The BIMTech Podcast

Episode 8 | 10 Years of BIMTech: Stories, Success & The Road Ahead

• BIMTech Media • Season 2 • Episode 8

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In this episode of The BIMTech Podcast, Matt McGuire and Adam Speakman take a trip down memory lane, celebrating a decade of BIMTech. With plenty of laughs along the way, they reflect on the journey from humble beginnings to becoming a leading force in BIM.

Matt:

Back again.

Adam:

We just pretended like we were working. But we weren’t. Right.

Matt:

Just like everyone else here.

Adam:

Yeah. Welcome to another BIMTech podcast. So today is a bit of a special one. It's been ten years since you founded the company.

Matt:

A decade.

Adam:

A decade, yeah.

Matt:

Wow.

Adam:

Does it shock you how that reflects on how old you are now?

Matt:

Well, I wasn't thinking about that until you just said it. But cheers for that.

Adam:

You're welcome.

Matt:

Yeah. I think, I don't know, I guess it's just gone so quick.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

I just can't believe. I mean, going back to 2005, I started M&E CAD Design.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

And then ten years on, got involved with Rob and Shaun and did a rebrand and renaming and everything and launched BIMTech Engineering. And when we went from M&E CAD to BIMTech, it's like, wow, that's been ten years getting to that point.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

And now we're ten years on and it's like, it's ten years of BIMTech and I've been in this sort of industry, like having a company within this industry is 20 years.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Now that does make me feel old.

Adam:

Well, I suppose it won't be long until it is 20 years of BIMTech then.

Matt:

I know, time does go quick.

Adam:

I know. I mean, as we were running up to this ten year anniversary of the company, I'm more interested in as well like, what were your sort of goals? What did you think the company would be ten years from when you started? Did you think it’d be around or, you know, did you have.

Matt:

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Definitely. I thought someone else would be running and I'd be lay on a beach somewhere. But, you know.

Adam:

Are you getting any closer to that?

Matt:

No, no. No, unfortunately not. Well, although I'm going to be on a beach a week on Sunday, I go away for a bit of a winter holiday.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So that will be the closest I get. I don't think I'll be retiring anytime soon.

Adam:

No.

Matt:

That's what happens when you’ve got two daughters. You just can't afford to retire.

Adam:

Did you have any goals that you wanted to achieve by ten years then?

Matt:

I think going back again to sort of even just starting M&E CAD Design. What I thought was there was like a bit of a gap in the market for a company like us.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Because I'd worked for companies like NG Baileys and people, and I could see that... I was working there as a contractor, and I could see that when they got quiet, they could either let contractors go and risk not getting them back.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Or they could carry on paying them the wage and have them sat around doing nothing. Right. So there was this... I could see there was a position in the market where if you could provide them with that service and they didn't need to employ contractors or anything, they could come to you instead. And then if you got quiet, you could go to another client, you'd have multiple clients. Whereas with them guys.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

They're just one in-house company. So I saw there was probably a gap in the market that you could provide a service to all the different M&E contractors that were out there. Right. So that was always the sort of long term sort of target, was to become that company that when somebody wants BIM as it is BIM now. At the time it was 3D modeling and whatever. That they would come to you and that's where you’d sort of pick all your work and your clients up from and that's what's happened over the years. I mean, it was a bit of a slow burn to get into all these companies and sort of get the respect of these people that they know that they can trust you and they can come to you and they know that you'll deliver a service that's as good as what they can do in-house.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So you have to establish that. But yeah, I think we're there now.

Adam:

Well with you saying it’s a slow burner. Is that because BIM has took off quite... Well quite recently. I'd say maybe in the last five years compared to the first five years when it was still being introduced.

Matt:

I think there's a combination of that, and I think there's also, it is getting into these companies and knowing who to speak to and things like that. Like last week we held a bit of a networking function in London. Yeah. And we had, I don't know, 40 odd people in the room, from all different clients and that. And one of the things I remember some guy commenting on, he was a director of one of our clients, and he said it'd be hard for anybody else to get this many different companies who were all pretty much in competition with each other... Yeah....in the same room networking. But because we're kind of the common denominator there that we work for them all. We invited them. And because we have the respect of them, they all turned up.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So it was a great event.

