Project: Precast Concrete Technology Platform
The consortium behind this project – a Danish SME specialised in an innovative concrete technology and a Belgian SME specialized in analysis and design software for the building industry – wishes to address a major market opportunity through the development and demonstration of a technology platform that will bring the precast concrete industry up to speed in terms of digitalizing production processes and incorporating IT. Specifically the consortium wants to develop a technology platform that will digitalize planning, production and quality control of precast concrete production. This will be a major breakthrough for the precast concrete market as a whole and push the boundaries for what has traditionally been considered to be a state-of-the-art precast production factory. _x000D_The precast concrete industry emerged in the 1960’s and brought the first significant industrialization of processes to the concrete construction market. With the introduction of precast concrete elements, the process of casting the concrete on the construction site was moved inside the walls of precast concrete factories, who produced finished products, e.g. walls, floors, beams, columns etc. and then shipped it to the construction site. At the time, this development was generally perceived as a huge breakthrough, because it was much more efficient to perform the process on a factory. _x000D__x000D_Since the introduction of precast elements, the industry has, however, not evolved significantly. Especially in terms of digitalization of workflows, the industry has been lagging far behind. Today the industry is still characterized by manual planning, drawing and calculation methods . The same has been the case for the building industry in general, but with the introduction of 3D Building Information Modeling (BIM) about 10 years ago, the industry is now undergoing a radical change in digitalizing the design and planning stage of construction projects. Existing software solutions, including BIM is, however, limited in its use as it is primarily used for drawing each precast concrete units and not for controlling the entire production process or communicating directly with the customers. _x000D__x000D_As a result, the consortium behind this project has identified a strong need for developing a technology platform that: 1) Will digitalize the entire production in terms of monitoring processes, material use, time, costs and quality as well as planning and handling data 2) Is able to integrate with BIM by taking digital information from this system and directly use it as inputs for planning the production thus allowing for a much more complete and optimal level of building information sharing between stakeholders in the value chain. A complete digitalization of the production flow at a precast concrete factory equivalent to the one envisaged in this project does not exist today. The methods used today are either completely manual or not linked to the level needed in order to realize any significant cost savings or quality control improvements._x000D__x000D_The success criterion within the planned duration of the project is the development of a complete and functional technology platform encompassing both software, hardware and training ready for commercial dissemination to precast concrete factories all over the world including implementation and full-scale test on at least one existing precast concrete plant. Already now, the first precast P has been identified for launching the technology platform and testing the beta version. Obtaining this success criterion will bring the consortium Ps into the absolutely top of frontrunners in their individual markets and will create significant future spin off perspectives._x000D_
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Acronym
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PCTP
(Reference Number: 8166)
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Duration
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26/08/2013 - 31/07/2015
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Project Topic
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This project concerns the development of a technology platform encompassing both hardware and software related to the production of precast concrete. _x000D_ The objective of the project is to design, develop and successfully implement the technology platform at a precast concrete factory.
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Network
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Eurostars
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Call
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Eurostars Cut-Off 10
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Project partner
