BIMcontracts

Automated Payment and Contract Management in the Construction Industry Using Distributed Ledger Technology and BIM-5D

Application industry: Construction industry
Technology area: Blockchain/distributed ledger technology

BIMcontracts is developing a solution based on blockchain technology to simplify and automate contract and payment management in construction projects with greater transparency. This should speed up construction projects and avoid payment delays.

The baseline
Construction projects usually involve many different stakeholders, such as craftspeople, surveyors, project planners, and lawyers. The contractors are usually individually bound by contracts and often work in a nested hierarchy of subcontractors. The larger the construction project, the more complex and confusing the contract structures. Every contract entails many checks and processes, which in practice often lead to disruptions in the processes, causing payment problems throughout the chain and, at worst, even undeserved insolvencies.

The project goal
In the BIMcontracts project, an automated payment and contract management system is being developed and tested in concrete application cases with a construction company. The intended solution, the so-called BIMcontracts Demonstrator, is based on blockchain architecture and links this with digital building models (Building Information Modelling, BIM for short) and smart, automated contract processing (Smart Contracts). An example: A craftsman has performed a service and confirms this directly on the construction site using a mobile device. The building supervisor is automatically informed of this, and the inspector can now confirm performance or report nonconformity using the same application. Every project step is automatically logged and transparently documented. Once the service has been accepted, payment is automatically released. Blockchain technology ensures that all interactions are traceable.

Application and practical benefit
The solution is designed to make the overall contractual execution of construction projects more fail-safe, comprehensible, and trustworthy. This will particularly benefit small and medium-sized enterprises. For example, automating procedures can accelerate payment processes, which in turn improves the liquidity of companies and reduces the risk of bankruptcy. In this way, the overall economic damage can also be minimized.

Future plan include making the basic version of the BIMcontracts Demonstrator publicly available and to connect it to the BIM-Cloud, which is operated by the German Institute for Standardization. It is also conceivable that additional services or adaptations, for example, for civil engineering, could be developed and marketed.

Term: 1 August 2019 to 31 July 2022

Consortium: adesso SE (lead member), Ruhr-Universität Bochum, University of Duisburg-Essen, FREUNDLIEB Bauunternehmung GmbH & Co. KG, Kapellmann und Partner Rechtsanwälte mbB

Contact:
Sverre Nader
adesso SE

E-Mail:
sverre.nader@adesso.de

Website:
www.bimcontracts.com