Big Data – an opportunity to be grasped

Eduardo Niebles
01 October 2014

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Digital data should provide business advantage in Architecture and Engineering, says Eduardo Niebles, Managing Director, International Business, BST Global.

The volume of digital data is growing rapidly each year. 

In fact, it is thought the average person today processes more data in a single day than a person in the 1500s did in an entire lifetime. 

Everyone today is an active participant in the amassing and sharing of digital data, whether from tweets, blogs, and video, unstructured data from corporate systems, or the “Internet of Things.” The digital universe is expanding at a tremendous pace, creating new challenges and new opportunities for both individuals and businesses.

Using data is not new in the architecture, engineering and construction industry. However, what is new is the amount of data that is already available or capable of being captured in real time, and then translated directly to the planning process.

The current view in most executive meetings is that if you deploy “Big Data,” your company will generate new ways of uncovering organization capabilities, or create new value that will separate the company from the rest of its competitors. In general, the consensus is that Big Data is best applicable around business strategy and finance. 

But Big Data is much more than that. While certainly organisations will gain advantages by better understanding the data they have, Big Data is also about the integration of data to better understand the business, clients, and employees at a more discrete level.  

Take for example its use around smart cities. It is estimated that the world population will be 8.3bn by 2030 with 65M people added to the world’s urban population each year. That is equivalent to adding seven Chicagos or five Londons annually. 

Adopting an integrative approach will be important to meet the strain on power, water and food resources that urban populations will create. Architects, consultancies, planners, and urban designers need access to more data in order to design and manage cities that people will want to live in and prosper. Data will be key to designing a new way of life.  

Big Data can support the design and planning of smart cities through:

• Monitoring - analyse the data captured from sensors from homes, offices, and factories to determine how a city uses energy.
• Crowdsourcing - to capture and leverage data in real-time from citizens on how they commute or what spaces in a city or building they like the most (or least).
• Automation - to improve on the traditional project planning process.
• Transparency - Increase collaboration between government policy, clients, and contractors.

Using data is not new in the architecture, engineering and construction industry. However, what is new is the amount of data that is already available or capable of being captured in real time, and then translated directly to the planning process. 

Big Data is an opportunity. The planning of tomorrow’s cities will be reliant on information flow, and firms that are prepared to use the variety of data available are poised for success.

Eduardo A. Niebles is the Managing Director, International Business at BST Global, an international business management software and cloud solutions provider for the world’s leading Architectural, Engineering, and Environmental Consultancies.

Twitter: @eniebles

Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/eniebles