Adam:

Yeah, I suppose, on the sort of subject of the company being, well, the company being what it is now. I mean, you said we did a rebrand to start off from that transition between M&E CAD and BIMTech.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

As it was back then. And now over the last year, we spent then rebranding again. Like with the newer theme and the website and everything, and probably one of the aims when we got to ten years was to give that refresh to the whole brand.

Matt:

Yeah, I think so. I mean, obviously you've been involved in that massively yourself. So, you know all the ins and outs of it all. But I think the difference was, was when we did it back in 2015, we did a rename and a rebrand. This time we've just done the sort of rebrand just to freshen it up.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

When we did it from M&E CAD to BIMTech, we wanted to get that sort of key word of BIM into the title so people knew what you did. Sort of without having to look up what is it you do? I mean, it says it in the name now.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So we've got the name now and we wouldn't want to change it now anyway, because I think the name's so well known in the industry now.

Adam:

I think it's perfect.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

The rebrand to that, BIMTech, I think, like, I don't really see any other names that stand out to me in BIM.

Matt:

No, obviously.

Adam:

Obviously. But, Yeah. Okay then. So, with the website in mind, one part of the process of making the website was to try and block out the history of the company a little bit, and sort of create a timeline that showed off that sort of starting point of M&E CAD and where we are now. And I'm just wondering, out of the numerous, like sort of pivotal moments that have been throughout the company's history, is there a couple that you can pinpoint that really started to solidify the company.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

In that sort of light that you’re talking about.

Matt:

I think so. I think there's a few key things. I think I'll do them in order of when they kind of happened.

Adam:

Okay.

Matt:

I think, working on Scalpel Tower, in, I think it was around about 2016, 2017.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

I would say it was probably the first project that I would say we worked on that you would class as BIM. We had limited asset tagging within the model on the data side of it, but it was the collaboration side of it that I think was just a bit of an eye opener. I remember I was at the time, because we've gone back a few years now. I was kind of project lead in that project as well.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

And I was going down to London every week, and I was sitting in an office and Skanska who was our client, they would bring in the architects, the designers, the structural guys, and we were put in a position where we were lead coordinator, and we had the attention of all these people where prior to that, we'd be firing emails off to people and waiting for responses. In this situation, we could put everything into a 3D model, federate it. We’d put it up on a screen, we’d show what all the issues are. We’d assign issues to different people. They’d either go away and get them fixed or a lot of the times they were decisions made there and then on the spot.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

And it was the first time that we had that full on engagement with all the different parties, and we got to do a project how they should be delivered.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

And that's like I said, that was probably the first one we did like that. And then moving forward, it's carried on. So that was good. And then I'd say the next big milestone for us was taking on the Glasgow office.

Adam:

Oh, yeah.

Matt:

I mean, that was great for us. I mean, James up there heads it up for us. He does a fantastic job. I mean, I do get involved with the office and that up there, but it's limited because James does such a good job. Just makes life so easy. So he was a bit of a godsend coming in and joining BIMTech and the team that we've got with him up there. So that's kind of worked out great. And then after that I'd say it was the BIM accreditation when we got the BSI Kitemark in 2021. So you get it for three years, but you still get audited every year. So we did our three year renewal last year. So we’ve got it for three years again. But then we still, like I say, get audited. So we've got an audit coming up in December again. So I think that was good because I think that just demonstrated to our clients that we know what we're doing. We work to the standards and...

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

...we know we know how to deliver a BIM project. So I think they're probably the three key things. I would say...

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

...over the ten years for me.

Adam:

Nice one. And so we've talked about a project, we've talked about an opening of office, and then a certification. So with the projects in mind, I know scalpel was a big project, that had a lot of I mean, Caino in the office talks about it as being one of the most congested models.

Matt:

Well he would because he worked on it.

Adam:

But is there any projects that you can remember that you faced challenges with that stuck out for you as it’s something that...

Matt:

I'll be honest, scalpel tower was a tough one.

Adam:

Something that, we did to combat that challenge, to sort of pull us forward as that sort of standard for BIM.

Matt:

I'd say one of the big things is like the knowledge we have of DfMA or prefabrication, whatever you want to call it. I think that's become massive within the industry, and I think the knowledge our guys have of that, with all the sort of main players in the industry, most of the big companies have their own fabrication workshops and that and we know what their standards are. We can work to their standards. I think that's one of the big things that we bring to the party. And then the other sort of big project that we got involved with and I think we've kind of cemented our place where we're a bit of the go to company on it is the prison projects.

