Companies in the Engineering and Construction Industry Must Act Now to Avoid Future Disruption
Summary
Advancing digital technologies that include building information modeling, prefabrication, wireless sensors, automated and robotic equipment, and 3D printing will transform the entire industry.Rapid urbanization, with more than 200,000 people per day relocating from rural areas into cities, climate change, resource depletion, and the widening talent gap are but a few of the most powerful of these trends.“The myriad potential changes in the E&C industry leads to high ambiguity and makes it impossible to predict the future,” noted Santiago Castagnino, a BCG partner and coauthor of the report.In the “building in a virtual world” scenario, which many experts consider highly likely, design and engineering software systems are powered by artificial intelligence, and autonomous construction equipment replace most manual work throughout the E&C value chain.This underscores that players along the construction value chain need to prepare strategically to thrive in the face of anticipated disruption.” In addition to recommending specific responses to each of the scenarios, the report provides a set of actions that will be relevant in any possible future.