclosure. Finally, recommendations and requirements for the specific implementation of BIM on the construction phase are proposed: the BIM model for technical disclosure is the most unique model in the entire life cycle; the locally refined extent is much more than the final completion model, which should be paid more attention to in the whole process of program development when BIM implemented.

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a revolutionary stride of technology in the orthodox construction and procedures in conventional Architecture Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry which is stressed upon for its delay on embracing new technologies. The strength of BIM has been disvalued in the eyes of many professionals, to think of BIM as just another ‘software’ which is in reality, a ‘process’ of attaining an outstanding collaboration among each and every stakeholder throughout a project’s life cycle. Hence, the philosophy of Supply Chain Management (SCM) in a construction project can be achieved effectively with the BIM’s promise of flexible and transparent interaction among Construction Supply Chain (CSC) contributors. However, the complexities in CSC of a conservative setup has been more composite with the intervention of BIM. Consequently, the BIM project stakeholders have encountered complications on the effective application of BIM on CSC while reaching the envisioned goals of BIM. Thus, the intention of this study is to develop a foreseeable information flow model related to construction supply chain in a BIM aided project. In order to attain the aim, an extensive literature synthesis was piloted to develop a conceptual informational flow model among CSC stakeholders of a BIM project. This contemporary research outlines that the CSC of a BIM project is much interactive and flexible with its collaborative effort of stakeholders when compared to the clashes among professionals in traditional setups. In a practical context, the roles and duties of BIM project stakeholders identified in BIM standards, have slightly differed due to real-world complications in construction industry. Besides that, BIM standards have laid down charismatic arrangements on information flows among BIM project stakeholders, which is in reality, a complex and random setup. Hence, the research outcome has successfully answered the complications by laying down guidelines for any outsider to the BIM field to recognise what would be the contribution of each stakeholder throughout the BIM project’s life cycle.

Purpose The oil and gas industry form the main resource of economy in Iraq and constructing any project in such sectors requires a huge amount of expenses due to the unique requirements that oil and gas facilities required in such projects. Therefore, adopting an appropriate technological approach such as building information modeling (BIM) which is unfortunately not adopted yet in Iraq is essential to successfully deliver these projects. Thus, this paper aimed to introduce BIM to Iraq through Basra Oil Company (BOC) which is one of the biggest public oil and gas companies in Iraq. Design/methodology/approach The related literature of journals articles, conference proceedings and published reports have been reviewed. As a result, firstly: a hypothesis has been derived that is “If Basra Oil Company (BOC) adopts and applies BIM approach instead of the 2D approach currently used to manage its projects, the company can overcome several constraints in managing its projects that associated with such 2D traditional approach”; secondly: homogenous, consistence and reliable web-based questionnaire has been designed as its Cronbach’s alpha equal to 0.897 and 0.711 for BIM benefits and barriers, respectively. This questionnaire distributed to the BOC related professionals to test such hypothesis by investigating their readiness and accepting of BIM approach and to rank BIM barriers based on five-point Likert scale. Findings Based on the analysis using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 of 115 responses, almost 50% of the respondents had experience 11–15 years, while 22.6% had experience more than 15 years in oil and gas industry construction projects. Those participants were from diverse engineering majors that are: 4.3% Architectural Engineers, 31.3% Civil Engineers, 20% Mechanical Engineers, 22.6% Electrical Engineers and 21.7% from other engineering majors. The respondents’ departments demography was 16.5% of design department, 12.2% of construction department, 20.9% of Project Management Department, 12.2% of Maintenance department, 4.3% of HSE Department, 13% of Production Department and 20.9% of “Other Department.” The study resulted in 1: accepting BIM approach to be an alternative of current 2D-traditional approach used by the company to manage and construct its projects, since mean of collected data is (4.4332), Kruskal–Wallis H test significance values were 0.398 and 0.372; and ANOVA test significance values were 0.433 and 0.599 among Engineering Majors groups and Company’s Department groups, respectively. 2: Disclosed and sequenced BIM barriers in the company based on their criticality. 3: verifying reliably how BIM attributes are important to oil and gas construction projects in Iraq, 4: the company top management and company policies are the most critical potential factors to hinder or adopt and implement BIM in the company, 5: while cost is not seen a critical barrier to implement BIM in the oil and gas sector. Research limitations/implications The limitation of this study is the excluding of decision makers of BOC, thus more profound future studies need to be conducted where top management and decision makers are involved, particularly the present study demonstrated that support of company top management is the most critical factor which can help the company to adopt (BIM). Originality/value The study concludes that BIM approach is valuable for managing projects in oil and gas sector in Iraq and identify the originality in output by using the research method. This noble study provides a leverage for enhanced research to adopt and implement building information modeling (BIM) in Iraq as the study originally demonstrates benefits and identifies the critical barriers in BIM implementation to push the boundaries toward adopt Digitalization and reduce CO2 emission in Iraqi oil and gas sector. The study can be used as evidence and platform to encourage professionals and practitioners to present more sophisticated tools of BIM in the oil and gas industry, especially for facility and operation management. These findings achieved via oil and gas experts, and it is first time to achieve such findings from a case study in Iraqi oil and gas sector.

