The purpose of this document is to outline the background, objectives and activities of the opensource.construction initiative. It is intended to create a common understanding for everyone supporting the initiative as active member and/or partner.
Open source software has become a key innovation engine and enables enormous leaps forward in the technology industry, changing and enriching our lives in many ways. Even the largest and most financially powerful technology companies in the world are taking advantage of open source software and freely accessible data sources. Driven by this success, open source has become a movement and a way of working that goes beyond software production. The “open” movement uses the values and decentralised production model of open source software to find new ways to solve problems in different communities and industries.
"Open source isn't about saving money, it's about doing more stuff and getting continuous innovation with the finite budget you have." Jim Whitehurst, former President of IBM and CEO of Red Hat
The construction industry is characterised by numerous small and medium-sized companies that operate locally with standard systems but individual processes. 90% of architecture and engineering offices have less than 10 employees, 62% of construction companies have less than 50 employees. Most companies have little to no budget for research and development - certainly not for the development of digital solutions. Broadly speaking, the industry has…
- … a learning problem: Stakeholders find it difficult to adapt to new trends / technologies.
- … an innovation problem: The landscape is characterised by closed ecosystems within companies and within software tools, which prevents innovation (and start-ups) from scaling.
- … a collaboration problem: The “not invented here” syndrome is a real issue. In terms of digitalisation efforts, many companies still operate in competition rather than collaboration mode.
Looking closer, all things related to digital solutions or data strategies do not have an easy standing in the industry:
- Most decision makers do not have a background in software engineering or similar, so purchasing decisions or long-term digital strategies are a pain.
- Costs for licences are rising, fuelled by a hard vendor-lock in.
- Overpromising on efficiency gains in the past with digital solutions cause hesitation. In addition, it is very cumbersome to adapt existing solutions to individual needs.
- Attracting tech talent is difficult. The traditional value creation process of most companies is not digital. Hiring and leading software engineers within these organisations is not an easy undertaking.
At the same time, all organisations are under pressure to a) participate in digital workflows with external partners, b) optimise their processes to stay competitive and c) commit to the grown expectations regarding transparency and sustainability from their clients.
Although the idea of decentralisation and especially continuous innovation would match perfectly with the structure of the industry, there are only a few domain specific open source or open data projects. At the same time, there is momentum building up. It is fueled by projects like IfcOpenShell, BlenderBIM, speckle and ThatOpenCompany, to name just a few. This momentum is also supported by increasing efforts in the public sector to prefer open source solutions, aptly summarised with the hashtag #publicmoneypubliccode.
Nonetheless, challenges for open source projects include the following:
- Lack of resources for marketing their solutions: Marketing is crucial to increase visibility and attract contributors as well as sponsors who financially support the efforts.
- Missing understanding from clients of how to interact with open source business models: Organisations are not used to open innovation models in the realm of digital solutions. Software is still only approached from two directions: Either a solution is built in one's own silo or a product is bought "off the shelf". Also, allocating resources to open source solutions instead to internal, closed projects is not a common concept yet.
- Lack of resources for integrating os solutions in tech stack / contributing to os solutions: Many companies simply do not yet employ software engineers. This is why building up on existing solutions or contributing to them is often hardly possible.
“Our mission is to accelerate the change towards a more open and innovative construction industry.”
In general, the initiative aims to promote open ecosystems, open standards, open software and generally more code-driven projects in the real estate and construction industry.
Specifically, the initiative aims at the following objectives:
- Access to technology is simplified for AECO professionals
- “Digital sustainability” becomes a driver for digitalisation efforts
- Organisations are empowered to move from passive to active players in the digital transformation
In detail: Access to technology is simplified for AECO professionals Typically, people in AECO do not have a software engineering background. Without a more profound understanding of what is possible and what is best practice in developing digital processes and tools, a lot of energy is wasted in current transformation projects. The objective is to create low-threshold connections between AECO and tech professionals and to enable smooth know-how transfer. This way, IT-related topics can be discussed in a friendly environment with open-minded people, where there are no wrong questions and people can learn from each other, even as non-coders.
In detail: “Digital sustainability” becomes a driver for digitalisation efforts The real estate and construction industries are fragmented, companies operate on low margins and a typical project involves 80 companies. While some big players are moving forward and developing cutting-edge frameworks, they rely on collaboration with the rest of the companies involved: no digital workflows without partners. According to the principle of “digital sustainability”, digital knowledge goods (data, content, software) must be created and made accessible so that they create the greatest possible benefit for everyone involved in typical construction projects. Only then, the industry can move forward on ambitious goals regarding sustainability and costs.
In detail: Organisations are empowered to move from passive to active players in the digital transformation Today, many organisations are passive and wait until a standard is released to move on. Tomorrow, they become more proactive and start to build small solutions that they can immediately use. Ideally, they do this not in their silo but in the open and do things different than today: open source = collaboration with a business case. The objective is that open source business models become more common and more companies start to develop infrastructure together with a clear understanding of specifications, delimitations and investments.
The initiative addresses three target groups:
- “Non-digital” decision makers from architecture and engineering offices, construction companies, operators, developers as well as public and private clients.
- Existing and aspiring coders from the industry and academia.
- Open source projects from the industry and academia.
