A GUIDE FOR CAPITAL CONSTRUCTION
5 SIGNS IT ’S TIME TO UPDATE YOUR SOFTWARE SOLUTION
FROM 2020 TO 2022, CONSTRUCTION TECHNOLOGY INVESTMENTS INCREASED TO $50 BILLION—AN 85% INCREASE OVER THE PREVIOUS THREE YEARS.
CONSTRUCTION IS SPEEDING UP
Owners and contractors have embraced technology’s potential to help them manage scope, control costs, and maintain schedules. Construction is an industry that understands the power of innovation—otherwise, we would still dig foundations by hand and manage every construction process with a spreadsheet and a whiteboard. Today, behind every capital construction project is a collection of software powering the planning, collaboration, and staggeringly complex execution processes. But look more closely, and you’ll see aging applications nearing their end of life.
Software comes with a lifecycle. Organizations grow, and customers evolve—and so must their software. In the new digital-first future, organizations must assess their toolkits to determine whether those processes and solutions fit their aspirations.
And the timing couldn’t be better. In 2016, McKinsey identified construction as the second-least digitized industry, behind only agriculture and hunting. Despite its long-standing reputation as a digital laggard, our industry is doing its best to change that narrative. From 2020 to 2022, construction technology investments increased to $50 billion—an 85% increase over the previous three years. IT budgets continue to grow, and industry leaders are showing greater interest in emerging technologies like AI and machine learning.
This handbook can help construction leaders determine just that. The following pages highlight five of the leading indicators that it’s time for your organization to retire your legacy software solutions and make the leap to a digital-first toolkit.
MOORE’S LAW AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR CONSTRUCTION
Coined by Intel founder Gordon E. Moore, Moore’s Law is an observation of how technology continues to evolve exponentially. Moore’s Law states that the number of transistors on a single computer chip doubles every two years—a trend that has held every two years since 1965. In summary, this means that technology has an exponential cycle of getting more powerful and more efficient faster than most of us would assume. This trend empowers growth markets like artificial intelligence and machine learning just as quickly as it does the latest smartphone.Generally speaking, Moore’s Law refers to the speed and exponential growth of innovation. Technology is changing—and fast. For construction organizations, Moore’s Law emphasizes the need to maintain relevant technologies and explains the rapid evolution of toolsets in recent years.
Photo: Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation