Time Travel Can Happen on Construction Sites

SAN FRANCISCO—As technology slowly gets a foothold in the commercial real estate world, artificial intelligence is taking on an increased role in the process. AI has gone from its basic form, self-correcting and learning as it receives more information, into more complex tasks such as scanning documents, detecting market anomalies and discovering untapped value creation/investment opportunities.

And now, the technology has a new audience in the building and construction industry. Builders and construction workers can now travel through time to look at the first week, month or year of a project, as if viewing it in-person once again. Using an artificial intelligence framework, OpenSpace gives construction industry workers the ability to move backward and forward in time, creating a visual record more complete than memory or any written document.

“Office workers have had the ability to create, edit, share and revisit their work for a long time, but that has never truly existed in the construction industry,” said Jeevan Kalanithi, co-founder of OpenSpace. “That’s because creating, storing, searching, localizing and indexing visual data from the real world has never really been possible until now. It’s our mission to build great AI software that enables construction workers to do more.”

OpenSpace is compatible with commercially available consumer 4,000-pixel 360-degree cameras. Workers attach the camera to a standard hard hat, which allows workers to record video of everything they see naturally while walking a job site. The video is then uploaded and OpenSpace automatically stitches together hundreds of thousands of videos frames. The company’s patented AI technology then creates a single record. This fills accountability gaps, helps close RFI updates and promotes security inspections.

Once a worker completes a walk through, OpenSpace charts the path around the job site and transfers that path directly onto digital plans. When the video is uploaded, OpenSpace then enables the entire construction team to see a 360-degree photographic view of any point of interest.

“We are working with firms such as Turner Construction, Hathaway Dinwiddie and others now, and have signed up more large builders in the last few weeks. Our solution is open to all firms,” Kalanithi tells GlobeSt.com. “OpenSpace has obvious application to the builders themselves, but we have seen interest from many people and organizations including real estate developers and owners, asset managers, insurance companies and even power plant inspectors. Anyone whose job relies on accurately tracking and managing the real world could benefit from a technology like OpenSpace.”

Open Space has secured funding from Lux Capital, Foundation Capital and the National Science Foundation, among others. OpenSpace was founded by Kalanithi, Philip DeCamp and Michael Fleischman, three former classmates at MIT, and veteran startup founders and technology executives.