The slow build to construction innovation

We’re at the beginning of what’s being billed as the fourth industrial revolution—a digital transformation building on the use of electronics and information technology to automate production and other legacy industries like construction. Innovation velocity, scope and impact are the primary characteristics of the movement, and the speed at which change is happening has no historical equal. Improvements are exponential – leaping ahead rather than evolving along a linear timeline. Just about every business is being affected, some faster than others. So why is it that construction, which is primed for digital transformation, has been one of the slower sectors to adopt new technologies? 

It’s not because construction companies don’t grasp the potential—it’s easy to see what drones can do for site imaging; autonomous vehicles for mundane transport tasks; and GPS for fleet tracking. These have obvious benefits. But they require investment, and construction companies are famous for not quickly parting with their money. But not without good reason: the cost of business is constantly going up while pushing down margins. That’s why industry leaders need to consider technologies that help them compete, be more efficient, and get better at the tasks that increase margins, like bidding on jobs. 

Start with known tech, like telematics. Bidding on projects to ensure there will be a profit at the end of the job requires a command of cost management, and telematics provides a clear view into costs managers need to control for pricing. Telematics tracks expenses in real-time, detailing how much fuel and other materials are used and their costs. These insights make project bids that much more precise. Tracking a fleet with the onboard systems is helpful when you want to know how an individual machine is performing or whether it needs to be maintained, and the historic view of all that data makes predicting use for new jobs that much easier. 

Similarly, GPS, which has been around for a relatively long time, is another technology that’s becoming exponentially more important. Satellite tracking used to just show where a construction asset was. Now, multiple assets can be interconnected with other systems and tied to additional streams of information in a single interface for a holistic view that improves operations. 

Running a profitable construction company means having the right equipment, right materials and right people together on the job. The tools the industry has used to corral all these variables until now has served it well, but there’s so much more that it could be doing to give itself a more lucrative advantage. New technologies tethered to existing ones and the ability to crunch more data faster offers economies of scale that couldn’t be realized even five years ago.

It’s time for the construction industry to explore what’s possible beyond its comfort zone. The rest of the world is embracing accelerating technologies, and for an industry dedicated to building not to do the same would be to deny itself growth. 

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