Technology is developing at an exponential rate, and while architecture still moves significantly slower than the latest transistor, things are picking up.
The Architect’s Newspaper (AN) speaks to tech experts Craig Curtis of Katerra (Katerra’s approach could make factory construction a model for the future) to learn more about the revolutionary changes that are in the pipeline for the construction industry, and Dennis Shelden of the Digital Building Lab (Talking about our tech future with the Digital Building Lab) about how we’ve gotten to this point, and what’s next.
We also profile several incubators and accelerators behind some of the most influential design and AEC technology start-ups that promise to revolutionize the construction and architecture industries. AN profiled the following:
The MINI-owned URBAN-X in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, a younger incubator which leverages its assembled experts to guide startups through a semester-long program;
Digital agency R/GA, long a major player in the advertising field, has carved out spaces in all of its offices for accelerator space and given startups an easy way to hit the ground running;
ZeroSixty, a three-month design-and-technology-focused incubator program, was launched by Gehry Technologies to help bring disruption to the AEC industry;
The one-stop shop Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator, which gives its members access to makerspaces, fabrication labs, and plenty of research space across a 60,000-square-foot campus;
Georgia Tech’s Digital Building Laboratory, which has already released a suite of programs that architect’s (especially those who use BIM) have already come to rely on;
The advanced offices of the Autodesk BUILD Space, one of the company’s best tools for keeping up with the rapidly changing worlds of architecture and design;
and New Lab’s 84-000-square foot flagship collaborative tech hub in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
The interviews and profiles were originally printed in our April 2018 technology issue.