4. Collaborative Working in a BIM Environment (BIM Platform)

The paradigm of the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) involves data management and the interconnection between machines-objects-people and processes. The key words of the revolution underway are:

Compared to the previous industrial revolutions (18th century: mechanical loom vs. iron and steel; 19th century: production line vs. reinforced concrete, 20th century: automation manufacturing vs. precast concrete), today buildings are fully involved in Industry 4.0, alongside all other industrial sectors and services sectors. Therefore, the new approach to production and the use of products involves objects, subjects and processes, integrated among each other through the generation of common information in continuous evolution. Such information needs to be collected (in a structured way), processed (precisely and statistically), redistributed (openly and transparently). With regard to the quality of the works and to the competitiveness of the sector, Regulation no. 305/2011 (European Commission, Regulation (EU) No 305/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council, Official Journal of the European Union, Strasbourg, [5]) obliges all producers to declare the technical characteristics of construction products before their commercialization. Today such information on products must be made available in an open and standardized form (Reg. no. 1025/2012, par. 3), guaranteeing data transparency for the public and private sectors. In the building sector, the main means to convey information has historically been represented by designs and related documents. In the first technological transit, from the drafting machine to CAD (Computer Aided Design), not much changed, if not in a merely technological sense, more than in a procedural sense. The use of CAD (vector software), as in the case of the drafting machine, involves the management of vectors and texts for the representation of concepts. The interaction between technicians takes place through the use of analogical or digital means, thus “static”, remote from the process.