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NEW YORK CITY-To those in the design, construction and building operations industry, the concept of cloud computing can have many different meanings, from servers to code to different devices – even the kitchen sink. But panelists at the 2012 Buildings NY conference agreed that the new technology could have a major impact on property performance and employee productivity as the workplace continues to evolve in the digital direction.

“It also facilitates greater levels of collaboration between users, which could be beneficial to multidisciplinary teams, which are very common in our industry, and particularly common when looking to build high-performance buildings as well,” said panelist Matt Ostanik, president of Submittal Exchange, a provider of integrated project collaboration software for design, construction communications and LEED project management.