Autodesk $240 Million Acquisition of Norway-Based Spacemaker Further Evidence of Global Tie-Ups In Buildings & Infrastructure

News of Autodesk's $240 million acquisition of Oslo, Norway-based, Spacemaker.AI offers the latest evidence of the maturation of Europe's Buildings and Infrastructure technology sector and the increasing trend toward international deals, as leading edge technology companies are cropping up far beyond early centers in places like San Francisco, Boston, and London and as the industry's growing tech players push to expand their customer bases, globally. The deal also highlights the growing importance of AI and Machine learning in this phase of technology dealmaking. An emerging leader in the field of AI and generative design tools for early-stage development and design planning, Spacemaker Founder & CEO, Havard Haukeland spoke at our Global Summit in Paris in 2019, and we identified Spacemaker among a list of promising European Startups in our 2019 European Report.

2019 European Annual Report
BuiltWorlds began visiting Europe in 2017, documenting the emerging Buildings and Infrastructure startup ecosystem there. In our 2019 European Report, we looked at promising startups, leading investors, and other major players across the European Continent.

Around the World, Deals Sizes Grow & More Companies Invest Internationally.

Autodesk's acquisition of Spacemaker is certainly not the first international deal in the AEC tech sector. Oracle's $1.2 Billion acquisition of Australia-based Aconex may still be the largest, and Bentley's acquisition of London-base synchro was another illustration of the trend. In the reverse, Nemetchek's acquisitions of Bluebeam is an example of a European firm buying an American firm. What appears to be different now is the pace of larger deals. Over four days, this past October, we covered international investment in the sector, looking at examples of earlier and later stage companies garnering growing international investment, not only in Europe, but also in places like South America, Australia, Israel, and Saudi Arabia/UAE.

Moving from Digitization of Workflows to Automation and Intelligence.

Early in the sector's technology transformation, the focus was on moving companies from Excel spreadsheets and paper forms and blueprints into cloud based, mobile-friendly systems with structured databases and workflows that would reduce labor associated with double-entry, lack of access to data, and the simple pains of printing, scanning, faxing, mailing, filing and otherwise managing paper.  In the last several years, the attention has shifted from moving processes online to leveraging Machine Learning and Artificial intelligence to gain faster and better insights from data to make predictions and to automate processes.  Spacemaker is one example of this growing breed of solutions, and we can expect to see a lot more from that group in the years to come, especially as older and more established firms look to incorporate those features into their own offerings.

 

Research and Lists Featuring Emerging Tech in AI and Machine Learning:

Watch Recent Discussion Sessions and Demos Around AI/Machine Learning:

Project Management

Analyst Call – Transforming Construction Project Management in the Age of Big Data

November’s first analyst call discussed how properly harnessed data has the potential to make construction projects safer, simpler, and more efficient through  — while wrongly interpreted project management data can […]

BuiltWorlds Session: Adam Cisler, Senior Solutions Engineer, Avvir

Adam Cisler, Senior Solutions Engineer at Avvir, took the time to join us at our prestigious 2023 Construction Tech Conference, where we engaged in an enlightening conversation about his past […]

BuiltWorlds Analyst Call: Future Workforce

The recording of this Analyst Call, which has hosted to address the pressing issue of the labor shortage in the construction industry, provided valuable insights into the challenges faced by […]

AI/ML - session video

Siavash Mohseni, Dir. of Innovation, DIVERGE – Calls for Focus on AI/ML in the Industry

Siavash Mohseni, Dir. of Innovation, DIVERGE – Calls for Focus on AI/ML in the Industry – Strengthens BuiltWorlds Conviction in new AI/ML Research Track Siavash Mohseni, Director of Innovation for […]

Demo Drop: BeeInventor

Harry Chan, CEO, BeeInventor delivers the IoT company’s demo at the first ever BuiltWorlds Tokyo Summit Demo Night Competition on 10/17,2023 at Kajima’s Annex building in Tokyo Japan. For those […]

BuiltWorlds Analyst Call: Generative Risk Mitigation

Today’s Analyst Call featured Georgia Stillwell, Head of Professional Services EMEA, for ALICE Technologies to talk through Generative Risk Mitigation; what it is and why it’s important. Before Stillwell began […]

2023 Americas Summit Keynote: Mark Whitson, President, DPR Construction

Mark Whitson, President, DPR Construction delivered his keynote speech titled “Where do we Want to go and Why Can’t we get There?” to kick off our 2023 Americas Summit that […]

BuiltWorlds Session: Chris Fortunato, Principal, CRH Ventures

Chris Fotunato, Principal at CRH Ventures made time to sit down with us at our 2023 Americas Summit for a quick chat about the state of the industry and what’s […]

Demo Drop: Kewazo

From our 2023 Americas Summit Demo Night Competition comes the popular vote winner in the Later-Stage category – KEWAZO and their COO, Artem Kuchukov. KEWAZO is a leading construction robotics […]

innovations

Analyst Call– Innovations in Infrastructure

This mid-October analyst call focused on innovations within infrastructure, with an emphasis on the various types of technology that provide value throughout a building’s full lifecycle. The call was facilitated […]

ABOUT BUILTWORLDS:

BuiltWorlds is the buildings and infrastructure industry’s leading platform for open innovation, keeping companies in the worlds of engineering, construction and related fields informed and connected, and helping them find avenues to collaborate for their own strategic success and for the betterment of the industry, as whole. For more information about BuiltWorlds, visit the BuiltWorlds Network