buildingSMART Virtual Summit Autumn 2021, hosted by buildingSMART International, was officially opened at 3pm Beijing time on September 27, 2021.

Since 2013, buildingSMART has held a twice-yearly technical summit (Spring Summit/Fall Summit) organized by buildingSMART Chapters. The purpose of the summit is to bring together different Chapters, international members, business representatives and users to focus on openBIM, BIM standard preparation and research will be carried out in forums such as construction, railway, infrastructure, technology, product, airport, construction and management, so that openBIM standard and concept can be better applied and serve in the design, construction and management of the whole life cycle of construction projects. In the past two years, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the buildingSMART Summit was moved online.

The opening day began with an opening introduction by buildingSMART's International Marketing Director, Aidan Mercer, followed by welcoming remarks from buildingSMART International Chairman Patrick MacLeamy and International CEO Richard Petrie and a brief report on the latest developments at buildingSMART.

As the platinum sponsor of the Autumn Summit, Dr. Wang Haishan, Chief Expert and Chairman of JCC, delivered a keynote speech on the opening day titled "Standards Leading, Certification Empowering, Win-Win Cooperation - Helping Enterprises' Digital Transformation and High Quality Development of BIM".

Dr. Wang Haishan introduced the rapid development process of China's construction digitalisation and highlighted the importance of national quality infrastructure. He pointed out that the current digital transformation has brought unprecedented opportunities and challenges to the world, and that there is an urgent need for the industry to improve the relevant standards, to solve the challenges of high-quality development of engineering digitalisation through testing and certification and other conformity assessment activities, and to enrich digital engineering to convey trust in services and trade between industries. With the rapid development of digitalisation, JCC is committed to "becoming a facilitator of digital transformation in the engineering construction industry and a provider of quality assessment of data assets". He called on the industry to join forces and establish an open standard and conformity assessment system based on the openBIM concept, which is mutually recognised internationally. With standards as the leader, we will empower digitalisation through certification, strengthen international exchange and cooperation, and contribute to the improvement of global digitalisation capabilities and the development of international trade in services!

On the third day of the summit, JCC held a roundtable forum with the theme of "Standardisation, Conformity Assessment and OpenBIM". The forum brought together BIM experts from buildingSMART's international headquarters, China, Switzerland, Austria, the Railway BIM Alliance and Tsinghua University to discuss how to unite the strengths of buildingSMART's various divisions to promote global conformity assessment activities through standardisation and openBIM technology, and to help global enterprises' digital transformation and BIM quality development.

During the forum, experts from different countries agreed on the need for a healthy and sound behavioural framework to drive the rapid development of the buildingMART brand. In response to the roundtable theme, Wei Lai, Secretary General of buildingSMART China, spoke about the importance of maintaining and developing the buildingSMART brand in the Chinese branch and the need to promote the openBIM concept in the Chinese market, and advocated that the openBIM technical system should be closely integrated with specific projects to form a closed-loop mechanism, relying on professional services such as certification with the China Construction Association Certification Centre to promote the development of the openBIM concept in China. It also advocated that the openBIM technology system should be integrated with specific projects to form a closed-loop mechanism, relying on professional institutions such as the China Construction Association Certification Centre to provide certification, training and consultancy services to promote the development of openBIM concept in China.

Afterwards, Sheng Liming, Secretary General of the Railway BIM Alliance, gave a detailed presentation on the digital development of rail transport in China, pointing out the vast BIM market in China and emphasising the importance of the Alliance's cooperation with buildingSMART and the CCA Certification Centre in the railway sector. Richard Petrie, CEO of buildingSMART International, agreed with this, pointing out that there are plenty of opportunities in the BIM market in China, and suggested establishing cooperation from the railway sector first.
 

Huang Shuang, Head of Operations of buildingSMART China, also spoke about the vast market for personnel certification in China, and that the China branch is promoting the openBIM competition, hoping that more people will learn about openBIM through the competition and that the openBIM concept will take root in China.

Mr. Li Xu, Manager of the Digital Engineering Department of JCC, talked about the importance of using buildingSMART as a platform to promote global conformity assessment activities, and said that JCC as a professional certification body for construction enterprises, will strengthen cooperation with all divisions to help the high-quality development of the openBIM concept.

With regard to the promotion of the openBIM concept in institutions, Professor Gu Ming, Director of the Institute of Software Engineering at Tsinghua University's School of Software, Birgitta Schock, Head of buildingSMART Switzerland, and Christian Schranz, Head of the Digital Construction Centre at the Technical University of Vienna, all mentioned that the current curriculum and textbook content in schools As a result, there is little understanding of the openBIM concept and the concept is not uniformly perceived. The experts therefore also re-emphasised the importance of establishing and promoting a unified openBIM framework, which is the only way to better promote the development of openBIM theory on the basis of a unified certification.

The Autumn Summit will last for a fortnight. In addition to the keynote speeches and roundtable discussions, the summit will be divided into nine working groups for standards development and discussion during the summit, in accordance with past practice: infrastructure, compliance, airports, buildings, construction, products, railways, technology and transactional work. There will also be an online awards ceremony for the buildingSMART Global openBIM Awards 2021 during the summit, so you're welcome to join in on this exclusive global BIM event!