Future Distributed Podcast

Full episode details can be viewed on the Future Distributed website. Can construction software be designed in such a way that it is so easy to use, no training is required to operate it? Torben Dalgaard, CEO of Dalux, believes so. Torben took over Dalux as CEO in 2009 and manages the company with hisbrother, Bent. Dalux is a BIM software that allows companies to manage the process of design, construction and even operations, digitally.In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question.- How can you build software so user-friendly that the users don’t need any training?- Why is the whole development team at Dalux based in one room?- How do manage a company that’s growing at over 100% growth every year?

This show comes from Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. Estonia has a really incredible reputation for being the ‘most digital society in the world’ and for this reason alone, it’s a place I’ve been wanting to visit for a long time. I sat down with Virgo Sulakatko. Virgo has a really interesting background. He currently sits on the Board at Novarc Group, one of Estonia’s leading AEC consultancies. He is also the Vice-Chairman of the Estonian Digital Construction Cluster and you’ll hear more about what that is in the show. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big questions, like:- How is the most digital society in the world approaching the digitalisation of their construction sector? - How can innovation thrive in a country where ‘everyone knows each other’? - What benefits can be sought when you have your national digital construction platform in the same system as your digital healthcare, digital taxes, digital voting? From a data perspective the opportunities are just mind-blowing! 

See full story on the Future Distributed website. Solibri are the market leaders in Quality Assurance and Quality Control software for the construction industry.Back in late 2019, I sat down with their Product Director, Juan Rodríguez. I really enjoyed our conversation about all things construction technology and product management. In this conversation you can expect to hear about: what the future of product development looks like at Solibri, which countries are advanced on their digital construction journeys.

Managing BIM in one of Norway's leading architectural offices is no easy task. This week’s interview is with Margarida Barbosa, BIM Manager at A-lab Architects in Oslo, Norway.Margarida has a PhD from the Technical University of Lisbon which focussed on As-Built Building Information Modelling workflows and, since completing her PhD, Margarida has worked mainly in Oslo, but also Dallas Texas with Beck Group - an experience which we talk about in the show.In this interview we talk all about how A-lab are innovating, specifically around Building Information Modelling and Computational Design.

Until recently, construction planning had been done the same way for decades. However, the last few years has seen a number of startups and smaller companies implement technology to try to gain more clarity over the planning and management of the construction process. In this interview, I speak with David Nash, Partner and Co-founder at Laminar Projects, a consultancy-turned-software house focussing on construction planning. LinksLaminar ProjectsBook Recommendation: Man’s Search for MeaningLinkedIn ( David Nash | Will Needham )

Managing building information modelling on a large-scale infrastructure project is not an easy task. In this episode I spoke with Armin Khagebahri, BIM Manager at WSP, working on the client-side of the New Slussen Project in central Stockholm. It was great to hear about the innovative methods they are using to manage cost and risk on the project. 

Full details available on the Future Distributed website. Discussing the Future of Mobility with an expert in the field, Raphael Cavalcanti. We spoke while Raphael was in between roles, but he’s now started his new role as an Urban Mobility Strategic Advisor for Nova Mobility Consulting. So as you might’ve guessed, this episode is all about Future Mobility and the impact this might have on our cities. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question. Is there a one-size-fits-all solution for urban mobility in our cities? How can cities prepare for the changing demand for new mobility modes?Which startup in the Future Mobility space has caught Rapha’s eye?LinksBook Recommendation: Guns, Germs and SteelLinkedIn [ Raphael Cavalcanti | Will Needham ] Liked this episode? Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platform.

I want to start this week’s show with a big thank you to everyone that’s listened to any of the episodes so far. We are now on episode 16 of Series 1 and it’s fair to say I’ve learn a lot! Both about podcasting but more importantly about how different built environments operate across the Nordic countries. I hope you’ve enjoyed listening and I hope you’ve got something useful out of the episodes so far, and if you have I would be really grateful if you could leave a 5 star review on whichever podcasting application you use as it really helps other people find the show. Now onto this week’s show which was recorded late in 2019 when I was in Helsinki, Finland. I spoke with Sami Sahala, who focuses on Smart Cities and Smart Mobility at Forum Virium, the City of Helsinki’s Innovation Department. As you will hear, Helsinki has always been a leader in future mobility solutions and as such, Sami is a busy man, often presenting their work to other global cities that visit Helsinki to learn from their expertise. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big questions, like. What are the most important considerations when launching a city open data platform? Is open data of lower quality useless?  Or can it still be useful for decision-making? What is Helsinki, the city that gave rise to the Mobility-as-a-service concept,  focusing on now?

