Apr 17 2015
On Center's Software's 2015 Construction Industry Survey found significant activity surrounding movement to cloud technologies, with integration, collaboration, communication and error reduction cited as critical drivers. Fully 31% of respondents indicated that they were planning on moving takeoff, estimating, and project management processes to the cloud within the next one to two years.
Respondents identified themselves as executives, managers, chief estimators, estimators and project managers. The nationally conducted survey was completed in March 2015 and received over 900 responses.
Minimizing costly project errors and rework ranked as some of the top concerns to 65% of respondents, reflecting what has historically been a bane of the industry. Correspondingly, 70% of respondents cited estimating and 82% cited takeoff as important areas to integrate. According to Cecilia Padilla, CEO of On Center Software, these concerns are interrelated:
"Collectively this data paints a picture of the struggle that today's construction professionals are having with yesterday's tools, and their concerns for mitigating costly errors through adoption of new technologies. The money made during estimating and takeoff can easily be lost in the field due to errors that occur when multiple sets of plans are maintained on various types of media. It would appear that the industry is banking on the inherent error reduction through the 'one truth transparency' of cloud technologies to solve these problems," says Padilla.
The survey found that 80% of respondents utilize a mobile device for bidding or managing projects, indicating that remote input and access to data is critical for today's construction industry. Additionally, the survey found that 50% of respondents who were planning to move to a cloud solution in the next one to two years felt that it was important for field and office teams to have the ability to collaborate in real time on projects.
"There is only one way that real time collaboration can happen without all parties being in the same room, and that's through the utilization of cloud based technologies. Interestingly, 31% of the industry plans on moving to the cloud, but over 75% have delineated a scenario that only the cloud can provide: a single source for all data. Technically this means an additional 40% of the industry wants the collaborative technology of the cloud, but doesn't realize it yet," says Angelo M. Castelli, Chief Operating Officer, On Center Software.