A DETAILED STUDY ON THE PRE-CONTRACT VDC PROCESS OF SINGAPORE PRIVATE SECTOR DESIGN FIRMS

Abstract

The benefits of Building Information Modeling (BIM) is evident in the construction industry and many countries, including Singapore, has welcomed the use of BIM through the government’s requirement of BIM in many projects. Although some larger firms in Singapore have adopted BIM, its use is only limited to certain components of the supply chain. Understanding that BIM has more potential when utilised through the project lifecycle, the government has encouraged the VDC methodology, taking BIM as its main platform, to establish cohesiveness and collaboration from the design stage to the end of the building’s lifecycle. Yet, it is essential for the VDC framework to be implemented in the design stage, which is lacking currently. The purpose of this study is to discover the current implementation of VDC framework in the Singapore design consultancy firms, and more importantly, improve the rate of adoption of VDC. Moreover, the root causes of Singapore’s status in pre-contract VDC adoption is examined, as well as how the individuals in the industry perceives VDC. A survey was conducted to achieve the research objectives and gather information to validate the hypothesis of VDC not being widely adopted by the Singapore private sector design firms. The data obtained from the survey will be analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. Case study is carried out to validate the tangible effects of utilising VDC and to examine the accuracy of the survey findings. The main findings from the survey depicts that VDC is not widely adopted in the Singapore consultant firms. The main reasons were due to “resistance to changes”, “many changes in organisation” and “time consuming”. This implies that most of the reasons were psychological and the case study supports this by illustrating the benefits of VDC when design firm is willing to utilise technologies and BIM for collaboration.