One might assume that digital disruption has infiltrated all the industries today. But it turns out that construction has some serious catching up to do.

There is no shortage of business to be had. The construction industry, in fact, ranks as one of the fastest growing sectors globally. Statistics Canada reports investment in non-residential building construction totalled $14.1 billion the first quarter of 2018, up 3.1 per cent from the previous quarter. This was the fourth consecutive quarterly rise, leading to a 9.0 per cent year-over-year increase in construction investment. U.S. data shows similar growth rates.

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But there is a glaring shortage of tech innovation, says Samuel Godbout, vice-president of operations for Pharonyx at the Centech accelerator in Montreal, developers of a cloud-based and mobile tool for tracking and managing the progress of construction projects. “In 20 years, the construction industry has only gained one per cent in productivity, and is one of the last industries to adopt productivity technology. Most of what they do is still on paper or Excel sheets.”

Construction is one of the last major industries to be cracked with technology, confirms Lee Evans, CEO and co-founder of myComply in Saskatoon. Founded in 2015, myComply is a web-based safety and compliance service that allows contractors to verify and manage certifications of all workers on a job site through a mobile device.

The challenge for the industry to date has been the lack of infrastructure to support digital communications, Evans explains. “Construction sites are not like a traditional office space with good cellular connectivity and network cables coming into every office. Cloud and mobile access has improved so dramatically, they can now connect from remote areas.”

On the hardware side, the emergence of drones, augmented and virtual reality and IoT devices are providing many opportunities for forward thinking startups to get a foothold.

Keep reading in the Financial Post

 

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