Adam:

Oh yeah.

Matt:

So the future prison projects, I mean, we got involved. Andy Walker got us involved with them first. At the time, he was working for Kier. He's now a director at NG Bailey's. But when he was at Kier he got us involved because I’d known him from years before on previous projects. It’s very much like that in our industry. People move around and then they get in touch with you, they move to another company, they introduce you to that company. And it’s kind of how it works this industry. But, Andy had gone to Kier, then they started working on the prison projects. So he got us involved, and we looked at ways we could sort of improve the delivery, because time wise, they were up against it with the construction. So we ended up from that, getting involved with the consultants. And we said rather than them look at trying to produce design models.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Is that they could just look at focusing on the design, pass that information over to us and we'll create the model. But we'll create that model with construction in mind so that we could try and speed up the process of going from design to construction. We can kind of merge it into one. So off the back of that, we kind of haven't looked back on the prisons. I think we've been working on prison projects now for probably I'd say 7 or 8 years now. And it's kind of created a good backbone to the business, that we know we've always got prison work on there. Especially now with Labour, trying to take, I don't know the plaudits to say they're going to deliver all these prisons that we've been working on for seven years.

Adam:

Well, on that sort of vein of prefab, because the prisons had a lot of very specialist prefab.

Matt:

They did, yeah.

Adam:

So, I mean, I remember you talked about a project that we were part of during M&E CAD Design, which was in America, wasn't it?

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

And that was a company that was probably trying to push prefab fairly early on weren't they? So would you say that our company was probably involved quite early on with prefab and we've sort of driven that forward in the company, and probably one of the people who got started on it first and pushed those sort of...

Matt:

I would say, I wouldn't try and claim that we were the company who started prefab or anything like that. I think there’s other people. I think we've got engaged with it very early and like you say there, when we worked in Brooklyn on Atlantic Yards, and it was at the time, I mean, that wasn't just doing prefab, that was modular build. So, we were working on that, and it was the tallest modular build in the world at the time, for a residential building. It was, I think, 34 storeys. And it basically come to site in like Lego blocks, but very large Lego blocks. So it'd be delivered, they were almost like Porta-Cabin sized units that were dropped into place and bolted together. But they came with the fully fitted out kitchens, bathrooms, everything was already made in there. And then they just clicked together on site. And that's how they constructed the building. So yeah.

Adam:

So I'm assuming there's like a major difference back then in modular and fabrication sort of standard practices as to now when we're doing a prison, for example.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

Sustainability is probably another aspect to it.

Matt:

Yeah. But going back there, one of the biggest changes from when we did that in Brooklyn was we were working in Imperial, which, Jesus that was a pain in the arse. I mean, just even working out the scale of something. Like working in metric and you say somethings the scale of 1 to 50 and it’s like, oh yeah, I know what that is. When someone tells you the scale is a quarter of an inch to two and a half foot. It’s like, what does that mean, it's just strange.

Matt: And then when you're talking about falls on drainpipes and we say it will fall 1:

40, and they're talking about it falling two thirds of an inch in whatever. It's like, it's just weird.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So, yeah. That was one of the biggest changes, I think, from doing that over there to working on prefab over here.

Adam:

So how long ago was that project?

Matt:

2012 maybe, something like that. But, I mean, I'll be honest, I've worked in prefab before that as well. But I used to work for NG Baileys. And I think they were one of the first companies to sort of get engaged with prefab. But back in the day then, it was very much, everything was standardised. And you had a frame to put pipes on, and it was a set size. It wasn't very flexible. So you'd end up with two pipes running on a frame that was 600 wide or something with two little pipes on it. And it was just trying to prove that prefab was the way forward.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

But now it's a lot more flexible now. And they're not just restricted with certain sizes of frames.

Adam:

Yeah. So...

Matt:

And then... Sorry.

Adam:

Oh it’s alright.

