Our 2007 Member Meeting is literally around the corner ... and we cannot wait for you to experience what we have in store for you!

Our three keynote speakers, Carol Pletcher of Cargill, Pam Flaten and Bryan Strawser, both of Target, will inspire you with their presentations safeguarding intellectual capital, EDI Standards and Assest Protection Innovations.

 

We will have presentations on all of our current projects, including: ADI ISO 15926, AEX, GVCC, BIM, Smart Chips, SbPP, and Automated Design.

Also at our meeting we will be unveiling our newest projects! Come and hear presentations on: Leveraging Technology to Improve Construction Productivity, Workflows and Data Exchange Between Architects and Precast Fabricators, Streamlining the Building Regulatory Process, Intelligent Buildings and Core Technology Competencies.

Our pre- and post-meeting workshops and training are open to everyone, even non-members! On Monday, Sept 17 we have two workshops: BIM & ISO 15926 Harmonization Workshop and Process Industry Information Handover Guide Workshop. September 20-21 we will host an ADI Training workshop. Space is limited on these pre- and post-meeting workshops and they are filling up fast! If you are a member and attend our Member Meeting, September 17-19, these workshops are included in your registration fee. If you are a non-member and want to attend these workshops, there is a separate registration fee to attend. Early Bird cut-off date is August 31. Register now and save $100!

The guaranteed hotel room cut off date is August 31, so reserve your room asap.

Amongst the presentations will be time to network with your peers. We will be having a welcome reception, at the hotel, on Monday night and on Tuesday we have a special treat in store for you! We will be having a private tour of the beautiful Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis! After the tour will be a private reception in the Target Lounge at the Guthrie.

Siemens and CSULB Join FIATECH

We are pleased to announce the new membership of Siemens and California State University at Long Beach to FIATECH! Siemens, headquartered in Berlin and Munich, is one of the world's largest electrical engineering and electronics companies. Siemens provides innovative technologies and comprehensive know-how to benefit customers in 190 countries. Founded more than 150 years ago, the company is active in the areas of Information and Communications, Automation and Control, Power, Transportation, Medical, and Lighting. The College of Engineering at the California State University, Long Beach, envisions a future where it is recognized as a premier public Engineering College in the nation and a leader in providing high quality affordable education, in a teaching-intensive, research-driven environment.

Improvements in Preconstruction Interoperability

Don Fornes, CEO of Software Advice, recently spoke with Ric Jackson, Director of FIATECH, about a new project that should improve preconstruction management for capital projects in process industries.

Seeking Volunteers for New Committees - See Who Has Signed Up So Far!

To engage more of the membership and obtain more feedback and input, we are seeking individuals to serve on the following FIATECH committees, which to date have been comprised strictly of members of the Board. The Board has designated the following four areas as critical to FIATECH’s success and would like to open up participation on these committees to the full membership. Below are those members who have already joined!

1. Strategic Planning Committee: Manuel Robledo, Target; Sandra Benson, Oracle and Ann Marie Walters, Bentley
2. Marketing Committe: Bobbi Wilson, Bentley and Valerie Musinick, OnTrack Engineering
3. Conference Planning Committee: Madelyn Cancel, Intergraph; Fran Rabuck, Bentley and Dr. Julian Kang, Texas A&M
4. Membership Committee

These committees will meet on Thursday, September 20 from 7:30am-11:00am at the Radisson in Minneapolis and then will report to the FIATECH Board of Directors from 11:00-12:00 on what their committee’s charter (goals, objectives, responsibilities, etc.) will be. The committees will meet face-to-face twice annually at the Technology Conference and Member Meeting and will meet via conference call as needed. If you are interested in serving on one of the committees or would like to discuss your involvement further, contact Nicole Testa at 202-669-3935 or testa@fiatech.org.

2007 Membership Elections At A Glance

Do you want to see, at a glance, all the projects our member companies are currently working with? We have made it simple for you to do just that!

Please take a look at our Member Election chart to view all participating companies. If your company is not properly represented, please email Nicole Testa.

FIATECH and VTT Co-Host Intl Roadmapping Workshop

FIATECH and VTT (a FIATECH member), co-hosted August 22-24 in Helsinki, Finland, an international workshop to align the FIATECH Roadmap with the European STRAT-CON Roadmap. The workshop was also co-sponsored by CSTB (link to their site) and CIB (link to their site) and included FIATECH representation from Bechtel, Texas A&M, Noumenon, Dow Chemical, Bentley Systems, and NIST. In preparation of the workshop, the FIATECH Roadmap teams were re-convened and asked to review and update their respective tactical plans. NIST also undertook the task this summer of mapping the nine element areas to begin synchronizing and aligning the element areas across various technology platforms. The findings from this workshop will be presented at the FIATECH Member Meeting and a breakout session will be held to discuss details and plan action items to pursue in the U.S. as well as with our European and Asian partners. For more information contact Nicole Testa at testa@fiatech.org or visit www.fiatech.org/events/summit/07/bground.html.

