Dive Brief:

• The National Institute of Building Sciences has announced that Salla Eckhardt, Microsoft’s director of transformation services, will serve as chair of the National BIM Program Steering Committee.
• The announcement follows the kickoff of the U.S. National BIM Program in early February to discuss the need for a coordinated program to advance collaboration and innovation in the building industry. 
• Since 2018, according to LinkedIn, Eckhard has directed and managed the delivery of digital transformation strategy for the technology company’s Global Real Estate and Security division. Previous to Microsoft, she worked in VDC and technology-related roles at Seattle-area construction firms Hoffman Construction and Sellen Construction.

Dive Insight:

Eckhardt said she hopes to bridge industry innovators to create a U.S. National BIM Program that will unite the industry. “We need a standard that supports the entire digital building lifecycle from BIM-ready planning to BIM-based design and digital construction all the way to BIM as a component in built environment digital twins,” Eckhardt said in a release.

​The program’s next steps include establishing a governance structure to broadly engage diverse stakeholders through targeted workstreams and developing a business model for the initial three to five years, said Lakisha A. Woods, president and CEO of NIBS.

Earlier this month, NIBS joined more than 2,000 public sector representatives from 100 countries to form a Global BIM Network. The group aims to connect international public sector representatives, multilateral organizations and infrastructure funders to advance the digitalization of the global built environment.

“The construction industry is historically siloed, having to develop individually, what is essentially needed by all is inefficient,” Woods said in a statement. “While states and organizations have different practices and systems, the components of building an infrastructure are essentially the same. If we can use common processes and information structures, we can create and share them together. The same can apply globally to allow for shared expertise.”