Did you know Stockholm produces more Unicorns* per capita than any other region in the world after Silicon Valley? * Unicorn - privately held startup company with valuation over $1 billion. So what makes Stockholm so special? Well, this week's guest is certainly in a great position to answer these questions. I sat down with Anna Gissler, the CEO of Invest Stockholm. Anna has worked closely with the City of Stockholm for nearly 20 years. Related: missed last week's episode about Stockholm's award-winning Smart Cities project - GrowSmarter? Listen again here! In her current role, she works to promote Stockholm as a world leading innovation hub for foreign investors. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question. What makes Stockholm one of the best cities in the world to start a startup? What makes Stockholm one of the leaders in Smart Cities? And what do people mean when they say Stockholm is ‘A Woman’s Place’?   If you would like to explore business opportunities in this hot-bed of innovation in the heart of the Nordics, feel free to contact myself or Anna who will be happy to help out. LinksInvest StockholmArticle: Why Does Sweden Have So Many Startups? Article: Beyond Spotify and iZettle: How Sweden became Europe’s capital of startup exitsLinkedIn [Anna Gissler, Will Needham] 

Stockholm won the 2019 Smart City Award for it's role on the GrowSmarter project. Before receiving this award, I interviewed Lisa Enarsson, a Project Manager who has been working on the GrowSmarter project since it started, over five years ago. The project testing the roll out of 12 smart solutions which are discussed in the interview, and was funded my the European Commission's Horizon 2020 funding call.In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question. How can existing buildings be retrofit to be ‘smarter’ and much more energy efficient? What are some of the outcomes of this flagship smart-cities research project in Stockholm? What are the next steps in scaling the lessons learnt from this project to new cities around the world to maximise the impact.  LinksGrowSmarter Project Final Report: Recommendations for Policy Makers and PractitionersFinal BrochureFact SheetsLinkedIn [ Lisa Enarsson | Will Needham ] Liked this episode?Note: intro music by Vidian. 

Hear about the story of how the Digital Advancement Academy was set up to address the industry digital skills gap, from Iain Miskimmin of Bentley Systems. Links:Real Leadership: Through the HeartPlain Language BIM by Iain Miskimmin  LinkedIn [ Iain Miskimmin | Will Needham ] Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platform.Note: intro music by Vidian, also if you purchase anything from the links in this article, I will receive a small percentage from Amazon, at no extra cost to yourself, which helps to support the show! 

This week’s show comes from Helsinki, Finland. I speak with Teemu Lehtinen. Teemu looked after the KIRA-Digi programme…This is one of the most amazing programmes of built environment innovation I think i’ve ever come across. Over two years the Finnish government invested €16m in 139 ‘experiments’ within the built environment. Inspired by the Lean Startup methodology, companies ran their own experiments in areas such as robotics, artificial intelligence and BIM and tested hypotheses about whether their innovative ideas could be valuable to the Finnish economy. Now Teemu leads the KiraHUB team and if focused on scaling these innovations to make real-world impact. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big questions, like:What happens when you run 139 built environment experiments over the course of two years? How do go from experimentation to scaling innovation? What are the effects of globalisation on the Helsinki Digital Construction landscape? I really enjoyed listening to Teemu in this interview and I hope you enjoy his wisdom too! So without further ado, let’s dive into the interview with Teemu from Kira-HUB. 

On this week's show, I take a deep-dive on Data Templates in the Construction industry with Lars Fredenlund. Lars has been right at the forefront of the industry push towards to use of data templates on projects.As the lines between design, manufacturing and construction are blurred more than ever, it's clear that data templates play a really key role in making the exchange of information between these phases efficient and scalable. To make this happen, in 2020 Lars is part of the working group that will launch the CEN/ ISO standards on Data Templates.In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question like:  What does the future hold of data templates within the construction industry?How can a new CEN/ ISO Standard provide the backbone for consistent data sharing and international collaboration on construction projects.Which are the most advanced countries in Europe on the digitalisation journey and the reasons for this?  As you will hear, Lars isn’t afraid of telling it like it is and has some really interesting perspectives to share. 

What does it take to turn a smart building into an Empathic Building? This week’s show comes from Helsinki, Finland. I speak with Tomi Teikko. Tomi works for the Nordic IT Services and Software Company Tieto, but as you’ll hear, Tieto are not your traditional IT company. Tomi is responsible for bringing to life the Empathic Building concept which you’ll hear a lot more about in this episode. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big questions, like:. How can a building be Empathic? Productivity in a smart building is difficult to measure, so what else can we measure?  How do you encourage building occupants to give feedback? Links:Empathic BuildingBook Recommendation: Applied Empathy: Discovering the Tools to Remove Obstacles, Solve Problems, and Gain PerspectiveLinkedIn [Tomi Teikko, Will Needham]Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platformNote: intro music by Vidian.

