Avanti (project)
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Avanti was established by the UK Department of Trade and Industry in 2002DTI The Construction Research Programme, February 2007
to formulate an approach to collaborative working in order to enable
construction Construction are processes involved in delivering buildings, infrastructure, industrial facilities, and associated activities through to the end of their life. It typically starts with planning, financing, and design that continues until the a ...
project A project is a type of assignment, typically involving research or design, that is carefully planned to achieve a specific objective. An alternative view sees a project managerially as a sequence of events: a "set of interrelated tasks to be ...
partners to work together effectively. The project was promoted by the Department of Trade and Industry with the support of most of the largest UK firms in the construction industry. Avanti also involved the International Alliance for Interoperability (IAI),
Loughborough University Loughborough University (abbreviated as ''Lough'' or ''Lboro'' for Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a public university, public research university in the market town of Loughborough, Leicestershire, England. It has been a university sinc ...
and Co-Construct, a network of five construction research and information organizations. The Avanti programme aimed to help overcome problems caused by incomplete, inaccurate and ambiguous information."An historical problem"
, Construction Journal,
Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) is a global professional body for those working in the Built Environment, Construction, Land, Property and Real Estate. The RICS was founded in London in 1868. It works at a cross-governmental ...
, April 2006


Background

The
Tavistock Institute The Tavistock Institute of Human Relations is a British non-profit research and consulting organisation, specialising in the study of group behavior. There are sister organisations in China and Germany. It was formally established in September ...
report (1965) printed an extract from an
RICS The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) is a global professional body for those working in the Built Environment, Construction, Land, Property and Real Estate. The RICS was founded in London in 1868. It works at a cross-governmental ...
meeting of 1910 which stated "Architectural information is invariably inaccurate, ambiguous and incomplete". By the 1940s, the impact of this was valued at an additional 10% to the construction cost. By 1994 the
Latham Report The Latham Report, titled ''Constructing the Team'', was an influential report written by Sir Michael Latham, published in July 1994. Latham was commissioned by the United Kingdom government and industry organisations to review procurement and cont ...
''Constructing the Team'' suggested waste in the industry accounted for 25-30% of project costs. This figure is supported by earlier publications from the
Building Research Establishment The Building Research Establishment (BRE) is a centre of building science in the United Kingdom, owned by charitable organisation the BRE Trust. It is a former Government of the United Kingdom, UK government national laboratory that was privati ...
(BRE) and the Building Services Research and Information Association (BSRIA), which led to reports in 1987 from the Coordinating Committee for Project Information (now CPIC) that recommended a common format and disciplined approach to reduce the problem. These suggestions were proven on DTI-funded projects and case studies at Endeavour House at
London Stansted Airport Stansted Airport is an international airport serving London, the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It is located near Stansted Mountfitchet, Uttlesford, Essex, northeast of Central London. As London's Airports of London, third-bu ...
and the BAA
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, which showed that significant savings in project cost and drawing production could be made by addressing people and process issues.


The problem and approach

Most construction projects are complex and involve co-ordination between many project participants both on- and off-site. As projects have increased in size and complexity, the number of participants involved in a single project has also increased. To improve collaboration between participants, the industry needs tools that work well, appropriate processes to implement them, and the right approach from the people involved. Tackling these points was at the heart of the Avanti action research programme. Its purpose was to support live construction project teams, as they collaborate to deliver projects, by helping them apply the appropriate technologies. It worked through a team of partners representing each stage of the project process, with the objective of improving project and business performance through the use of
information and communication technologies Information and communications technology (ICT) is an extensional term for information technology (IT) that stresses the role of unified communications and the integration of telecommunications (telephone lines and wireless signals) and compute ...
(ICT) to support collaborative working. It set out to show the advantages of CAD systems over conventional
drawings Drawing is a visual art that uses an instrument to mark paper or another two-dimensional surface, or a digital representation of such. Traditionally, the instruments used to make a drawing include pencils, crayons, and ink pens, sometimes in com ...
, with information managed as a
database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...
rather than a drawing cabinet, and aimed to demonstrate that 3D Computer Aided Design systems could revolutionise projects, provided they were used for more than visualisation. To reduce the risks involved in adopting new working methods, Avanti brought together areas of current best practice (such as CPIC
protocols Protocol may refer to: Sociology and politics * Protocol (politics), a formal agreement between nation states * Protocol (diplomacy), the etiquette of diplomacy and affairs of state * Etiquette, a code of personal behavior Science and technology ...
) that had previously gained too little market penetration to have significant impact on the sector. The objective was to deliver improved project and business performance by using ICT to support collaborative working. Avanti focused on early access to all project information by all partners, on early involvement of the
supply chain A supply chain is a complex logistics system that consists of facilities that convert raw materials into finished products and distribute them to end consumers or end customers, while supply chain management deals with the flow of goods in distri ...
, and on sharing of information, drawings and schedules, in an agreed and consistent manner. The Avanti approach was supported by handbooks, toolkits and on-site mentoring and was reliant on advice and materials provided by CPIC. Avanti mobilised existing technologies to improve business performance by increasing the quality of information and predictability of outcomes and by reducing risk and waste. The core of the Avanti approach to a project's whole life cycle was based on team-working and access to a common
information model An information model in software engineering is a representation of concepts and the relationships, constraints, rules, and Operation (mathematics), operations to specify Semantic data model, data semantics for a chosen domain of discourse. Typica ...
. All CAD information was generated with the same origin, orientation and scale, and organised in layers that could be shared. All layers and CAD model files were named consistently within a specific Avanti convention to allow others to find the relevant CAD data.


