MAY - JUNE 2022CONSTRUCTIONTECHREVIEW.COM9Robotics for safety, wellbeing and productivityRobotics has already revolutionised industries like manufacturing and mining, creating efficiencies and augmenting the existing worker to make their experience at work faster, easier and safer. In the UK, Laing O'Rourke is working with project teams, trialling `cobot' technology to improve worker safety, wellbeing and productivity through a UK-based research and development initiative. The cobots assist in laying rebar reinforcements, achieving a 30% improvement in rebar laying activities, at the same time drastically improving ergonomic experience for our workers. In our Australian Hub, we have also seen the potential for robotics and machine learning technology to enhance safety on our worksites. Our industry-leading vision detection and machine learning system, the ToolBox Spotter has been designed to eliminate people, plant, and infrastructure accidents, though `seeing' objects, and communicate potential risks in real-time. ToolBox Spotter has been spun-out to portfolio company, Presien to continue to support the safety of our people. We are excited about the potential of this technology to enhance the safety performance of our industry that has a historically higher rate of injury.Delivering value through data analyticsLaing O'Rourke is increasingly looking at ways to interpret the huge undercurrent of data we capture, unlock key insights and use them to drive better decision making as a business for our clients, people and the community. We see huge potential to use our data to make better decisions and are adopting this forensic approach across our projects. In our Europe hub we have partnered with a UK-based start-up that use artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to improve our planning and schedule certainty.We see very real potential for this type of approach to create more realistic plans to our clients, thereby increasing confidence in our capacity to deliver of time and on budget, something our industry does not have a strong reputation for.We are excited about the potential for new technologies to help us overcome some of the significant challenges facing our sector and our broader community. Our experience investing in new technology, coupled with our focus on the development of our people mean we are well placed to deliver projects with the certainty our clients deserve. QUICK BYTESAccording to a study by Research and Markets, the global building information modelling (BIM) market will reach $11.7 billion by 2022, growing at a compound yearly growth rate of 21.6 percent between 2016 and 2022. Due to increased building activity and the push of BIM regulations, the Asia-Pacific region will see the most growth in demand .SOURCE: snaptrude
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