Gobind and Google Cloud Malaysia and Singapore country director Serene Sia signing the commemorative plaque, witnessed by Lim (right) at the Gamuda AI Academy launch.
The field of construction will be one of the latest to benefit from the enormous potential offered by artificial intelligence (AI), which is a field concerned with computers and machines that can “learn” and act in ways that typically need human input, or analyse data on a scale that exceeds human capability.
According to Upmetrics, the global construction industry in 2023 weighed in at US$12.74 trillion (RM54.7 trillion), with more than 738,000 players as of 2020.
Yet, the industry is one that stands to benefit the most from disruptive technologies, such as AI.
Strong demand for infrastructure, a shortage of skilled labour, and increased stakeholder pressure for data transparency and integration are all accelerating the digitalisation of the construction landscape, which used to be characterised with lots of manual processes and paper forms.
In a Deloitte report titled State of Digital Adoption in the Construction Industry 2024, the consultancy painted a scenario where there is a growing trend on industry solutions that make use of AI.
“Ensuring future growth in this important industry will require businesses across the Asia Pacific expanding their use of digital technologies and integrating them successfully into business operations,” said the summary of the report commissioned by Autodesk to explore trends impacting digital adoption in the construction and engineering sector across six markets in the Asia Pacific.
According to the authors, Malaysian construction and engineering businesses used the second highest number of technologies on average (after India), while reporting median expenditure of 23% on new technology.
Putting knowledge into practice from the start
As far as displaying leadership is concerned, Gamuda Bhd has embarked on digitalisation way ahead of the pack in not just Malaysia, but also the region.
It sees extensive digitalisation not as a fashionable thing to do, but a mission-critical move to thrive in a crowded field and to expand globally by demonstrating to clients how it can efficiently realise value throughout project lifecycles, ranging from design, bidding and financing to procurement.
Gamuda went heavily into digitalisation when it embarked on mechanised tunnelling operations for Klang Valley’s MRT network, when it managed a fleet of sophisticated tunnel boring machines (TBM).
Drawing upon lessons from constructing the Stormwater Management and Road Tunnel (SMART) through difficult karst terrain, followed by more learning points from the Kajang line tunnels, Gamuda was able to integrate artificial intelligence into its fleet of autonomous TBMs used in the Putrajaya line to speed up construction while managing all the attendant risks, including safety and costs.
Prior to this, Gamuda was heavily into Building Information Modelling (BIM) as far back as 10 years ago, way before it became an industrial norm here.
Gobind getting briefed by the Gamuda Excellence Transformation team on AI technologies includng the newly launched GL Connect Portal and the award-winning Autonomous Tunnel Boring Machine simulator.
AI now part of Gamuda’s culture
With its significant footprint outside Malaysia now, Gamuda is cognisant of the need for a common platform so that all team members can stay on the same page, no matter their specific location, as well as to foster collaboration through a solution that allows store and link project data for analytics and deep insight.
It solidified this when it started using Autodesk Construction Cloud in September 2022, which was integrated into its Gamuda Digital Operating System (GDOS), the platform that allows it to tap on the immense potential of AI.
“The nature of the construction industry lends itself well to digitalisation, where a lot of things are actually data-driven,” said Gamuda’s chief digital officer John Lim Ji Xiong at the launch of Gamuda AI Academy on Oct 11.
GDOS is now a standard ecosystem of tools for every Gamuda project where enterprise data is consolidated and underpinned by a unified data cloud platform utilising Google Cloud.
“We would like the team to focus on driving value-creating use cases,” said Lim, who had worked on building the Putrajaya MRT Line.
Efficiency is the immediate gain from embracing AI, with the unified data cloud providing engineers and relevant stakeholders with a powerful tool in design, engineering, supply chain, procurement, and field operations through a dashboard that gives a holistic and integrated picture of workflow that is as close to real-time as possible.
“GDOS controls all these, with things centred around Autodesk Construction Cloud.
“Our sensors are people, who input data into the connected ecosystem.
“There is now less need to pick up the phone to call for updates as everyone can track the status of the project,” he said, adding that AI can be routinely relied upon to handle things such as requests for information, identifying issues, handle changing orders from clients along the way, manage forms and correspondence with clients and subcontractors, handling payments, and so on.