Matt:

No, no I was going to say and the prison what you touched on because I kind of didn't mention about that. A lot of the prefab on the prison was more to do with structural prefab as well. So, all the services had to be precast into the concrete walls. So there was a lot of collaboration between us and the structural guys. So all the walls come in panels and they kind of got dropped into place. But again, they had the services already fitted inside the concrete walls.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Because obviously with it being a prison, you're not allowed to have surface mounted pipes and equipment and everything. So everything's embedded into the wall. So, like I say, you had all these panels, and to build a prison you've got thousands of these panels. And every panel you had to sit down and get it signed off that the right services were in it, if there was a socket embedded it was at exactly the right height and everything like that. So it was pretty intense really.

Adam:

Yeah. And I suppose that's what we talked about the other day actually was about fire regulations and stuff as well, and just the advancement from when maybe we're talking about that American, Brooklyn project.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

And how BIM was then even when we were doing projects in the UK and how stringent stuff is now in BIM, could you have imagined that it would be that stringent now or what did you think it would be at this point?

Matt:

BIM’s definitely the way forward. And I would like to think that 80 to 90% of reputable companies are working in BIM now.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

I’d be surprised if they're not, but, I mean, what you're talking about with, I know what you're talking about with builderswork and fire regulations now, and it is. It's a nightmare. I mean, what we're finding now, especially on that, is that a lot of the time, the actual constraints around the builderswork is what's dictating the coordination of services.

Adam:

Right.

Matt:

Whereas we used to be able to put the services in and at the end you’d go, right, we need to put a hole around them to get them through a wall. And now you've got fire damper manufacturers saying the hole has to be this specific size to suit this specific damper. You've then got the wall contractor saying, I need so much space between the edge of a hole and the next hole or a wall to be able to actually construct the wall. You've got deflection heads on the slab above and things like this. And when you put it all into the mix, there's that many different things that it just becomes a nightmare. We're just on a project now. We've got to a point where you've got everybody sat around putting in there sort of two pence of what's the solution? And I mean, we had to just in the end say, look, we need to call a workshop on this and we need to get everybody involved. You need to get the fire officer involved. You need to get the damper manufacturer involved. You need to get the people constructing the wall involved. You need to get the people manufacturing the wall involved. You need to get all these people around the table because you’ll go off and you think you're doing the right thing. And then at the 11th hour, somebody will jump in and say, you didn't think of this though, and you'll be back to square one. So it's just a nightmare. Absolutely hate it at the minute that, I’ve got to say, the biggest bane of our lives at the minute.

Adam:

So maybe that's what’s sort of a negative to BIM sometimes is the amount of information that has to be culminated by a company like us is just... And then the differing opinions on stringent regulations.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

And spacing and builderswork.

Matt:

Yeah. Well I mean like I said before about collaboration, it's all about getting everybody together and collaborating to deliver a project well. But then sometimes you get back to the old saying of too many cooks sort of thing. You can get to a point where there's too many people putting their opinion in and you feel like the job's never going to get done because you can't keep everybody happy. Yeah. But, yeah.

Adam:

I mean, from what we've seen from, like, feedback from clients, I mean, BIMTech seems to be like in the BIM world, the people who do the most detailed models really. We were known for that so early on when we started taking over from consultants models. And now we're in this position where we come in early and where we want to come in now in the stage...

Matt:

Well, it’s the RiBA stages. I say we sometimes get involved now from stage three. RiBA stage three. We would normally have got involved at stage four, and going back to the old, that used to be four A, B and C, and we'd really been getting involved roundabout 4c.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

But now we're getting involved, like you say, sometimes at stage three.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Which is great because when you get to stage four, you start to think about build ability and maintenance for future assets and things like that. Whereas at stage three, that kind of gets overlooked a lot.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

But because we've got that knowledge and we get involved at stage three, we're kind of trying to bring that to the table earlier so that we're not going down a dead end, so to speak.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

With the modeling.

Adam:

Yeah. So I guess the other thing is, like, it’s been ten years. What could you see in another ten years? I mean...

Matt:

Hopefully I’ll be on that beach in another ten years.

Adam:

Well what I'm thinking as well is, BIM in general, like, I know we've talked about this previously in a podcast where we said, like, oh AI might come into it and Dynamo scripting and how it will be in ten years. But I mean, like we were talking about, there's so much stuff you have to coordinate at the minute. And I mean, we have a great team here. Like, thinking about when I came into the business in 2017, I mean, I came in 2016 as like an apprentice sort of thing. For like, you know, a short period of time. But, when I came in, it was one office in Prestwich, it was a team of about ten, maybe 11 people. And now we're at the position where we've got three offices, there's 40 employees. You know, there's a wealth of knowledge, there's a training scheme that builds people up from the ground up, from like graduates, and people who like me who didn't even know this was a thing BIM.

