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Geoffrey Moore Langdon
CADENCE AEC Tech News # 13 (Nov. 1, 1999)
Construction Industry Extranets
As one of the three biggest endeavors of humankind (food, shelter, clothing), the construction industry as a whole is larger than the whole software industry many times over. Close to a third of all of us are involved in some way with helping the buildings, roads, airports, industries and everything else we see about us in the built environment and the products that go in them to get created.
Now that CADD is firmly established as the de-facto necessity for doing business in the design portion of the construction industry (engineering, architecture, interior design), there are two new important implications. First, as my predecessor in this column, Jerry Laiserin, mentioned, the CADD market is saturated with at least 95% CADD usership. Second, the unilateral use of CADD now makes the instant digital exchange of drawings/models possible--perhaps necessary.
The first implication means that CADD software developer companies must look to new markets. The alternative is to attempt the increasingly difficult task of enticing potential new users from a group that already has CADD. They are looking at that huge construction industry, and can see that, starting with the designers, they can help, and profit by, the entire construction process.
The second implication means that project collaboration and product selection (with automatic specifications) is finally realistically possible. This synergy, along with the recent vast improvements to the 30 year-old Internet, has helped create the right environment for what may eventually be the most dramatic change the construction industry has seen--a coordinated delivery system for design, construction, manufacturing, delivery and more. Starting with "Architectural Project Specific Web Sites" where architects, engineers, and builders share project notes, photos, and CADD files, and adding huge databases of building products with specifications, and then branching out to other services, we end up with "extranets" specific to the construction industry.
Currently Joel Orr keeps track of the developments (and mergers) of some 54 different construction industry extranets. The most high profile of these have been ProjectCenter, developed by Evolv and now part of BricsNet, which is actively supported by the AIA; ActiveProject by Framework Technologies; ProjectNet by Blueline Online, and Bidcom, all working on the Web, and FirstClass, which runs as a stand alone system.
Autodesk Joins the Construction Industry Web Frenzy with buzzsaw.com
In her keynote last May at A/E/C SYSTEMS, Carol Bartz (CEO of Autodesk) said that Autodesk is repositioning itself to encompass many new areas and services so that by 2002, its AutoCAD software would be only 5% of its business. Now we know what she meant with Autodesk's announcement on Nov.1 of the new construction industry extranet called buzzsaw.com. Depending on the success of the spin-off, Autodesk could potentially leap to a market which would dwarf its huge success in the CADD software area. Additionally, with the heavy emphasis on AutoCAD at buzzsaw.com, Autodesk is positioned to break into new markets (with builders and product manufacturers) as well as hold on to existing AutoCAD users, all of whom would want to make the entire collaborative process easier online with one common software.
With a visit to arch-competitor Bentley Systems' extranet, ProjectCenter, you can see that, of over 200 available CADD programs by over 70 different companies, its list of design software includes only six by one company--mostly variants of its MicroStation TriForma. Similarly, at the buzzsaw.com site the design software list is seven variants of AutoCAD2000. Clearly, besides trying to provide new services for the construction industry (and of course profit in new markets), these extranets are meant to hold on to and extend their respective turf in the CADD market.
An enticing new twist with buzzsaw.com is that the Project Specific Web Site area--where architects can post drawings for engineers and collaborators to see and use--is free. A similar site at ProjectCenter is currently $250 per month ($139 to AIA members). While buzzsaw.com does say that it will support the huge cost of providing 100 MB of storage to anyone who asks with other services such as some $150 for burning a CD at the conclusion of a project, and with things such as Web banner advertising, I personally remain cautious. I know I can burn my own CDs for less than a dollar, and I see no advertising so far on buzzsaw.com despite some $15 million in venture capital from one partner. Also, when companies use phrases citing their primary purpose as "to establish a critical mass of users" it screams to me that the rules may change later on. The support area notes that projects stagnant for 90 days will be just "deleted", which I also read as a potential warning of heavyhandedness--and even more reason I should be burning my own backup CDs all along.
Architects Can Regain Control
Joel Orr has authored an article about these extranets in which he advises architects to use these kinds of services instead of taking the initially cheaper and easier route of creating their own project specific Web sites. While I agree that in some projects the do-it-yourself approach may grow out of hand (at which point you can easily switch to using buzzsaw.com for that project), this advice forgets a continuing desire for architects to regain control. At many AIA meetings architects seem to bemoan how their role in the construction process has diminished with non-traditional project delivery modes (where developers and even owners are at the top of the process instead of architects) while still being more legally liable than anyone else in the process. By initiating and controlling the drawing delivery vehicle for each design project, architects have an enormous chance to gain back that control, and to profit by expanding into more related areas as well. Architects such as Stamford White and Frank Lloyd Wright controlled the entire process, from picking sites through design to choosing interior furnishings and controlling construction. Were they around today, they would likely be right on top of extranets--creating their own as well as using ProjectCenter and buzzsaw.com as appropriate to each project.
Links for this issue (in order of appearance)
CSI = http://www.csinet.org
JoelOrr = http://www.extranets.cc
ProjectCenter/Evolv = http://www.evolv.com
Bricsnet = http://www.bricsnet.com
AIA = http://www.aiaonline.com
ActiveProject/Framework Technologies = http://www.frametech.com
Blueline Online = http://www.bluelineonline.com
BidCom = http://www.bidcom.com
FirstClass = http://www.firstclass.com
Autodesk = http://www.autodesk.com
buzzsaw.com = http://www.buzzsaw.com
Bentley Systems = http://www.bentley.com
Famous Architects = http://www.greatbuildings.com
About Geoffrey Moore Langdon, AIA
Prof. Langdon is a registered architect and is the principal of Architectural CADD Consultants, a firm that specializes in helping architectural firms with computing and CADD. He has taught Design, Solar Energy, and Architectural CADD at a number of colleges in the Boston area. He is the author of Architectural CADD: A Resource Guide to Design and Production Software Appropriate for Architects, a guest speaker at many AIA events, and the founder and organizer of the Designers 3D CAD Shootout competition. contact him at aectechnews@architecturalcadd.com, or through his website: http://www.architecturalcadd.com
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