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Innovation and Digital Transformation in Focus at Oracle Industry Connect
The energy inside the New York Hilton Midtown matched the weekday bustle on the Manhattan streets outside as Oracle Industry Connect unfolded in April with record attendance for the Construction and Engineering program. Participants immersed themselves in innovation from start to finish, absorbing and discussing insights from presentations showcasing business transformation and real-world customer success.
The knowledge-sharing event began with a keynote address (watch on demand) from McKinsey Partners Steffen Fuchs and Gernot Strube setting the stage for digital transformation in the E&C industry - painting a picture of urgent need and unprecedented opportunity. Fuchs shared that productivity lags in the E&C industry cost the global economy approximately $1.6 trillion annually – roughly equal to the GDP of Canada. One key to closing that gap is technology, with digital transformation offering the potential to improve productivity by as much as 15%. The McKinsey team also shared compelling examples of digital innovation in the E&C industry, including a leading real estate development company that introduced 5D building information modeling (BIM) and achieved $25 million in cost savings from original project estimates while avoiding 3,000 design clashes, and reducing masonry by 20%.
A wide range of breakout sessions followed the General Session and continued throughout the event, offering insights on customer success, project delivery trends and best practices across a range of industries. Programs focused on themes as diverse as improving project outcomes using technology such as drones and autonomous vehicles, to a lively discussion on customers’ experience with Oracle Prime Projects Cloud Service in improving outcomes in field collaboration, Lean scheduling, and capital planning.
A dominant theme at the event was the need to navigate the challenge of investing in an organization’s core business while anticipating and delivering new business models. During a panel discussion on innovation (watch on demand), David Wilson, chief innovation officer for Bechtel Corporation, defines his role as “disrupting with intent,” and said that his guiding principle is, “How do we create a better experience for our builders?” Wilson explained that his organization thought they had a technology problem, but, in reality, they faced a process challenge. “The real question is, ‘How can we reshape processes now that we’re unencumbered by paper?’”
Also featured was a talk from Darren Bechtel, founder and managing director of Brick and Mortar Ventures, who presented his vision on the “Dawn of the Digital Era for the Built Environment.” His venture capital firm has tracked more than 500 start-ups in the E&C technology sector and sees innovation accelerating as the technology matures and the need to improve productivity through innovation becomes ever more pressing.
For more from Oracle Industry Connect, check out our recaps of day one (blog, video) and day two (blog, video).
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