Franki Construct raised the bar for project collaboration with Bricsys^® 24/7

Franki Construct is a Belgian construction company that specializes in multi-million euro civil engineering projects, including rail, road, and other critical national infrastructure.

At the heart of Franki Construct’s successful project delivery is Bricsys^® 24/7, a cloud-based Common Data Environment (CDE) that powers over 50 active projects. This has improved the collaboration, efficiency, and transparency on all construction projects. We spoke with Franki Construct’s Herman de Jager and Frederik Van Eerdenbrugh to learn more.

The Challenge

In 2022, Franki Construct was a key partner in a project to increase the capacity of the Albert Canal. The Albert Canal, the most important waterway in Flanders with an annual goods transport volume for 40 million tons, is crossed by 62 bridges. The project entailed widening the canal and raising bridges to ensure a 9.1-meter clearance above water level. This would allow ships with four layers of containers to navigate the canal, increasing the capacity of trade by 25% and reducing road traffic by two million trucks per year.

The project was highly complex and required a consortium of partners with specialized skills. Hye NV was responsible for the dikes and quay walls, Aelterman specialized in steel bridges, and Willemen Infra was responsible for the construction of the road. In addition to these three key partners, various other stakeholders were involved in the project, including architects, design offices, and subcontractors. The consortium needed a way to share important engineering and design documentation between all these stakeholders.

Managing such a complex project with so many different stakeholders required a tool that was both intuitive and efficient.

The Solution

Bricsys 24/7 was the ideal solution, providing a single platform for all project documentation. This allowed the consortium to collaborate effectively and deliver the project on time and within budget.

The Albert Canal project is a prime example of how Bricsys 24/7 is used to successfully manage complex construction projects. By providing a single platform for all project documentation and communication, Bricsys 24/7 helps to improve collaboration, efficiency, and transparency.

Van Eerdenbrugh notes that the metadata capability that Bricsys 24/7 offers is key to the success of complex projects at Franki Construct:

“When new people arrive on a long running project, they don't know the number or detail of the documents. But with Bricsys 24/7 they can search based on metadata and find all the related data and documents for a certain location, asset or discipline. That's one of the best parts of Bricsys 24/7 for us.”

Franki Construct uses Bricsys 24/7 workflows to organize approval procedures of the project. Bricsys 24/7’s built-in ability to create, edit and manage workflows to automate common document management and release tasks streamlined project management for Franki Construct, and reduced the risk of construction errors. Once a document was approved, it was automatically sent to the customer's platform, the Flemish Waterway. The Flemish Waterway was so impressed with Franki Construct's use of Bricsys 24/7 that they decided to adopt the software themselves.

The combination of automated messages between stakeholders and statuses on each document brought a significant increase in efficiency to the project. In addition, the administrators who initially implemented Bricsys 24/7 decided to use the same folder structure on each project. This ensured that everyone working on the platform understood their responsibilities and how their work contributed to the overall project.

Results

The use of Bricsys 24/7 on the Albert Canal project resulted in several positive outcomes. The cloud-based CDE made it easy for all stakeholders to access and share project documentation, which improved collaboration and communication. This was especially beneficial for the consortium of partners, who were able to work together more effectively and efficiently.

The automated workflows in Bricsys 24/7 also helped to streamline the approval process. This reduced the time it took to get documents approved, which freed up time for engineers and designers to focus on more creative and strategic tasks.

Unlike the adoption of other software solutions, which can cause disruption and slow a project during the adoption phase, Bricsys 24/7 does the opposite. It is quick to learn and will accelerate time to deliverable. De Jager commented:

"On a scale of 1 to 5, for the end user, it's 5. It's easy to use."

The centralized repository of project data in Bricsys 24/7 made it easy to track progress and identify any potential problems early on. This helped to improve transparency and risk management, which ultimately led to the project being delivered on time and within budget.

Bricsys 24/7 brought order and visibility to a project with many moving parts. It helped Franki Construct ensure that everyone was on the same page, documents were approved in a timely manner, and that the project was delivered on time and within budget.

To learn more, and discover the benefits of simple, yet powerful construction collaboration, get in touch today.