The Evolution of ITs Information to Innovation

the implementation at each construction site. An example would be the consolidation of invoicing, billing and has improved integrity of the system, by scanning the invoices, delivery notes and other key documents to be processed centrally in headquarters. This is both beneficial to us and our suppliers because it reduces the hassle and allows us to pay them much quicker. In fact, the implementation of EDS (e-Document Management System) allows various data collected from the construction site to be centralized and accessible where necessary, which saves a lot of time and effort in the manual collection of data that is prone to lost and theft without proper security systems in place. This is later on followed by the extension of KM (Knowledge Management) in place to ease sharing of experiences in the various projects involved. This effectively allows users to discover what was done in the past and use them as reference guide to manage new projects, especially unique situations that require sophisticated solutions without the need of reinventing the wheel.

Next, moving into an e-Invoicing solution by creating a digital invoice-based ecosystem will further improve the efficiency and effectiveness of payments involved. To add on to the context, technology has not only improved productivity across the corporation, but has also helped reduce wastage at construction sites. This saves companies substantial costs, and at the same time allowing them the opportunity to embrace and promote green practices. This is where the Virtual Design Construction (DC) was established using 3D modelling coupled with integrated logic applications to detect collision and sequence construction phase at zero imaginable error rates.

Another noticeable influence of IT is the emergence of mobile devices that has shifted the way people live their lives. People no longer respond from fixed work stations or are reachable at only specific hours of the day. Mobility as a concept has changed how people wish to stay connected at all times, breaking physical traditional barriers that limit the creativity of what a network truly means. Sensors for IoT devices have augmented the impact even further by changing the way how data is being captured in place of traditional or manual means which are prone to errors and discrepancies. With IoT Sensors, they can be placed in construction machines to gauge how they are behaving and control them remotely. Data captured will also be able to estimate the need for maintenance and perform predictive analysis over the tasks involved from various other heavy machineries simultaneously compiled into the Big Data engine.

For example, a bore pile machine with sensors in place could determine how deep the pile has gone into the ground and the condition of the soil. Such pieces of information are deemed critical in determining the necessary measures and instruments required to adjust the piling works accordingly and effectively. Statistical Data that is captured and stored via Cloud Solutions could also be utilised in performing predictive analysis over the time and resources needed to complete all the construction phases involved. Moreover, wastage has always been an issue in the construction industries due to insufficient and inappropriate estimates performed. Hence, we believe with Big Data and IoT, we could achieve better productivity by only spending adequate resources that prevent unnecessary wastage and save significant costs to the company.

Safety on the other hand, is regarded as the top most priority in construction sites. With Big Data coupled with IoT Sensors, we foresee that they could provide us with a better overview of the processes involved and potential concerns that could possibly occur across the construction sites with minimal man power efforts in monitoring via manual logs or journals. More often than not, these logs are not accurate and lack the ability of explaining what really happened. But with the sensors being placed at strategic areas, these could do a far better job in detecting what is really going on and consolidate them into meaningful form of information that is made readily available in real-time via Cloud solutions and mobile devices where key stakeholders could access them anywhere at any time, empowering them in making not just the right decisions, but timely ones as well.

In addition, we have also realised theimportance for IT in organisations to start embracing the concept of what Gartner has introduced as “Bimodal IT” – two distinct modes of practices with one mode focusing on Stability (Traditional and Sequential) and the other mode on Agility (Exploratory and Innovation). With this approach, it addresses the fundamental and at the same time, the massive change in technology against the existing business processes involved in order to transform businesses to the next level.