Purpose The recent research trend of building information modelling (BIM) involves interoperability and issues pertaining to the design, construction, operations, and maintenance phases of a building. However, few researchers are concerned with problems encountered in the last two phases of the building life cycle. Since BIM has been widely used in the design and construction phases, further expanding the BIM data stream to the post-construction phase can not only establish a consistent, shared database for information exchange between the phases but assist in current facility management applications. This research reconceptualises BIM with object-oriented thoughts to a space-based representation, and tries to construct an interface between BIM and existing facility management software. Method Model-driven architecture (MDA) is one of the modern software design approaches. With its foundation – meta-object facility (MOF) – and model transformation, MDA provides an ideal solution for easily maintaining the interoperability. In this research, a MOF of a building is constructed by imitating the MDA approach, encapsulating BIM data and providing an interface for external facility management software. This MOF of a building is designed with spatial interference due to the maintenance and repair work is usually based on the space. Results & Discussion A conceptual demonstration of disaster mitigation is conducted to test the feasibility of using MDA to encapsulate BIM data for extended applications. Furthermore, the expected results are reconstructing maintenance records to a space-based database for a better software design and a solution for interoperability.

Building Information Model (BIM) was initially proposed by Autodesk in 2002. Currently, BIM has been widely recognized in the industry worldwide, baced on its great value. The concept of BIM has been gradually well-known in construction industry in China, and it’s a good prospect for development and application of BIM. But its application and promotion is still in start-up phase in China. It should be actively promoted in whole society. It was suggested in the paper: application and promotion of BIM technology should be implemented step by step, and precursed to apply in construction phase, ultimately achieved overall industrial application. This paper analyzed characteristics and advantages of application and promotion of BIM technology in construction phase, and discussed implementation sschemes and steps. Finally, it proposed BIM should be grandly guided to achieve comprehensive application in project’s whole-life.

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is one of the methods that can be used to enhance project effectiveness. However, its implementation in Indonesia is relatively low. This issue is attributed to various inhibiting factors. This research aims to identify the BIM implementation barriers and the mitigation steps that need to be taken. A survey was conducted using both closed-ended questionnaire and open-ended questionnaire. The intended respondents were stakeholders stakeholders who have understandings of BIM, and have previously applied BIM in construction projects. The analysis of closed-ended questions was performed using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) method to identify the levels of influence of inhibiting factors on BIM implementation. Meanwhile, open-ended questions were analysed to gather opinions regarding solution approaches to the barriers to BIM implementation. The result of this study indicate that software and hardware costs are the major barrier to implementing BIM in construction projects. Additionally, factors such as lack of knowledge and understanding of BIM, difficulty in changing or transitioning work culture, investment costs and profits uncertainty of BIM, and a lack of awareness of the BIM benefits are other obstacles that need attention. To promote the realization of BIM implementation, steps such as socialization, training and certification, as well as government support in facilitating BIM implementation in construction projects, are expected to be realized.

The continuous advancement of Building Information Modelling (BIM) influences the paradigm shift of collaboration, among multi-organisations for better digital data information generation, sharing, and management. In Malaysia, the utilization of BIM in construction projects is limited due to various challenges faced by multi-organizations including disputes in handling BIM collaboration which create a complex situation for the contractor to manage the construction phase. In fact, from the contractor's perspective, there is less specific procedure and reference to refer to as a guideline to implement BIM among multi-organisations. Thus, the conceptual framework is an initiative created as best practice to influence the success of collaboration among organizations in managing BIM construction projects based on contractor perspectives. This research study focused on three main objectives; (i) to determine the challenges faced among multi-organisations in enhancing collaboration in managing BIM construction projects, (2) to investigate the indicators that influence the multi-organisation in enhancing collaboration in managing BIM construction projects, and (3) to establish the conceptual framework in enhancing multi-organisation collaboration in managing BIM construction project based on contractor perspective. The methodology for this research study is a systematic literature review (SLR) and questionnaire survey were involved 30 BIM experts who have experience in managing BIM construction projects. The data from the questionnaire survey was processed and analyzed using the ranking analysis via mean and standard deviation to rank the factor for both objectives. Finally, based on the consolidated findings, a conceptual framework for multi-organization collaboration in managing BIM construction projects based on contractor perspectives was developed. The conceptual framework serves as an initial reference database and guideline platform for the contractor and other organizations to enhance BIM collaboration in construction projects in the context of the virtual environment.

