Total cost management at the design stage using a building product model

Abstract

Most of the strategies to improving the total cost management of built environment products throughout their whole life are either theoretical and or technological centric.  The goal, however, is common in that they all aim at integrating and optimising the data generated by a multi-disciplined work force.  This has resulted in a paradigm shift towards effective deployment of information and communication technologies; resulting in related concepts such as �virtual building teams�. The virtual building team paradigm, inter alia , encourages product development participants to create and share comprehensive project data; mainly with a view to enhancing the �as built value� of a facility while minimising the negative impacts to the environment.  A myriad of techniques and technologies have been proposed for this task, amongst which building product modelling is but one.  Building product models play a pivotal role in the overall optimisation of built environment resources because they promote the use of non-proprietary data format to exchanging data pertinent to building products.  This research explores the extent to which building product models could facilitate total cost management at the design stage of a constructed facility.  It also envisages the trends and prospects of the Quantity Surveying profession in view of this emerging paradigm of building product models that are driven by industry foundation classes (IFCs).