'Smart construction' is the keyword generating the most buzz in the construction industry lately. In this post, we'll look at what smart construction is and the background behind its emergence. Smart construction is a concept that fuses the latest ICT—such as drones, big data, AI, and IoT—with traditional civil engineering and building technologies in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Major smart construction technologies currently in use or expected to be used in the near future include BIM design, drone surveying, IoT-based construction management, and modularization. Smart construction has emerged as the most important issue for the global construction industry because smart construction technology is almost the only way to solve the industry's long-standing problems of low productivity and low profitability.
The construction industry accounts for 13% of global GDP and grows 3.6% annually, yet its productivity grows at just 1% per year—a serious situation compared with the 3.6% seen in manufacturing. Its profitability is also a mere 4.4%, very low compared with other industries.
Convergence with ICT—that is, smart construction—is being cited as the way to transform the construction industry's productivity and profitability. Reports show that the level of digitalization is proportional to productivity growth, yet construction ranks at the very bottom in digitalization across all industries; the only industries less digitalized than construction are agriculture and hunting. Against this backdrop, advanced countries led by the United States are increasingly adopting smart construction technologies to transform the industry, and the Korean government, too, established a 'Smart Construction Technology Roadmap' last year to prepare for the rapidly approaching smart construction era. As one of the roadmap's implementation measures, a Smart Construction Support Center has been established at the Korea Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology to actively support promising smart construction startups. Notable smart construction startups include Carta, which develops a drone data platform for construction; Advo, which builds mini-homes and booths using modular precast concrete techniques; and Firebuster, which develops smart fire prevention and disaster solutions. Next week, we'll explore what kinds of smart construction technologies exist.
