The awards ceremony took place in Stuttgart’s House of Architects and was attended by around 180 guests. To take part in the competition, project developers, craft businesses, associations, universities and other tertiary education institutes were invited to submit their best BIM work. At the BIM AWARD 2018 Drees & Sommer SE Executive Board member and jury member Steffen Szeidl explained: ‘Building Information Modeling, in other words the digital planning, construction and management of real estate, provides enormous cost and time savings for clients and is an important element in the digitization of the construction and real estate industry. The projects and work that have been submitted provide an impressive demonstration of the innovative capacity of the method, and show just how visionary it is for the industry.’ Markus Eiberger, Project Partner at Drees & Sommer SE, represents the international consulting and project management company in the newly established BIM-Cluster Baden-Württemberg e.V. As Board member of the Association, he is a vigorous promoter of its objectives.
Katrin Schütz, State Secretary at the Ministry for Economic Affairs, Labor and Housing in Baden-Württemberg, was a special guest at the awards ceremony. She specifically highlighted the potential of Building Information Modeling during her speech:‘Baden-Württemberg will only remain a leading innovation and business location if we use the opportunities presented by digitization in all sectors of the economy. The construction industry is one of the key sectors of the German economy, and contributes a significant proportion of gross value added and employment. We can improve productivity still further by ensuring we make proper use of the potential of digitization in the Baden-Württemberg construction industry. The consistent application of BIM is the way forward.’
The awards were split into six categories:
Teaching
The Teaching category award went to the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology for its development of an interdisciplinary BIM module, which accorded students a deeper practical understanding of BIM processes by using the digital method themselves to develop a draft (3D), construction sequence simulation (4D) and cost calculation (5D).
Research
The Research category award went to the University of Stuttgart’s Institute of Building Structures and Structural Design (itke) for its project entitled ITKE Research Pavilion 2016-2017. This was a lightweight construction made from fiber-reinforced polymer, projected and built by students and researchers as part of a Masters degree program. BIM enabled them to adopt a universal, model-based method of working.
Processes/organization
Früh Engineering Stuttgart received the award in the Processes/Organization category. With the assistance of BIM the company developed a laser scanning process to check the dimensional accuracy of formwork construction elements used in the manufacture of the shell structure of Stuttgart’s new central railway station.
Small and medium sized craft enterprises
This newly designed award in the Small and medium sized craft enterprises category went to Hemminger Ingenieurbüro (as user) and Smart Data Factory (as developer) for their BIM data on the fly with smartphone app work. The application allows 3D data to be captured quickly and easily, thereby shortening project processes significantly.
Two Special projects awards
In addition to the prizes already mentioned, there were two other awards for Special projects. In the Infrastructure category, Baden-Württemberg’s highway construction authority won the award for its use of the BIM method in the second Gauchachtal Bridge project in which BIM was used for purposes including improving project organization and communication, and interface coordination. In the Structural engineering category the BIM AWARD went to Ed. Züblin AG / Strabag AG for their Siemens BT@Zug submission. This project relates to the construction of a new office/production building for Siemens AG Switzerland which is being realized with the assistance of BIM.5D®.
A total of 15 different companies, associations and educational establishments from Baden-Württemberg submitted their best work and projects for this year’s BIM AWARD.