In only a few months, the coronavirus pandemic has upended the daily lives of people around the world. Across the globe, companies are dealing with Covid-19 by mandating or encouraging employees to work from home. The virus has quite unintentionally triggered one of the greatest workplace revolutions in our lifetime, radically transforming the way we live, work and learn.

In Singapore, the Circuit Breaker rules have affected every sector of the economy and extended across whole industries. To comply with strict social distancing guidelines and enforced telecommuting, companies have been compelled to restructure their operations. The built environment industry is no exception.

In the third session of the BCA-SIA-ACES Webinar Series, Digitalisation Senior Manager Ms Marianne Amores of BCA and Mr Eugene Seah, Senior Director (Special Projects) of Surbana Jurong shared their expertise and experiences on how Integrated Digital Delivery (IDD) can be effectively leveraged in the current pandemic situation.   

Ms Marianne Amores discussing how IDD technologies can help mitigate workflow disruptions during a pandemic.

A “new normal” of working

The Covid-19 situation has severely disrupted workflow by halting interaction and collaboration across multiple stakeholders in the construction industry. Stop-work orders at project sites and enforced work from home rules have also frozen the physical exchange of data and information between project partners.

In light of this “new normal” of business activities, BCA’s push towards IDD under the Construction Industry Transformation Map (ITM) in the built environment sector has helped firms gain an advantage. IDD uses data and digital technologies to provide a single virtual platform for the entire construction value chain to deliver and manage a building project. This makes off-site collaboration for different project parties possible in a pandemic situation, explained Ms Amores.

IDD is built upon technologies like Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Virtual Design and Construction (VDC). BIM ensures a single shared data source while VDC provides the ability to perform virtual simulation and walk-throughs. This means all the different stakeholders across the value chain – developer, contractors, architects, engineers – can easily get on the same page.

In addition, digital tools and cloud-based platforms allow remote access to real-time data, providing opportunities for offsite collaboration and analysis. Having relevant, updated and accurate data also reduces errors and streamline workflows. Taken together, Ms Amores pointed out that digitalisation will enable industry players to flexibly and agilely adapt traditional work processes to new ways of working.

Mr Eugene Seah shared on Surbana Jurong’s experience in using digitalisation technologies to collaborate and work through the Covid-19 crisis.

Surbana Jurong’s IDD experience

Mr Seah then shared on Surbana Jurong’s experience of working in and through the crisis. Prior to the pandemic, the company has already been investing in innovative technologies for various aspects of its business. When Covid-19 hit, business continuity plans were activated.

Its early adoption of digitalisation allowed segregated teams to continue working through virtual meeting technologies like Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Skype. Project groups used the digital modelling capabilities of BIM to manage design and engineering information. Putting BIM on the cloud further allows complex project information to be accessed, discussed and revised at different stages of the project across different team members.

Mr Seah added that prior to the stop-work order, site managers could continue to monitor and supervise building sites remotely using cameras and even drones. These give project managers a thorough view of construction activities and operations regardless of the time of the day and conditions of site access. These remote monitoring capabilities came into good use when Surbana Jurong was tasked by the Singapore government to set up a community isolation facility at the Singapore Expo convention centre for recovering Covid-19 patients in just three days.

For the company, their early adoption of IDD has unexpectedly paid off in a big way in this coronavirus pandemic. As Mr Seah suggested, in trying times like this, investments in digital technologies have become a great differentiator and competitive advantage.

About the speakers

Ms. Marianne Amores is a Senior Manager for Digitalisation at BCA who developed the IDD Framework to guide industry partners in applying innovation and digital technologies.

Mr Eugene Seah is the Senior Director for Special Projects at Surbana Jurong and works on enhancing productivity in Design and Construction through Computational BIM, xR and other technologies. He is also a Green Mark professional and is knowledgeable in the field of sustainable buildings.