New Report Released from FIATECH and NIST

NIST and FIATECH have released a collaborative report, "General Buildings Information Handover Guide: Principles, Methodology and Case Studies"

Aligning AEX and RDL/15926

The AEX project is now updating their recommendations for the use of Reference Data Library (RDL) class identifiers with AEX equipment files. An example on how this is done is shown in a case study for a small part of a P&ID. Piping & Instrument Diagrams (P&ID's) are the core documents of any plant. Their primary role is to represent the configuration of the plant with:
 
* all plant objects with their primary class (the class that you can find in ISO 15926-4)      
* how these objects are interconnected
* how these objects are composed
* how certain objects are contained in other objects
 
For a closer look at at the case study, visit this page.

The RDL can be queried here: http://rds.posccaesar.com/ (POSC/Caesar's RDS project, in cooperation with FIATECH ADI).

Second Phase of GVCC Near Completion

Many project and industry workshops, panels, status reviews, and live demonstrations of working software have been conducted and hosted by FIATECH, PIP, and S&B Engineers and Constructors (one of the leading participants).  Please visit the FIATECH web page for additional details or send a query to Sharon Bickford, bickford@fiatech.org, for PDF versions of the presentations, documents, or prototypes. We always invite industry review and comments for improvement.

Once completed deliverables are received, project team members will validate the data, review the operational features, and test the functionality of the software before releasing it to FIATECH and PIP Members. This task could take 8-12 weeks to perform.

At the September 19 session at the FIATECH 2007 Member Meeting you will : See a presentation of PIP Valve Catalog and Editor; View a demonstration of Report Writer and Valve Matcher (preview of completed Phase 2) and be a part of the discussion on Phase 3.

BIM for Precast Concrete

The National Building Information Model Standard (NBIMS) is a set of interoperable standards for exchange of facility and infrastructure data through the life-cycle of a project.  NBIMS is a joint project coordinated by the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) in conjunction with many other facilities-related associations and software companies.

The objective of this work is to define the Information Delivery Manuals (IDM) and Model View Definitions (MVD) for precast concrete design, dealing with the use case exchanges between architectural design and precast fabricator.  The initial step will be to define the IDM use specification. Later, the MVD will be specified and communicated with software implementers.

For more information, please contact Chuck Eastman.

The Process Industries and the ISO 15926 Semantic Web

A comprehensive study, produced by Hans Teifgeler of OntoConsult, has been released that includes the design, engineering, facilities management and business processes software systems, and redundant paper records management across all of the facility life-cycle phases. Based on interviews and survey responses, $15.8 billion in annual interoperability costs were quantified for the capital facilities industry in 2002. Of these costs, two-thirds are borne by owners and operators, which incur most of these costs during ongoing facility operation and maintenance (O&M). In addition to the costs quantified, respondents indicated that there are additional significant inefficiency and lost opportunity costs associated with interoperability problems that were beyond the scope of our analysis. Thus, the $15.8 billion cost estimate developed in this study is likely to be a conservative figure.

Achieving Zero-Defect Projects Using Laser Scanning Technology Webinar, Sept 25 Presented by James McGill, Quantapoint, Inc. and Millie Brinkley, Quantapoint, Inc. Projects teams face a number of challenges when attempting to meet or beat project budget or schedule.  Some of the most substantial include significant field time and the time and cost of redrawing or remodeling existing field conditions data, the number of field welds due to inaccurate or unknown tie points and unidentified interferences during design from inaccurate or limited existing field conditions data.  What would the impact be on field and remodeling time if your team could access facility on their individual workstations for virtual site visits?  How would field welds be affected if you could access a detailed report containing an image, coordinates and even flange information for each tie point to use as a basis for design?  Finally, what would the impact on interferences be if you could clash proposed designs against actual field conditions on their workstations or could be provided with detailed reports containing an image, coordinates and suggested resolutions for any interferences before the designs were issued for construction?  This presentation will address how laser scanning be used to answer these questions and the associated benefits. Since the inception of our monthly webinars last summer, approximately 360 members have benefited from learning about up-and-coming technology in our industry. Being able to participate in the live webinars is a benefit only given to our members. So if you want to be sure to get in on the one in September, and you are not a member yet, contact us today about becoming one! Porter to Chair Where the Best Get Better in 2008 in the “Big Easy” Jim Porter, FIATECH co-chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Engineer and Vice President, Engineering & Operations at DuPont will chair FIATECH’s Annual Technology Conference and Showcase. Showcase space and sponsorships are now available for FIATECH’s 2008 Technology Conference and Showcase – Where the Best Get Better. Showcase now includes a speaking slot and one complimentary registration! Contact Tara Wilson to ensure the best showcase location and your choice of sponsorship at Twilson@EventsiaGroup.com or 713-337-1600.