The construction industry has made significant improvements in adopting and integrating emerging technologies. One example is the wide use of Building Information Modeling (BIM), which offers numerous benefits to the construction industry. BIM assists project teams in achieving better quality with lower risk, shorter timeframes, and reduced costs. Meanwhile, the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) defines the required discipline to meet stakeholders' needs. PMBOK aims to facilitate the achievement of predefined project deliverables and improve project goals through effective communication and decision-making processes. This paper presents a questionnaire-based investigation to measure whether BIM implementation enhances the PMBOK in projects and whether BIM positively affects Project Management Knowledge Areas (PMKAs) on a global scale. The questionnaire consisted of 7 general questions, 37 PMBOK-oriented questions, and 4 questions targeting BIM advantages and obstacles. 95 experts participated in the survey based on the LinkedIn search and survey invitation. The results showed that BIM dramatically influences the quality of execution of PMKAs, specifically in Project Integration Management. Additionally, the study examined the effect of BIM on the product lifecycle that BIM improves project coordination and discovers clashes during the engineering phase. In the construction phase, BIM facilitates as-built drawings and enhances communication, and during the post-construction phase, BIM enhances facility and components’ lifecycle management. The research also found that the most significant obstacles to implementing BIM are the lack of experts, value propositions, and efficient training.

Although building information modelling (BIM) is endowed with the potential for collaboration, the nature of the relationship between BIM application and collaboration has not been well-elaborated. This research classifies collaboration into the two dimensions of cooperation and coordination and empirically tests a model to understand not only the effect of BIM application on collaboration in construction projects but also the moderating effects of fairness perception and contract specificity. Using 296 samples from the Chinese construction industry, this research reveals the existence of a positive relationship between BIM application and collaboration. In addition, fairness perception weakens the relationship between BIM application and both collaboration dimensions of cooperation and coordination, while contract specificity strengthens the effect of BIM application on the coordination dimension only. These findings offer new insights through a nuanced understanding of the nature of the relationship between BIM application and collaboration, providing useful guidance for BIM application in the construction industry.

PurposeThis paper aims to describe how building information model (BIM) and big data can be combined in the same interface for providing new value to stakeholders, such as the property owner and user, as well as property service and workplace service companies. The research presents a new concept, which shows how the BIM can be exploited efficiently during maintenance.Design/methodology/approachInitially, existing facility management (FM) processes were investigated to find out how to digitize them and identify bottlenecks. Second, BIM’s data content was explored to identify the information that could be used to streamline FM processes. Third, the potential of the active data measured in the building was evaluated. Finally, research was undertaken to find out how constantly fluctuating information can be combined with BIM objects and what kind of added value that combination could offer. The literature review was used to support the primary contribution. In addition, the research problems were described and the basics of the research were obtained by interviews. The author has interviewed 27 professionals from several stakeholders.FindingsThe first finding is that the BIM can serve as a platform for building use, various services and management when it has been adequately generated during the planning and construction phases and enriched before being commissioned. The other essential finding is the theory of conditions data model (CDM), which is a technical environment that combines active data with BIM. The most important advantages of BIM in FM are as follows: • Building owner attains better user satisfaction, acquires better quality and smarter services, saves energy, ensures better indoor conditions and improves building profitability. • Service providers can develop and offer new services, speed up operations, save resources and generate more profits. • The occupant gets a better user experience, faster and higher quality services and better indoor conditions.Research limitations/implicationsThe CDM enables to generate for the real estate and construction (RE&C) sector a novel BIM-based ecosystem with standard rules, instead of every individual operator developing his/her own unique solution for BIM use in FM. This will have an impact on the entire RE&C sector’s operating methods and will have significant financial implications in the near future. Application of this research is limited to office buildings where indoor condition measuring is undertaken continuously and where the knowledge of the use cases of spaces is available. In addition, the proper BIM in the Industry Foundation Classes format must exist. The evaluation of the validity of big data is not discussed in this article. Visualization of data and content of user interfaces will be the topic of another article by the author. This article does not deal with intricate technical details, but crucial issues are defined.Originality/valueThe article presents a unique method for BIM use in FM. The theory of CDM (how to combine active data with BIM) is completely new and a similar solution has not been presented earlier. The theory of the presented method will be the crucial key for BIM use and will lead worldwide commissioning. Currently, the theory is under test in the practical pilot project. The results of the project will be published in the next article.