Over the past 25 years, nearly every industry has doubled its productivity rate, while the construction sector has remained stagnant.
According to PWC, construction companies "are still using paper-based processes that can only be described as archaic." McKinsey, in turn, states that construction firms "have been operating the same way since the 1940s."
This enormous development gap can be interpreted as a tremendous opportunity. Let me explain why.
When the construction industry begins to invest heavily in technology, the efficiency gains will be enormous — proportional to today's inefficiencies.
Simply by adopting digital solutions in corporate development projects, according to the Boston Consulting Group, savings could reach $1.2 trillion. When it comes to operational processes, cost reductions could amount to $500 million per year.
In other words, the greater the investment in technology, the greater the gains from cost reductions in both design and execution.
All the more so because, on the other end, construction startups — known as ConstruTechs — are growing at an exponential rate. In the first quarter of 2018 alone, more than $1 billion was invested in these companies.
These are companies working with Drones, 3D Printing, Big Data, Augmented Reality, Artificial Intelligence, Sensors, Robotics, and other innovative technologies.
The industry's watchword is innovation — which, combined with efficiency, will generate extraordinary results given the magnitude of the opportunity ahead.
However, just as has happened in other industries that have already gone through this "technological turning point," only companies that understand this quickly and seize the opportunities will succeed in the near future.
For those that ignore this global wave of digital transformation, not a stone will be left standing.
The Chinese case
With most hospitals at full capacity, the Chinese had to act faster than ever to contain the global epidemic while a definitive cure had yet to be found.
They had to build a new hospital in record time to relieve pressure on existing facilities and contain potential new cases.
Unfortunately, this is not the reality in Brazil, where hospitals, train lines, and various other types of construction can be delayed by decades.
Fortunately for the Chinese, things were different in China.
With a plan that would be utopian for most countries, the Chinese set out to build a new hospital in just 10 days. And they succeeded.
The inauguration of the Huoshenshan hospital, with one thousand beds, was announced eight days after construction began.
And as if that were not impressive enough, it was soon announced that a second emergency hospital, with 1,500 beds, would also be built on an expedited basis in the region to treat coronavirus patients.
How did they achieve such efficiency? The answer is straightforward:
Advanced construction technologies in China make it possible to carry out short-term emergency projects.
In the case of the first hospital, those in charge of the project used blueprints from the Xiaotangshan hospital, built in 2003 to treat patients during the SARS outbreak — another epidemic virus that caused hundreds of deaths in the country. As a result, the entire design phase was bypassed.
With the hospital blueprints already available, it was simply a matter of feeding the project into the system that integrates all factory equipment and initiating high-speed production.
Today, China is one of the world leaders in smart factories, where technologies such as robotics, 5G, and the Internet of Things, among others, are used to increase production efficiency.
Technology for the construction sector is transforming the industry not only in China, but across all global innovation hubs. The problem is that many companies in this market in Brazil are not even aware of these developments.
Can you imagine what you could do in your business or your work if you knew how to apply innovations like these?
Source: Startse