Build Digital Hosts First Annual Conference
The first Annual Conference of the Build Digital Project took place on Wednesday, 26 October 2022 and showcased the project's progress in the first year of a five-year project.
This hybrid event was held in four locations throughout the country: Dublin, Cork, Galway, and Waterford, while also live-streamed to over 100 delegates.
Minister Michael McGrath of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform spoke about the progress being made by the Build Digital Project.
“Since November last year, the Build Digital project has made significant progress, despite many challenges. I am happy to see the Build Digital team with 58 industry experts, across the five important pillars of (1) Digital Leadership & Cultural Change, (2) Digital Standards, (3) Digital Education and Training, (4) Digital Procurement, and (5) Sustainability and Circular Economy. The Build Digital Project is driving innovation which is supporting the delivery of Project Ireland 2040, strengthening the sector’s capability to meet national, EU, and international sustainability and circular economy targets. The project is a collaboration between Government, industry, and academia, with a strong focus on meeting the needs of SMEs, suppliers and clients“
The event was opened with an Address from the Industry Lead Pat Lucey, who spoke about
“The Build Digital Project presents a unique opportunity for positive change in construction; collaboration is embedded at all levels, the deliverables are reviewed annually to ensure alignment with the project objectives and critically, it has the certainty of grant funding for five years. Success will be measured by how it contributes to solving real problems and lead to increased digital adoption in the construction sector. I’d like to see increased involvement from industry and through that greater involvement maximise the benefits of this opportunity.”
PJ Rudden, Chair of the Construction Sector Group (CSG) Innovation and Digital Adoption Sub-Group, presented on Supporting Innovation and Capacity Building in the Construction Industry with 7 Priority Actions.
“Priority Action 7 is the Build Digital Project to digitize the construction industry using Building Information Modelling (BIM). The DPER funding through Grant Agreement was set up earlier this year with the project awarded to TU Dublin and CitA supported by ATU, MTU, SETU and UCD. A country-wide baseline survey has just been completed across the industry to establish the current degree of digitization and to build on that in terms of Leadership, Standards, Training and Procurement pillars.”
Build Digital Project Director, Dr Clare Eriksson spoke about the strength of the collaborative partnership of bringing together Government, Industry and Academia to deliver the Build Digital Project's objective of delivering increased digital adoption across the entire Irish construction and built environment sector.
Other presentations that followed included:
Project Lead Robert Moore, Project Director Clare Eriksson (TU Dublin), Pillar Chairs Ted McKenna (MTU), Barry McAuley (TU Dublin), Ken Thomas (SETU), Alan Hore (TU Dublin) and James O'Donnell (UCD)
Industry speakers were: Aonghus O'Keeffe (Roughan O'Donovan), Stephen Foley (Collen Construction), Aidan Bermingham (Irish Rail), Sarah Ingle (ACEI), Bernard Pierce (HSE Estates), Janet Lynch (ARUP), Eileen Faherty (Modula)