October - 2019CONSTRUCTIONTECHREVIEW.COM9offs with 2D drawings. This was the birth of model-based estimating at Pepper, and it has grown to be our standard in just a little over a year. While BIM has become an industry standard for many general contractors, few, if any, are positioned like us to scale its use on any size project or to apply it throughout the life of the building.Our collaborative structure opened the door to other opportunities for innovation. Throughout 2017, VP of High Performance & Sustainability Susan Heinking, Software Architect Dang Do and I worked on the Pepper Building Performance Tool to quickly calculate the upfront construction cost impacts of different system selections, along with their associated long-term operational savings. Originally, we thought we would need a third-party developer, but when we realized that we would be paying to educate them on our idea and the process, we decided to take on the effort internally. We rolled out the Pepper High-Performance Tool in March of 2018, and we have used it to support countless jobs since. At Pepper, we're constantly evaluating how to best leverage resources. Sometimes that means working through relationships with vendors and partners. In June of 2018, we attended the BuiltWorlds Venture Conference in Chicago and showed our program to Jesse Devitte, General Partner at Building Ventures. Jesse provided great feedback, but the real value was the conversations that took place afterward. He introduced us to players on the tech side of our industry, and our conversations culminated with an investment in the Building Ventures Fund a few months later. There are real opportunities with start-ups in our industry, and we wanted exposure to those opportunities without having to make direct investments. While we have software developers on staff, we are not a software company, so we focus their initiatives and innovations on tools that make us a better builder. Sometimes opportunities overlap, as is the case with SmartVid.io, which is a software that can benefit Pepper Construction and was developed by a company in which the Building Ventures Fund invested. As such, we are piloting the program.Dedicating our resources to the Pepper Building Performance tool made sense because it was not capital intensive. Even though other trends, like modularization, have been around for decades, they require an incredible amount of upfront capital. Katerra has done a great job of shaking up the market; however, to position themselves, they created a different business model that is vertically integrated from developer/owner all the way down through trades and material suppliers. Locally, Skender is also making a play in the modular construction arena by opening a factory in Chicago. It's ambitious, and once they have perfected the process, we will look to them as a supplier of fully furnished rooms. Modularization can decrease costs and deliver projects faster, and just because we didn't manufacture the rooms does not mean we can't benefit from the process. The reason why modularization works for Katerra is the same reason our Building Performance tool has been successful for us. Innovation works when we pursue solutions that are both sustainable for our business and beneficial to our clients.
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