NBS publishes latest BIM survey
The 2016 NBS National BIM Survey, now in its sixth year, shows a construction industry that is BIM positive but not BIM ready. The survey was published just before the Government mandate requiring the implementation of BIM at Level 2 on all centrally procured public-sector projects came into effect on 4 April.
This year’s survey shows the industry’s current adoption of BIM at 54%, up from 48% last year. 86% of those respondents who are aware of BIM expect to be using it by this time next year and 97% within five years.
In a further boost to the Government’s BIM strategy, 73% of those surveyed agreed that BIM is the future of project information in construction, and 75% agreed that they were clear that they needed to use BIM for public-sector work.
However, in terms of being ‘BIM ready’, 41%, said that they were not clear on what they have to do to comply with the BIM mandate. 28% feel they lack skills and knowledge, describing themselves as ‘not very’ or ‘not at all’ confident when it comes to BIM.
57% believe BIM will help to halve the overall programme, from inception to completion, for new-build and refurbished assets. In addition, 63% agreed that BIM will help deliver the targeted reduction of a third in the initial cost of construction and the whole life cost of built assets.
For this to happen, the survey suggests more needs to be done to generate greater collaboration and ensure BIM is not restricted to the design stage. 37% of construction professionals said they had used BIM models from the start of a project to its very end, but only 16% had passed on a model to those responsible for the management of a building.
There was also widespread agreement (65%) that BIM is not yet standardised enough, with fewer people overall using the standards that have been created than have adopted BIM.
Most BIM users (70%) are of the opinion that clients will ‘increasingly insist’ upon it, with 64% agreeing that adopting BIM had given them competitive advantage.
Of those yet to be converted to BIM, 55% expressed concern that they will be ‘left behind’ if they don’t adopt. Half of this number felt BIM was too expensive to consider at this moment in time, a response consistent with previous years’ findings where cost has been identified as a barrier to increased BIM adoption.
Commenting on this year’s survey Adrian Malleson, head of research, analysis and forecasting at NBS, said, ‘Overall, the findings suggest that the Government’s strategy seems to be working and that its BIM mandate for publicly-funded work will go on to influence work in the private sector.’
