Perth’s BuildSort and Best Bar have formed a partnership to develop a blockchain powered construction data marketplace to enable just-in-time manufacturing for the building industry.
The ‘B-word’ is all abuzz around the world right now. Everywhere you look someone is building a blockchain of this, a blockchain of that.
Two other B-words – BuildSort and Best Bar – (or is that three B words?) have announced a collaboration to build a marketplace for the building industry using a blockchain application.
A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) has been signed between with Best Bar Reinforcements, Australia’s second largest supplier of steel reinforcement, and Perth-based BuildSort, in what is a first step towards what the founders believe will be just-in-time (JIT) manufacturing for the building industry.
“Our partnership with Best Bar will help us develop features which will remove administration-heavy processes for material suppliers, and give builders and contractors the facility to instantaneously order materials and receive them just as they’re needed,” BuildSort CEO and Co-Founder Chris Dorian said.
The claim is that BuildSort users – such as architects, engineers and builders – will be able to collaborate on projects to better utilise resources and reduce waste by an order of magnitude.
Building information models (BIM) and data of projects managed on the BuildSort platform will be securely traded with other parties so that they can provide a specific benefit.
In the case of a material supplier, information like a project’s material take-offs will be automatically used for instant material ordering. At the same time, BuildSort will aggregate industry-wide data to provide an accurate real-time view of material demand.
The enabling of JIT manufacturing can allow material suppliers to reduce inventory costs significantly.
For example, one study found that over a five-year period, American firms that introduced JIT gained a 70% reduction in inventory, a 50% reduction in labour costs and an 80% reduction in space requirements. (The Economist, July 2009).
“It’s our mission,” Chris said, “that the vast impact of these savings will be felt by both consumers building a new home, and commercial developers building a new school or hospital.”
“Concrete reinforcement supply is on the critical path for all construction projects. It is a crucial structural system and having a leading reinforcement supplier like Best Bar as a partner validates our market for material demand data and other benefits of the BuildSort platform.”
“It’s very exciting to partner with BuildSort on blockchain based JIT business processes,” Best Bar’s Australian General Manager Gavin Futcher said.
“Best Bar remains at the forefront of technology in the reinforcing steel industry with our ReoSend & ReoNet applications. These apps add more value for our customers and help project delivery to be on time, in budget and within spec while also easing the life of a busy project manager. Working with BuildSort is a natural next step and a great fit for Best Bar in our effort to remain the best value service offering in the marketplace.”
“We have always focused on innovation with our customers in mind,” said Dominic Da Silva, Best Bar’s Technology Manager, “creating an environment with customer-centric tools. We believe that BuildSort will extend what Best Bar already has, creating a seamless customer experience which will deliver real, measurable project savings.”
BuildSort is not Chris Dorian’s first startup, but has been a natural evolution from his successful and profitable Builders E-Commerce application which streamlined the home building approvals process.
“We are proud to have developed this important relationship with Best Bar on the road to achieving our mission of boosting construction efficiency and productivity worldwide,” said Chris.
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FEATURE IMAGE: From Left to Right – Aaron D’cruz (BuildSort, CMO & Co-Founder), Chris Dorian (BuildSort, CEO & Co-Founder), Gavin Futcher (Best Bar, Australian General Manager), and Dominic Da Silva (Best Bar, Australia Business Development and Technology Manager.