Matt:

Yeah.

Adam:

I suppose it's like. Well, did you from where we are now, I'm assuming you didn't expect it to get to this point. And then now we're pushing further on, what are your goals in the next ten years? Is it expansion?

Matt:

Take over the world.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Yeah, I mean, one thing I would love to do is get into the American market.

Adam:

Right.

Matt:

I mean, like I say we did work over there years ago. And then people I speak to over there now, they reckon, they say they’re behind the UK when it comes to BIM and everything. I don't know how true that is because we're not over there. But I would like the opportunity to get over there, find out and if they are behind, sort of try and help educate them and bring them up to speed.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

But yeah, that'd be good. There is other opportunities. I mean, at the minute we're sort of negotiating, trying to open other offices and things like that. So that'll be good. We're looking at working on joint ventures with like partnering up with companies and things like that. So there's plenty of things coming down the road that we can see and we'd like to get involved. One of the things we've just been looking at recently, you've been involved yourself with is the health and safety, trying to work with Richard Oxley to bring more health and safety into BIM. And sort of trying to identify, not just safety risks, but health risks early in the modeling process and identify them through the model so that people can understand what these risks are.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So it's just things like that. I can just see massive things that BIM can be used for. And, it will get there. I mean, it's already progressed massively. I think one of the best things ever was when the government mandated that it had to be used on all government projects, because that's where it slowly started filtering its way through to the sort of private sector.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Because there was that many companies using BIM, being able to say, look, we're proving now it saves money.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

It saves on waste materials and all these things that, the private sector were like, well, it’d be stupid If we didn't sort of take notice and get on board with it.

Adam:

Yeah. Well, I think that's a good place to finish off. I think we covered quite a lot there actually.

Matt:

Yeah. No, it's been good.

Adam:

Weird to think, I mean, I’ve nearly been here for, I've been here for eight years now.

Matt:

Wow.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Does that made you feel old?

Adam:

Yeah. It’s just weird to think. I mean, it's more what you said. It's like, you sort of blink and you’re down the line.

Matt:

It's gone so quick.

Adam:

It sort of shows to me. Like, I've been here for eight years. And to me, it's the kind of company you want to work for, you know?

Matt:

Yeah. That's good. That's good to hear.

Adam:

I'm not just saying that because you're next to me, by the way.

Matt:

No, well we have great team here. And I mean, that's one of the things like getting to ten years and just the appreciation we like to show for the guys because without them we've been nothing.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

I think one of the things you mentioned, like earlier was something about, what do you think maybe sets you apart from other

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

companies delivering BIM. And they might say the same thing but I would say is the people we've got, the people we've got are absolutely brilliant. They all come in, they give 100%. And we have a great mix as well. We've got young people coming up who are enthusiastic and they want to get involved. They're interested in new technologies and they want to get involved in all that. And we've also got the experienced guys who bizarrely, seem to thrive on the new technology as well. And they seem to love it and get involved. So we have a great wealth of experience with the senior guys. We've got the enthusiasm of the younger guys, and it just blends together great into a brilliant team. So grateful for having that team behind us, it just makes life so much easier.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Yeah. And then, on top of that we've got brilliant clients as well. I mean, the clients we're working with at the minute. I don't think I can think of a bad one we're working with at the minute, they're all great. They all seem to engage well with us. They appreciate what we do, and it just makes life a lot easier.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

And I guess it kind of all merges into one. Because that's the other thing for our guys, it makes it so much easier to come to work and do a good job when you know you're appreciated.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

So knowing our clients appreciate what we're doing is a big thing for us.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Yeah. We're so grateful for all the people who give us all our work and keep it coming.

Adam:

Keep it coming.

Matt:

Yep.

Adam:

BIMTech! Alright. Thanks very much.

Matt:

Thank you.

Adam:

Yeah.

Matt:

Well, cheers. To another 10 years.

Adam:

Yeah. Ahhh, that’s a good nonspecific beer.