10 May 2017 | Herpreet Kaur Grewal
A new international organisation - the Built Environment Technology Association (BETA) - has been established to equip the real estate, construction, design, urban planning and facility management industries to better understand and use contemporary and developing technologies for the built environment.
BETA, launched by the International Facilities Management Association (IFMA) will foster collaborative relationships with companies, vendors and trade organisations; develop a real-time communication portal; commission research; and produce educational and training products for these transformational technologies.
The body will help navigate professionals through relevant technological frontiers including areas such as:
- Machines talking to machines through the Internet of Things (IoT)
- Smart buildings, campuses and cities
- Building automation systems
- Artificial intelligence and augmented reality
- Design, material and construction technologies
- Blockchain
- Cyber security
- The cloud, mobility and analytics
- The evolution of integrated workplace management solutions (IWMS)
- Building information modeling and collaboration tools
- 3D/4D/5D printing
- Drones
BETA will provide "a platform and a community for people to come together from all over the world to discover what technologies are available at every stage of the built environment". It will also create a think tank for the use of tech in the future. This community will include industry experts, end users and vendors from both the private and public sectors.
This year's annual flagship conference from the British Institute of Facilities Management, ThinkFM, will examine how technological advances are transforming the way the world works and how facilities and workplaces can be created, managed and developed.