Table 1

Representative Building Information Modeling Implementations in Different Countries

Country

Description

Finland

Approximately 33% of architects and engineers were using BIM applications according to a 2007 survey; no case studies or other surveys of Finnish engineering firms have been conducted to date to the authors' knowledge (Wong, Wong & Nadeem, 2010). The major adopters of BIM include VTT. Building information modeling guidelines are being formulated with industry-wide support and collaboration (Wong et al., 2010).

Norway

The Norwegian Homebuilders' Association has encouraged the adoption of BIM industry wide; the major adopter of BIM at present is SINTEF (Wong et al., 2010).

Denmark

More than a third (35%) of the architectural firms surveyed in 2008 were using Architectural Desktop, followed by Archicad, Revit and Bentley Architecture (Wong et al., 2010).

Sweden

No official mandate for BIM implementation exists and the main drivers are the "Big Three" construction giants; however, there are signs that Traffikverket may be ready to require BIM for infrastructure projects (Around the world with BIM, 2012).

Singapore

This is the only country in Southeast Asia that has implemented BIM to any extent (Wong et al., 2010).

India

An architectural firm that stands out among the crowd by virtue of their progressive outlook and relatively advanced implementation of BIM in a country where most architects are still using AutoCAD and construction is still very much paper-based is InFORM Architects, a 40-member architectural firm in Bangalore. According to a recent article ("A Case Study of BIM Implementation in India"), the company selected Revit, an Autodesk product, as their application of choice with outstanding results: "Its work is critically acclaimed and has won several national design awards as well as design competitions." At present, just over half (55%-60%) of the design projects at InFORM Architects are completed with the Autodesk Revit application. According to the case study, "This includes all the new projects; older ones that are already under construction continue to be on CAD .The firm is committed to expanding this number to over 85% of its projects, so that the majority of its work is done in Revit" (a Case Study of BIM Implementation in India," 2012, p. 3). The case study cites a number of constraints to the implementation of BIM, including:

* Resistance from some staff members concerning the ability of the BIM system to "deliver the goods": The transition from AutoCAD to Revit did face resistance initially -- there was skepticism regarding the ability to deliver smoothly, to address complex design issues, timelines, and the desired quality of output" (a Case Study of BIM Implementation in India," 2012, p. 3).

* in addition, the authors cite a dearth of time available for training on the new Revit systems during a period when the company was busy with other projects using its conventional CAD applications: "Also, the lack of time to update Revit skills while working on projects was a major challenge."

The company overcame these constraints to efficient implementation by investing the resources needed to facilitate the transition, including assigning a full-time architect to the project. According to the case study, "To make the transition easier, InFORM Architects employed a dedicated BIM consultant who was also an architect -- she went about systematically organizing the work flow and, at the same time, helped in the modeling and creation of construction documents for the first 'model' project." Building on the success of this initial project, staff members became sufficiently convinced to use BIM in their own new projects. In this regard, the case study notes that, "Successful implementation of this encouraged the adoption of BIM on other projects. Training sessions to bridge the learning gaps, as well as in-house presentations show-casing the designs done with BIM, helped in motivating entire teams to shift to Revit" (a Case Study of BIM Implementation in India," 2012, p. 4).

United States

DPR Construction operates from 17 offices across the country and the company has deployed BIM applications in all of them to good effect. Although the transition to BIM is not discussed,...

It is also axiomatic that the validation of any strategy will require measuring the effect that an intervention has on the targeted phenomenon. In this case, the validation of the BIM strategy will be based on historic industry performance data, but this data must be interpreted with respect to the constraints to implementation noted above, as well as the time needed for any substantive change initiative to have an effect on organizational performance and the bottom line. There is also the need to factor in the costs of initial as well as the ongoing training that is needed to use BIM systems effectively while "wringing efficiencies out of the learning organization." Finally, it is reasonable to conclude that the state-of-the-art BIM technologies that exist today will be supplanted by even more powerful rendering tools in the future, and the costs associated with training high-paid professionals may be wasted to the extent that new modeling tools are more intuitive while providing even more robust results without the need for training. Despite these constraints and considerations, it is clear that companies that are using BIM today are modeling the way for other construction sector companies that want to achieve a competitive advantage in an increasingly competitive marketplace.
Conclusion

The research showed that one of the most promising three-dimensional rendering tools available to the construction sector today is building information modeling. These applications were shown to be especially useful in helping multidisciplinary design teams collaborate on existing projects as well as providing valuable benchmark and building characteristic data storage that can be used for future projects. The research also showed that these desirable outcomes are especially need during a period when Libya is experiencing a building boom, but a number of obstacles to industry-wide deployment remain in place. Nevertheless, the recent trends in the rate of uptake in other countries indicates that building information modeling represents current industry best practices and companies seeking to gain access to this burgeoning market would be well advised to investigate the suitability of BIM technologies.