System and method linking building information modeling and enterprise resource planning

Abstract

An electronic construction collaboration system for managing a construction project is provided. The electronic construction collaboration system includes an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) sub-system including a contract engine configured to generate at least one project contract including a contract data set and ERP metadata corresponding to Building Information Modeling (BIM) metadata included in a structural object of a construction project model in a BIM sub-system and an interconnection engine configured to associatively link the ERP metadata and the BIM metadata and send the contract data set to the BIM sub-system in response to associatively linking the ERP metadata and the BIM metadata.

1 . A method, comprising:
 receiving BIM data from a BIM subsystem, the data including a plurality of building structural objects, each with a plurality of associated meta-data fields;   receiving ERP data from an ERP subsystem, the data including contract and financial fields;   establishing a plurality of links between the ERP data and the BIM data, each of the links associated with a particular building structural object, the links established based on a corresponding field, and once established, the links includes even non-corresponding fields; and   displaying in a common view, linked data from each of the subsystems without transitioning between the two sub-systems.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the establishment of the links is prioritized based on a number of corresponding fields between the ERP data and the BIM data for the particular building structural object. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the linked data displayed in the common view includes one or more of an entity installing a selected structural object, materials for the selected structural object, a shape of the selected structural object, dimensions of the selected structural object, a contract for construction of the selected structural object, cash flow related to the selected structural object, change orders for the selected structural object, labor hours for the selected structural object, equipment hours for the selected structural object, approvals for the selected structural object, or combinations thereof. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 3 , wherein the linked data displayed in the common view includes time cards for the selected structural object. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein at least two corresponding fields are required to establish the links, the at least two fields including a project number and a vendor number. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the displaying includes, first displaying in the common view the linked data associated only with a selected structural object, and in response to an addition user selection from the common view, displaying, in the common view, data for a structural object other than the selected structural object, but with fields in common with the selected structural object. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 6 , wherein the data for the structural object other than the selected structural object includes a common vendor or sub-contractor for the selected structural object and the structural object other than the selected structural object. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising updating both the BIM data and ERP data, using the established links, for a structural object specified in a change order in response to receiving data from the change order. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the plurality of links are further established based on COBie-formatted data. 
     
     
         10 . An electronic construction collaboration system for managing a construction project comprising:
 an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) sub-system including;
 a contract engine configured to generate at least one project contract including a contract data set and ERP metadata; and 
 an interconnection engine configured to associatively link the ERP metadata with BIM metadata included in a structural object of a construction project model in a BIM sub-system and send the contract data set to the BIM sub-system in response to associatively linking the ERP metadata and the BIM metadata. 
   
     
     
         11 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 10 , where the interconnection engine is further configured to format the contract data set into a Construction Operations Building Information Exchange (COBie) format prior to sending the contract data. 
     
     
         12 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 11 , where the COBie format includes a type of extensible markup language (XML) format. 
     
     
         13 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 10 , where the ERP metadata and the BIM metdata include one or more of material data, vendor data, project number data, project phase data, a subcontract number, project schedule data, and cost data. 
     
     
         14 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 10 , where the ERP metadata includes a first data field corresponding to a second data field in the BIM metadata. 
     
     
         15 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 14 , where the first data field in the ERP metadata is associatively linked with a plurality of data fields in the BIM metadata. 
     
     
         16 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 14 , where the first data field and the second data field are each included in separate data sets, the first data set including a different field than the second data set. 
     
     
         17 . The electronic construction collaboration system of  claim 10 , where the contract data set includes contract documents, cost data, labor hour data, equipment hour data. 
     
     
         18 . A method for managing a construction project in an electronic construction collaboration system, the method comprising:
 receiving a structural object selection input from a BIM sub-system;   selecting a structural object in a construction project model executed via the BIM sub-system in response to receiving the structural object selection input, the structural object including BIM metadata;   sending a contract data information request to an ERP sub-system in the electronic construction collaboration system in response to selecting the structural object, the contract data information request including BIM metadata;   receiving the contract data information request from the ERP sub-system;   associatively linking the BIM metadata with ERP metadata the ERP metadata included in a project contract in the ERP sub-system based on the contract data information request; and   sending the contract data set in response to associatively linking the BIM metadata with the ERP metadata, the contract data set included in the project contract.   
     
     
         19 . The method of  claim 18 , where the ERP metadata and the BIM metdata include one or more of material data, vendor data, project number data, project phase data, a subcontract number, project schedule data, and cost data. 
     
     
         20 . The method of  claim 19 , where the structural object is defined parametrically with regard to other structural objects in the construction project model.