Skyrocketing AEC data increases the need for data management best practices

As the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry experiences staggering growth in data creation, organizations need to focus heavily on data governance best practices.

That’s one of the findings of a new study of the AEC industry, which shows that data storage has experienced a compound growth of 31.2% since 2017. The amount of new data being captured or created is enormous, but its full value depends on how the data is managed, stored, accessed and protected.

According to the AEC Data Insights report from Egnyte“The AEC industry is experiencing unprecedented growth, challenges and opportunities at the same time. Demand is high, supply chains are unpredictable, but the entire industry is growing. So is the amount of data it uses and stores to function in this rollercoaster environment.”

Egnyte surveyed approximately 3,000 organizations about their current and recent data management and data storage practices. While the company expected an increase in data creation and storage, it was surprised by how much that has increased.

Surprising growth

“Probably the most surprising finding was the rate of storage growth of our customers over the four years,” Ronen Vengosh, vice president of AEC at Egnyte told VentureBeat. “While this is in line with other industry reports, the fact that our customers have nearly quadrupled their data storage on average – from 0.9 TB in 2017 to 3.5 TB in 2021 – is a rather striking indication of how AEC companies have become data. businesses.”

The pandemic has greatly accelerated the digital transformation of the AEC industry, Vengosh explained. More and more AEC companies have migrated to the cloud in recent years. This is largely driven by the cloud’s ability to enable more effective communication and collaboration between remote workers and those working on project sites, while simultaneously allowing them to securely analyze and process large amounts of data.

“In addition, the industry is experiencing a dramatic acceleration in the adoption of advanced, data-intensive technology (drone video, laser scanning, etc.), and we are seeing organizations collect and store all that data – often without robust practices for sorting. what data should be kept and what should be discarded,” Vengosh said.

This growth has had a major impact on the data infrastructure, Vengosh said. AEC companies have had to make strategic decisions about how to effectively manage and secure their increasing amounts of data without disrupting productivity or project outcomes. This is because the AEC industry faces stricter regulations and compliance requirements.

Key findings of the report

There were several key findings in the Egnyte AEC Data Insights Report, Vengosh said. They contain:

• AEC firms store and trade more files than in other industries. The typical AEC company manages 149% (2.49x) more files than the cross-industry average. This includes sectors such as real estate, retail, manufacturing and life sciences.
• The growth of the data volume is explosive. The average AEC company increased its file storage by 31.2% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) between 2017 and 2021.
• Data sprawl is a growing challenge. The number of individual files stored by AEC companies grew by 23.4% CAGR between 2017 and 2021. Companies are increasingly relying on larger file types from a variety of sources, including drone footage and 3D images. In addition, the emergence of specialty applications such as Procore and Bluebeam has led to the constant movement of files from one location to another.
• Usage patterns vary widely between disciplines. An AEC employee’s sub-sector (owner, architecture, engineering, general contractor, and specialty contractor) has a direct impact on how they handle files and the types of files they use. General contractors share files at the fastest rate, while owners have access to most files.
• Data security issues vary by company size and discipline. With more data comes more risk. Egnyte signaled a staggering growth of “very serious” data issues from Q4 2020 to Q4 2021, a 325 percent increase across all AEC domains. For context, a problem is considered very serious when it represents the potential loss or exposure of confidential information or other adverse event that has a significant impact on the business.

Data management to balance growth and business needs

In response to this skyrocketing amount of AEC data, Vengosh gave his advice on how best AEC companies should respond.

“To best optimize their data and increase project productivity, AEC companies need to tailor the management of their fast-growing data to their business needs,” he said.

To achieve that goal, an effective data management plan should include:

• General business objectives and the data needed to achieve those objectives.
• The means and methods to make progress.
• A schedule for frequent reviews and updates.
• Documentation of necessary organizational and project processes (e.g. policies, forms, checklists, tutorials and screenshots).

“Setting up data governance is critical,” advised Vengosh. “Setting up systems and processes not only protects office and project-generated data, but can also help companies comply with corporate, industry and government regulations.”

Most importantly, IT organizations must accept that manual processes for managing and managing data (e.g. manual content classification or manual content retention policies) are not feasible with current data volumes, and that policy-based automation is central to a successful content management and governance strategy,” said Vengosh.