Author: Constructech Editors
Steven Gross, vice president of client solutions, Computer Guidance Corp., recently took time out of his busy schedule to catch up with Constructech Editorial Director Peggy Smedley to talk about the importance customer environments, the value of workflows, and how emerging technology solutions are impacting construction. Peggy Smedley: What are some of the biggest needs in the construction industry today? (Steven Gross): Efficient and integrated capture of critical information from the field. This information should only be entered once, it must be captured on a timely basis, and be subjected to the necessary controls to ensure accuracy. It should then…
“I’m sorry, Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that.” –HAL 9000, 2001: A Space Odyssey When Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick co-wrote the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, artificial intelligence was about 90% science fiction and 10% hopeful experiments. Then, they projected that AI (artificial intelligence) would require a vast computer and database on board the space probe taking a crew to Jupiter; in 2024, AI is resident on a handheld smartphone and needs a connection to the vast database known as the internet. And, as Shakespeare wrote, therein lies the rub. In the film and subsequent novel,…
By now, most people should understand the risks of being complacent with cyber protection—something widely discussed in last month’s featured article. Cybersecurity Ventures reports cybercrime will cost victims $9.5 trillion worldwide in 2024 and rise to $10.5 trillion by 2025. As enterprises continue to move toward total digitization, cyber threat actors see additional devices and systems as new opportunities to enter a network. Like chess, the challenges of cybersecurity are knowing your vulnerabilities and the strengths of your opponents. And, like chess, they change each move. A weak point is found and exploited, that causes a response by repairing the weakness.…
The Trifecta of Threats The construction industry is facing a trifecta of economic forces in 2024, making it difficult for owners to get their projects off the ground, let alone complete them efficiently and profitably. Soaring inflation is eroding budgets and profit margins; increased interest rates are making financing more expensive; and persistent supply-chain disruptions are causing shortages and delays in obtaining critical materials. According to Dodge Construction Network’s latest report, many projects aren’t even getting started because of these rough economic factors. Dodge states total construction starts declined 1% in March, marking the second consecutive month of contraction driven…
The 1930s radio vigilante The Shadow had the “power to cloud men’s minds so they can’t see him.” Today, we have computer villains who adopt the same approach, clouding a computer’s “mind” so they are invisible and can operate in the shadows. They are called hackers. What is needed, then, is a comparable hero, a Shadow, that can fight the evil at its own level. It is known as cybersecurity. And the war has been ongoing for decades, each side winning some and losing some battles, technology shifting from one side to the other, success one day replaced by failure…
Technology continues to play a key role in the construction industry and the adaptation of new innovative technologies continues to accelerate. Today’s ERP (enterprise-resource planning) solutions must step up to the plate to reduce costs, increase productivity, support smarter business decisions, automate manual labor-intensive processes, reduce risks, and facilitate communication among project stakeholders. The Value of a Dynamic ERP: Data An ERP continues to be the foundation of commercial constructors’ technology stack. A cloud-based, web-based ERP solution delivers an integrated approach where all stakeholders can access invaluable business information anywhere, anytime, and on demand to view status, predict future outcomes,…
We read a lot about the IoT—the Internet of Things—and how it can be beneficial to companies and people in general. But what constitutes IoT in today’s world? From the basic, home-based IoT environment to the large, nation-wide IoT architecture, the major elements are easily recognized. How common is IoT? In 2021, Walmart said it managed about 1.5 billion messages from IoT devices daily. In particular, the company uses the IoT to help maintain food in refrigerators and coolers and plan in-store maintenance needs. And that’s one company. For a device to be a part of the IoT, at minimum a few…
Autonomous vehicles, self-driving cars for example, are in the news a lot lately, not always in a positive way. San Francisco, which was a pioneer testbed for them has pulled some of them off the streets. Cruise, a division of General Motors, and Waymo, a subsidiary of Google’s parent company Alphabet, have been running robo-taxis on the streets of San Francisco for several years. Cruise and Waymo expanded operations to all the city in 2023 with Cruise claiming 300 autonomous cars running during the day and 100 at night; Waymo had 250 cars on the streets. But in August the…
The construction industry is getting connected with the rise of new equipment and technologies that enable data to assist in helping on the job. Last year, Counterpoint Technology Market Research suggested it expects the connected construction machinery market to see an annual growth rate of 11% in the next eight years. While this certainly can vary widely—some connected solutions are factory-direct while others are aftermarket—the benefits are significant for the construction industry. Consider the example of the INSIGHT Mixer System from Revolution Concrete Mixers. From Auto Load at the plant to System Washout after the delivery, INSIGHT Mixer System gives…
We have witnessed technologies change our world and even some technologies that have dominated our discussions this past year or so. Most popular has been AI (artificial intelligence), the AI that everyone talked about in 2023, which was covered in Part 1. Another “A” buzzword is AR (augmented reality) and VR (virtual reality) and its massive cousin, the metaverse. AR and VR have been around for a while in various forms, including video games, and we’ve covered them in Part 2. One technology that has been hyped heavily but hasn’t really made a strong appearance in practical applications is blockchain,…