“All of these are our ‘secret sauce’. We want to be more of a tech company, rather than construction company,” said Lim.
He is also a mechanical engineer who worked on the team that launched and operated the TBM from Chan Sow Lin to Bandar Malaysia.
Lim pointed out that this paradigm shift towards AI had led to the discovery of new avenues for growth and exploration for the company.
“In the construction industry, people come and go, and institutional knowledge often rests with the individuals or persons involved.
“With AI, there is also knowledge management through the shifting of institutional knowledge to a digital repository,” said Lim, reflecting on the road travelled thus far.
“AI in construction helps the industry as a whole overcome tough challenges that include cost and schedule overruns, safety concerns, skilled labour shortages, and subsequent business model transformation,” he said.
Setting the standard for digital construction
Lim was a key presenter at the recent Autodesk University 2024 in San Diego – alongside Autodesk senior vice president Jim Lynch – who shared Gamuda’s transformation story to a global audience of 30,000.
He added that the potential of AI in construction will be fulfilled in greater extent as machines become increasingly capable of mimicking human cognitive functions, like problem-solving, pattern recognition, and learning.
AI is already helping engineers and architects come up with better design of buildings through generative design that gives insights into the efficient layout, construction and management buildings and infrastructure by taking into consideration architecture, engineering, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing plans, and how to properly sequence the activities of the different specialist teams.
Beyond mitigating design clashes at the planning stage, AI-powered generative design can help create various 3D models that are optimised in various aspects to help with risk mitigation, especially in complex infrastructure projects.
The larger the project, the more the risk as there are multiple sub-contractors working concurrently on job sites, each presenting risk in forms such as quality, safety, time, and cost.
With AI and machine learning solutions, the main contractor can monitor the level of risk on the site so that the project team can focus their limited resources on the biggest risk factors.
Preventing or managing cost and schedule overruns is also another important area where AI can help, with some AI models having the ability to predict realistic timelines.
Observers of the industry also highlight AI’s ability to increase job site productivity, while ensuring safety.
Other than Gamuda’s autonomous TBMs, innovations in this area also extend to other self-driving construction machinery to perform repetitive tasks in ways that could be more efficient if done manually.
Increasingly, these include pouring concrete, demolition, excavation, and other site preparation works that can now be done with either fully autonomous or semi-autonomous earthwork machines.
Safety wise, the use of facial recognition and cameras hooked with analytics capabilities can help monitor productivity and conformance to safety, health and environment procedures.
Viewed in its entirety, the embrace of AI reflects Gamuda’s forward thinking mindset that enables it to have the agility for decision-making when delivering complex projects that require a lot of collaboration locally, as well as sites in Australia, Singapore, Vietnam, Taiwan and in the United Kingdom.
Technology at the forefront
Lim said the widespread adoption of AI has created many new opportunities, with the journey also benefiting from leverage on existing relationships that are symbiotic or complementary.
“From Singapore all the way to Australia, many of our peers don’t look at tech the same way we do,” he said when giving the confidence that Gamuda’s engineering prowess is augmented by software and data engineers that are now part and parcel of the team.
“We will not stray from our core competency. It is just boosted with the extra flavour of AI now. We are not here just to pour concrete, we are here to think,” he said of the industry’s exciting journey ahead on the road towards AI.
Reflecting on the string of global awards, including for its autonomous TBM, Lim said it is this mindset that helps position Gamuda as an industry leader in the world of the built environment.
“We are flying the flag for the country by demonstrating that we are just as good, if not better, than the rest of the world. In this, digital is our differentiator.”
Officiated by Digital Minister Gobind Singh Deo, the Gamuda AI Academy is a pioneering initiative aimed at cultivating the next generation of generative AI talents for Malaysia, utilising the power of Google Cloud’s cutting-edge products.
It is open to students, graduates, industry professionals, and startup founders.
Fully sponsored by Yayasan Gamuda, the academy offers a comprehensive three-month curriculum focusing on full-stack AI development, with promising graduates of the academy standing a chance to be interns at Gamuda or Google Cloud or their business partners.
