Dive Brief:

• A recent Dodge Data & Analytics study on how various large construction project stakeholders — with $50 million or more in annual value — use and perceive building information modeling (BIM) revealed that 50% of trade contractors, construction managers and general contractors use BIM on more than half of all projects, according to the Engineering News-Record.
• The study found that while GCs and CMs use more in-house BIM than trade contractors, they greatly underestimated trade contractor use of BIM on projects at 14% when, in actuality, it is 57%. More than 90% of GCs and CMs said that trade contractor use of BIM on a project brings added value.
• The Dodge study found that BIM use reduced the need for requests for information during the building process and also resulted in fewer reportable safety incidents.

Dive Insight:

Trade contractors reported the biggest reduction in reportable safety incidents from their use of BIM. Dodge said this fact, combined with the advantages of technological improvements, indicates that trade contractors have the most to gain from using BIM. Contractors also reported that BIM provides at least 5% in cost reductions as well. Additionally, trade contractors were the most likely group to be motivated to use BIM at the encouragement of owners or clients.

BIM has quickly become the most significant and widely adopted new technology method employed in the construction industry. According to a Timetric Construction Intelligence Center (CIC) survey this month, the majority of construction industry respondents said they believe that BIM is the "future of the industry." 49% of respondents were already using BIM, while another 10% said they planned to utilize BIM within a year. However, the Timetric survey found that 82% of the survey participants who said they used BIM only used it on fewer than 25% of their projects. Cost savings and efficiencies were the primary drivers of BIM adoption for the Timetric respondents.

In June, Research and Markets reported that the international BIM market, led by the Asia-Pacific region, should reach $11.7 billion by 2022, a growth rate of 21.6% between 2016 and 2022. The study found that BIM is growing in all areas of construction around the world, and adoption — especially in Asia — has been driven by emerging BIM mandates, a thriving real estate market and acknowledgment by contractors and other industry player of the benefits of BIM.