Guidance and Phases

Learning from early projects, Avanti produced practical working documentation and tested the methods on live projects. This information supplemented the CPIC document Code of Procedure for the Construction Industry and addressed problems of incomplete, inaccurate and ambiguous information. Avanti guidance included: * ''Standard Method and Procedure'' - advice on classification standards, spatial and technical co-ordination, example file and directory structures, and naming conventions. * ''Design Management Principles'' - comprising typical design management processes, information management processes, guidance on detailed task management and typical responsibilities of delivery team leaders. The advice also covers areas such as: * a business case on the commercial imperatives for collaborative ICT * guidance on ensuring the software chain supported the design and supply chains * authoring information in a common data environment and controlling the sharing of information in a multi-author environment For most projects, using this guidance consisted of three phases: * ''Phase 1'': Change the poor industry practice of producing information to individual standards and throwing it ‘over the wall’ to the next person in the supply chain who then reproduces their own information. Using an agreed standard for the project, spatially co-ordinated and high-quality 2D information will then be produced for the parties involved. * ''Phase 2'': Implementation of those same principles to generate 3D project models to produce 2D drawings and material measurement. * ''Phase 3'': Full implementation of 3D object-oriented and
Building information modelling Building information modeling (BIM) is an approach involving the generation and management of digital representations of the physical and functional characteristics of buildings or other physical assets and facilities. BIM is supported by vario ...
systems. Each live project captures the lessons learned and the benefits gained.


Further development

In July 2006, the Avanti DTI Project documentation and brand ownership was transferred to Constructing Excellence. Since the handover, Constructing Excellence endeavoured to promote the savings demonstrated on live projects. Further work was also carried out to make Avanti part of the update of
BS 1192 BS, B.S., Bs, bs, or B's may refer to: Arts and entertainment *BS-, a prefix for all games broadcast for the Satellaview modem via the Japanese Broadcasting Satellite system *B.S. (song), "B.S." (song), a song by Jhené Aiko from the album ''Chi ...
. The BS 5555 committee coded the methods.


Results

Evaluation of the impacts of the Avanti project showed: * Early commitment offering up to 80% saving on implementation cost on medium size project. * 50-85% saving on effort spent receiving information and formatting for reuse. * 60-80% saving on effort spent finding information and documents. * 75–80% saving in effort to achieve design co-ordination. * 50% saving on time spent to assess tenders and award sub-contracts. * 50% saving on effort in sub-contractor design approval.


The future

Constructing Excellence is developing a self-sustaining business to support roll out of the Avanti methodology to the UK construction industry. It will also draw on the results of other DTI-supported collaborative research such as ''Building Down Barriers''.Building Down Barriers


See also

* CPIC


References


External links


Avanti website

Constructing Excellence Avanti

What is Avanti?

People + Process + Tools

IAI home page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Avanti (Project) Civil engineering Construction in the United Kingdom Research projects Organizations established in 2002 Loughborough University 2002 establishments in the United Kingdom Research in the United States Projects established in 2002