Defining a Category: Reality Capture Analysis

As CEO of Avvir, I spend a considerable amount of time thinking and speaking about Avvir’s positioning. What kind of company are we, what problems do we solve, and how do we communicate the answers to those questions to our customers, partners and the general public? In my mind’s eye, the answer to the first two questions has always been clear. Yet it’s obvious to me from the many opportunities I’ve had to explain what we do, that that mental picture is not always getting across to others. 

Avvir enables clients to sync data from the field with their BIM, and automatically generates insights based on a comparison of those two data sets. When I explain this mission, the responses I get indicate that we’re immediately categorized as either a project management tool, some kind of BIM software, or  a “reality capture” company. But none of those descriptors really captures Avvir’s purpose or the value we bring to our customers. There seems to be a need for a new term to describe Avvir’s mission and the space we operate in. And I’d like to propose one. Avvir is a Reality Analysis company.

What is Reality Analysis?

Most people in construction today are familiar with the term “reality capture”. This term includes 360° photos, video walks, and LIDAR scans. But reality capture is really just the first step in a critical 4-step workflow that continues with data contextualization, analysis and insight generation, and finally action. 

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Reality Capture Workflow

‍The workflow consists of 4 steps. First data is captured in the field. To make the data useful it must be contextualized with other reality data as well as against some existing data scheme like a 2D map. Then the data must be analyzed and gleaned for insights. Finally, action can be taken based on those insights.  

For example, a project engineer might take a video walk of a site with a Ricoh Theta 360° camera. He’s just completed reality capture, but he isn’t done. He’ll then upload that video to a program like Structionsite that lets him contextualize the frames in space, digitally placing them on a map of the site. Ideally, he’d then examine the photo stills and use them to do something meaningful, like track a trade partner’s progress. Finally, he’d enter that information into a system like Procore where the project manager can then use it to determine how much to pay the trade partner that month. 

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The Reality Capture Spaces

‍Some of the companies that belong to each of the corresponding spaces in the reality capture workflow.  

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Unfortunately, today, the value being extracted from reality capture data is typically much more limited. Usually, those photos will just sit there. They might be consulted in the case of litigation down the road or shown to an owner to hand-wavingly communicate that progress has been made. But real insights are rarely gleaned. For some, the problem is that reality capture technology generates so much data that inspecting it is simply too big a lift. For others, it’s simply that they didn’t know what they could do with the data in the first place.

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Avvir performs that analysis automatically and delivers critical information to the right stakeholder when and where they need it. I’ve never consciously coined a phrase before but I do hope this one catches on. Because from here on out, when asked what Avvir does or what space we’re in I’d like to be understood when I answer, “we are the leading reality analysis platform in construction”. 
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- Raffi Holzer