Hammers, Inspired Awards Take London, As BIM Mandate Looms

Hammers, Inspired Awards take London, As bIM Mandate Looms

Talented Tech Teams: Bentley's honorees (above) kicked off a month of celebrating innovative industry achievements.

by JOHN GREGERSON | Nov 24, 2015

All industry eyes in London have been on prizes this month, honoring cutting-edge tools intended to promote a better, more collaborative built environment, even as the UK's extraordinary BIM mandate nears. Last week, it was Construction Computing magazine's turn on stage as host of The Hammers, its annual program honoring the best in AEC tech solutions for the commercial, residential and infrastructure markets. Earlier in the month, software multinational Bentley Systems, Exton PA, hosted its own annual Year in Infrastructure Conference, which once again included a separate black-tie affair for the Be Inspired Awards, given only to Bentley users, but chosen by independent juries.

At the Bentley event, the host also announced that it had been named "a strategic partner for project delivery technologies" by AECOM, the Los Angeles-based infrastructure giant. Under the new enterprise service agreement, AECOM gets full access to all of Bentley’s mobile apps, cloud services, and other services including ProjectHub, a hybrid ProjectWise system developed in-house at AECOM and used by 20,000 users on thousands of projects worldwide. The partnership "supports our goals of mobilizing faster, reducing risk, and implementing the resourcing flexibility required to optimally staff our projects with our widespread domain expertise,” explained AECOM CIO Tom Peck. 

The Hammers made their own big news when BIM supplier Graphisoft of Waltham MA, won Company of the Year, breaking a four-year hold on the category by project management specialist Viewpoint Construction Software, Portland OR. Graphisoft also won BIM Product of the Year for its ARCHICAD 19 tool. But Viewpoint did not go home empty-handed, winning Collaboration of the Year for its Viewpoint for Projects, a comprehensive suite of software solutions to help contractors synchronize all areas of their business. It also won Mobile Technology of the Year for Field View, an iPad- and iPhone-compatible program that allows users to view job-to-date totals and track performance against budget on a daily basis.

In the category of Architectural Design Software of the Year, Bentley's multidisciplinary AECOsim Building Designer took top honors. Meanwhile, Adoddle, a suite of collaborative software from London-based Asite, won both Product of the Year and Cloud-Based Technology of the Year. “With the onset of the UK governments' BIM Level 2 mandate for April 2016, we are truly honored to receive these awards that clearly indicate [our] platform is streaks ahead of its competitors,” said Asite COO Nathan Doughty in accepting the award.

• Hungry for more awards coverage? Check out the latest from the Council on Tall Buildings.

Manchester, NH-based Newforma also went home a winner, with its Project Center claiming the award for Document and Content Management Software of the Year. And Dome Technology Ltd. won Collaboration Project of the Year for its work with Vastint at Strand East, a major regeneration project just south of the Olympic Park in Stratford. (For a list of all of the 2015 Hammers, click here.)

'Be Inspired'

Held a few weeks earlier, Bentley's Be Inspired Awards cited the achievements of 18 honorees from a roster of 54 finalists. All were evaluated by independent panels of industry experts. In all, the 2015 awards program drew more than 360 submissions from 66 countries.

Speaking before an audience of several hundred, Bentley CEO Greg Bentley said, “While our goal... is advancing infrastructure, we can only accomplish it through the vision, talent, and dedication of the architects, engineers, constructors, and operations professionals who creatively apply our technology (in) pursuit of effective strategies for achieving new levels of project and/or infrastructure asset performance... I applaud all of the project nominees for their contributions to improving quality of life around the globe.”

This year's Special Recognition Winners were honored in these categories:

Advancing Collaborative BIM

• Morphosis Architects – Bill & Melinda Gates Hall – (Ithaca, NY)

Advancing Comprehensive BIM “Playbooks”

• Hatch Ltd – Keeyask Hydroelectric Generating Station Project – (Nelson River, Manitoba, Canada)

Advancing Construction Modeling

• Jacobs – NAG Project – (Baytown, TX)

Advancing Information Mobility in Operations

• Western Power Distribution – EMU for iPad – (Exeter, UK)

Advancing Integrated Projects

• HDR – Union Station to Oak Cliff Streetcar TIGER Design-Build Project – (Dallas, TX)

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The 2015 "Be Inspired Awards", selected in 18 categories:

Innovation in Asset Performance Management

• SA Water – Predictive and Operational Analytics Tools, Adelaide Metro Water Distribution Network – (Adelaide, South Australia, Australia)

Innovation in Bridges

• LCW Consult – The Ceira River Bridge – (Coimbra, Coimbra District, Portugal)

Innovation in Building

• Robin Partington and Partners – One Merchant Square – (London, UK)

Innovation in Construction

• Vic’s Crane & Heavy Haul, Inc. – Unit 25 Project – (Rosemount, MN, USA)

Innovation in Government

• Singapore Land Authority – Mapping Singapore in 3D – (Singapore)

Innovation in Land Development

• Tata Consulting Engineers Ltd. – Detailed Design of Utility Infrastructure – (Dharampur, Gujarat, India)

Innovation in Megaprojects

• AECOM – E4 Stockholm Bypass FSK02 Rock Tunnels Design Contract – (Stockholm, Sweden)

Innovation in Mining

• Tetra Tech Proteus – Kvanefjeld Rare Earth: Uranium Project – (Narsaq, Kujalleq, Greenland)

Innovation in Offshore

• Keystone Engineering Inc. – Block Island Wind Farm – (Block Island, RI, USA)

Innovation in Power Generation

• MWH Global – Tyseley Resource Recovery Centre – (Birmingham, West Midland, UK)

Innovation in Process Manufacturing

• Giprotyumenneftegaz – Preliminary Water Removal Unit: North Vankor Field – (Igarka, Krasnoyarsk Territory, Russia)

Innovation in Project Delivery

• AECOM – Global Project Collaboration in a Design-build-finance-operate (DBFO) World – (Global)

Innovation in Rail and Transit

• London Underground Ltd – Bond St to Baker St Tunnel Remediation Project – (London, UK)

Innovation in Roads

• Grontmij – A6 to Manchester Relief Road – (Stockport, Manchester and Cheshire, UK)

Innovation in Structures

• Stanley D. Lindsey and Associates, Ltd. – SkyHouse Apartments – (Denver, Atlanta, Orlando, Tampa, Charlotte, Raleigh, Nashville, Austin, Houston, and Dallas, USA)

Innovation in Utilities and Communications

• Pacific Gas and Electric Company – Engineering Contractor Collaboration Solution Using ProjectWise and Bentley Substation – (San Ramon, CA, USA)

Innovation in Water Network Analysis

• Prolagos/Aegea – Water Master Plan for the Região dos Lagos – (Rio de Janeiro, BR)

Innovation in Water Treatment Plants

• Aqua+ – Complex Scheduling and Automatic Water Quality Monitoring of Groundwater – (Khabarovsk, Far East Federal District, Russia)

Bentley has posted highlights of this year’s winning projects on its website. It will include more detailed descriptions of all nominated projects in the print and digital versions of its 2015 Infrastructure Yearbook, which will be published in January. To review the past 11 editions, which together feature more than 2,500 projects honored since 2004, visit Bentley’s Infrastructure Yearbooks.