The latest Autodesk University user conference, held in London in June with an estimated 2,000 attendees, showcased some of the recent achievements in the automation of design and construction.

Autodesk has added an A.I.-based assistant to its BIM 360 software to identify risks and safety issues in large, sprawling projects.

Tracy Young had enough project smarts and technology vision to create PlanGrid, a now widely used cloud-based platform that has transformed field-document handling and brought an eye-popping buyout price from software giant Autodesk.

Tridify, a software technology firm developing automation products for AEC, announced on Dec. 11 a partnership with the virtual reality platform vendor Unity Technologies to leverage a new cloud service, Tridify Convert, that lets developers rapidly import BIM and 3D CAD files into Unity with its Industry Foundation Class-formatted BIM data intact.

The convergence of virtual reality, prefabrication, manufacturing, building information modeling and construction came into better focus for Autodesk product users in mid November at the software vendor’s annual conference in Las Vegas.

Scott Borduin recently sat down with ENR in Autodesk’s Boston BUILD Space to talk about collaboration, manufacturing, robotics and collecting data with sensors.

Recent advances in machine learning and smart algorithms offer new insights for architects, engineers and contractors. But getting artificial-intelligence systems to align with the industry’s needs is the next step for the technology’s proponents.

Typical vendor-sponsored case studies read as self-service marketing, but a new report from ClearEdge3D—a developer of software for making sense out of scan data—stands out because of its many tips for organizing as-built data acquisition using any tools or platforms.