February 2010

Cover Story
Outlook 2010: Doing More with More
Features
Constructech Top Products 2010: Guiding You Back to Business
The Mobile Builder
Firsts and Seconds
An Interesting Start to 2010
It’s Going to be Exciting in 2010

Only Available In The Print Edition
Take-Offs
This month’s news section highlights how builders can work with providers and consultants to establish a building information modeling process, how technology will play a role in restructured or downsized companies, and why automated home technology might be a good add-on in 2010.
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January 2010 - Commercial

Volume 13 Number 01

Looking back at 2009, one could consider it to be a year of change—or more accurately, a year in which some key societal, political, and environmental factors were put in place that will drive a significant amount of change in the years to come.


December 2009

Volume 12 Number 12

Your equipment is no longer just a piece of equipment. It can shut itself down after two minutes of idling and can limit your drivers to a certain speed. Your equipment can even alert you when it is leaving the jobsite and help you perform some of the more time-intensive surveying tasks.


November 2009 - Commercial

Volume 12 Number 11

These days it’s hard not to get buried beneath the details on a construction job. Whether it’s a scenario of not having access to the right information at the right time or the complete opposite circumstance of becoming bogged down by all the diminutive data that circulates throughout a typical job, companies are struggling with an inability to manage content.


October 2009 - Residential

Volume 12 Number 10

Lennar Homes, www.lennar.com, Miami, Fla., typically tweets between five to 20 times a day, providing nearly 50,000 followers with information about its communities, housing news, and contests, as well as other topics that relate to its prospective clients and existing homeowners.


September 2009 - Commercial

Volume 12 Number 09

The moment one of your technology providers notifies you via email that they will no longer be supporting your product is the moment you realize this is a much different business environment than you have ever experienced.


August 2009 - Commercial

Volume 12 Number 08

Putting RFID (radio frequency identification) tags and readers into concrete, piping, tools, or vehicles to track where the item is in the construction process may seem a bit advanced, but the truth is the construction industry is using these “smart chips” for practical purposes.


June 2009

Volume 12 Number 06

Whatever it takes to get the job done. This policy has become practice for many construction companies to do business. While this business tactic can be considered highly commendable, and often times necessary to ensure customer satisfaction, it also leads to jobs being not as profitable as originally thought. And for an industry in which margins remain compressed, ‘whatever it takes’ might actually be doing more harm than good.


May 2009 - Commercial

Volume 12 Number 05

What is it about a recession that makes collaboration look so appealing? That’s not to say that collaboration is looked at negatively during strong market conditions; it’s just the fact that when the economy is strong and jobs are moving forward, it’s difficult for many AEC (architecture, engineering, and construction) professionals to make certain technological transitions that are necessary to streamline the collaborative process.


April 2009 - Residential

Volume 12 Number 4

If you were to spend one day observing all of your current business processes and practices, what would you expect to find?


March 2009 - Commercial

Volume 12 Number 3

For the first time in nearly a decade the construction industry has a unique opportunity to separate the wheat from the chaff, so to speak, when it comes to technology.


February 2009 - Residential

Volume 12 Number 02

Builders are in survival mode these days. The economy has taken a turn for the worst. Building has slowed in many areas. And to make matters worse the cost of everything from energy to nails hit unprecedented levels. However, despite all the negative reports, builders are “hunkering down” much like companies did after the lean years of the Great Depression.


January 2009 - Commercial

Volume 12 Number 1

Given the economy, the pressure on us to reform how we work has gone from a good idea around the water cooler to an absolute necessity inside the CFO office. In years past it was easy to pick and choose from the deals that were maybe a bit more difficult. Now we are in a situation where we have to do all the deals and make them work.

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