The intended added value is as follows:
“Non-digital” decision makers can …
- learn about latest tech trends
- grow their tech stack in an open way
- find talent
- connect with startups and integrators in an open way
A growing number of open source projects can …
- promote their solutions
- find contributors and supporters
- collaboratively inform non-tech stakeholders about the advantages of open source
A growing number of coders can …
- exchange with other like minded people
- learn from leaders
- connect with leading companies
- establish new business models in the open source domain (e.g. the „integrator business model“)
To get started, activities are focused on three core themes:
- Communication: Insights & Understanding
- Events: Learn & Connect
- Project Facilitation: Start & Support
In detail: Communication
The website and social media channels provide easy access for anyone to learn about open source and its potential for the construction industry. Key features:
-
Learning resources
- Texts & links about Open Source
- Project stories (focus on AECO organisations)
-
Tech Radar
- Open Source-Landscape (repository organised along the construction value chain, three categories of maturity, including mapping of selected AECO organisations that work with these solutions)
- Tech stories (focus on OS projects and on the people behind the projects)
-
Blackboard / ask.opensource.construction (tbd)
- Simple way for AECO organisations to pose questions around os in general but also individual challenges Community / sounding board gives feedback
In detail: Events
In 2024, events will be our key driver to improve the visibility of open source solutions in the construction industry. opensource.construction organises its own events to facilitate the exchange between AECO and tech professionals.
- Hackathon
- OS conference
In detail: Project Facilitation
A planning office wants “to grow out of Excel”. An organisation wants to better understand the potential of open source for specific digital challenges. But where to start? We connect AECO organisations with existing solutions and software engineers that help solve your problems the open way. Access to funding opportunities is also highlighted. Expert-Pools: CH-Open, Data Innovation Alliance + solution providers
Examples: Bauteilkatalog OpenMaterialData OpenCDE Gemeinwerk Drilling Data to Geometry
In the first phase, it's all about creating awareness for the innovation potential of open source for non-digital stakeholders in the construction industry. Through the planned activities, we reach out to the public and build a community.
If successful, further consolidation can be achieved. One idea is to create something like a public "OSPO" LINK for the construction industry. Further ideas are to setup a working group at the Eclipse Foundation or an Innovation Booster at Innosuisse to facilitate the development of innovation projects in the realm of open source.
- 3 additional partner onboarded
- Hackathon financed
- Core team established (min 5 people)
My constant worry is about duplication of efforts that slows collective impact. We should all be working on things that are additive and build on foundational solutions when they exist to make much needed innovation happen in the construction industry. As an architect and computational designer I was used to create things from scratch and I loved it. But I had to pivot in the past, when I learned the hard way that all innovation that I brought into a company was halted when I left – no one picked up on my badly documented code. When we started with our software company, I learned about how many open source libraries and components we used to build the infrastructure of our product. Unfortunately, almost all domain specific topics had to be build from scratch – what an unnecessary burden for innovators! Maximilian Vomhof, Initiator of opensource.construction
This is the motivation that led to the foundation of opensource.construction. It all started with a small event in Zurich and the setup of a website in November 2022. In 2023, we organized further events with in total more than 200 visitors and brought together an online community of more than 750 people.
All this was made possible by the generous sponsorship of Swiss Property and it's CEO Johannes May as well it's CTO Markus Steinbrecher.
To scale impact from the beginning, we started to look out for existing initiatives. Guided by the idea to actively bridge the gap between AECO and tech people, the focus was to add a tech driven puzzle piece to existing organisations in the construction industry (like BuildingSmart etc.). Therefore we decided to look out for organisations in the ICT sector. With CH Open, we found a great place to start.
Consequently, opensource.construction is organised as a working group of CH Open to keep the overhead small. With over 350 member companies, CH Open has been promoting open source software and open standards in Switzerland for 40 years – it is the perfect partner organisation to assist us on our journey to a more open construction industry.
CH-Open also provides the necessary infrastructure to run all financials and further organisational topics.
Swiss Property's subsidiary company vyzn is a premium member of CH-Open, which enables access to the infrastructure of the organisation.
In the first phase, opensource.construction is run by motivated individuals (= core team).
The team meets in monthly meetings, which are open to the public. The agenda for these meetings is as follows:
- introduction of new members / guests if applicable
- Communication
- Tech radar (at least one new entry every month, one tech story every month)
- Project stories (one story every month)
- General updates to website (maintenance like SEO optimisation and content management)
- Events
- Update to planned events
- Outlook to upcoming opportunities
- Project Facilitation
- new project requests, Updates on "Blackboard"
- Budget
- Update to budget and potential new partnerships
Core members are encouraged to participate in the monthly meetings.
Every core member takes over responsibility for at least one topic on the agenda.
The main costs in 2024 are the events. The goal is for every event to be self-supporting through individual event partners. Further costs like website hosting, maintenance and costs for individual aperos are covered through additional sponsorships.
Core members have the following benefits:
- direct access to a community of forward thinking people
- place topics from their own organisation directly in the discussion
- simplified access to potential partners / clients
- exponential learning curve in topics ranging from tech through facilitation to business cases through hands on experiences
At present, the core team is made up of the following people:
- Co-Lead Zurich: Maximilian Vomhof
- Co-Lead Zurich: Markus Steinbrecher
- Co-Lead Copenhagen: Christian Kongsgaard
- Member Zurich: Thorben Westerhuys (tbd)
- Member Zurich: Karel van Eechoud (tbd)
- further members are always welcome to join.
Core members are supporting the initiative with their time. Their organisations are encouraged to either partner in one of the events or become a member of CH Open to support the activities of the iniative financially.
Partner organisation can choose to support the initiative in three ways:
- as an active partner. Full package, full visibility on the website and in social media content + one (or more) seat in the core team.
- as an event partner. Primary supporting individual events with tailored packages depending on the occasion.
- as a passive partner. Visible on the website with logo, portrait and further social media content.