This week’s show comes from Helsinki, Finland. I sat down with  Paloma Bautista, the Chief Operating Officer of a startup called CHAOS Architects. CHAOS is building a smart city intelligence platform and working closely with a number of high-profile clients here in the Nordic countries, as you will here. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question like: How can we ensure human feedback in central to any smart city platform? How do we create sustainable cities, for everyone?  How can we measure the social impact of a development project? Links:Chaos ArchitectsBook Recommendation: Connecting the Dots: Leadership Lessons in a Start-up WorldLinkedIn [Paloma Bautista Sánchez, Will Needham]Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platform

This week's show is all about how Data Trusts and Project Data Analytics can help us deliver construction projects more efficiently. Full show-notes can be found here, on the Future Distributed website. I sat down with Martin Paver, CEO of Projecting Success and the Founder of the Project Data Analytics Community in the UK. Martin has over 30 years of experience in project and programme management across a variety of industries and is a Fellow of the Association for Project Managers (APM). In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question like: How can you build a community of over 4000 members all driving towards positive industry change? How can we maximise the impact derived from industry hackathons? What is a data trust? And how will data trusts impact the future of our industry? Links:Martin's company Projecting SuccessProject Data Analytics Meetup Groups [London, Bristol, Aberdeen]Book Recommendation: The Technology Fallacy.LinkedIn [Martin Paver, Will Needham]Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platform. Intro music by Vidian.

This week’s show is all about Generative Design & Reality Capture in the construction industry. The episode comes from Copenhagen, Denmark and the famous BLOXhub coworking space for urban innovators.I sat down with Niels Falke, the CEO of HD Lab. HD Lab is a forward-thinking team of designers, programmers, engineers and they specialise in a range of services including automated design, as-built scanning, scan-to-BIM and much more as we’ll hear.In this episode, we’ll be answering some big questions, like: What are the similarities between generative design and self-driving cars? How do you manage intellectual property within automated design?What are HD Lab’s plans for the future?   Links:HD LabIntegrating Project Delivery – Martin Fischer, Howard W. Ashcraft, Dean Reed Atul KhanzodeLinkedIn [Niels Falk, Will Needham]Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platform.Intro music by Vidian

This week’s show is a little bit different! I’ve spent the last week in Barcelona at the Smart Cities Expo World Congress - the biggest Smart Cities conference in Europe. It was a mind-boggling extravaganza of cities, technology, citizens & powerful ideas! What I loved about the conference, was that: as well as the normal technology vendors that you normally see at these kind of events, over 700+ Cities and Municipalities were also represented - so that was really cool! You should check out my Twitter (@future_dist) and my Instagram Stories to catchup on everything you missed. So for this week’s episode… I’ll bring you two interviews recorded live from the event.First up, you’ll here from the Global Public Sector Lead at Nokia - a company we know is ever-present in the 5g and hardware space, but as you will hear, they are increasing their reach into the services and system-integrator role. Next up, you’ll here from the FIWARE Chief Marketing Officer Cristina Brandtstetter the CEO of Bettair. FIWARE  is an open-source initiative defining a universal set of standards for context data management which facilitates the development of Smart Solutions for different domains. One such Smart Solution is that of Bettair - a platform that maps urban air pollution within Cities - you will also hear from Leonardo Santiago - the CEO of Bettair. Make sure you head over to FutureDistributed.org for all the latest content, remember to tell your friends and colleagues that this show is available to listen to for FREE in any app that supports podcasts. If you like what you heard today, make sure you like and subscribe and follow my daily journey on Instagram (@thefuturedistributed). And finally, have you ever heard the phrase ‘the Future is Here, it’s just not evenly Distributed Yet’ - well let’s do something about that. Intro music by Vidian. 

This week’s show is all about managing innovation within large incumbent businesses and it comes from Copenhagen in Denmark! I speak with Line Lyst the Director of Innovation at the large Danish AEC consultancy with over 15,000 employees! In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question. Why does Ramboll monitor over 1000 startups in the AEC industries? How is innovation managed in this large, incumbent engineering consultancy with more than 15000 employees? How does the Innovation Accelerator ensure that good ideas earn revenue from real clients as early as possible? Thanks a lot to Line for her time and sharing her experience in managing innovation with large incumbent organisations. Hopefully there's a lot of useful takeaways for the listener - let me know if you enjoyed the episode! Links & more information: More about the Ramboll Innovation AcceleratorBook Recommendation: I'm Afraid Debbie From Marketing Has Left for the Day: How to Use Behavioural Design to Create Change in the Real WorldAlso mentioned: The Mom Test: How to talk to customers & learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to youLine Lyst (Linkedin)Will Needham (LinkedIn)Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest, or simply share the URL on your preferred social media platform. Make sure you head over to FutureDistributed.org for all the latest content, remember to tell your friends and colleagues that this show is available to listen to for FREE in any app that supports podcasts. If you like what you heard today, make sure you like and subscribe and follow my daily journey on Instagram (@thefuturedistributed). And finally, have you ever heard the phrase ‘the Future is Here, it’s just not evenly Distributed Yet’ - well let’s do something about that. Note: Intro music by Vidian. Note: some links in this article are affiliate links. If you click through and purchase, I earn a small percentage at no extra cost for you.

More information available through the Future Distributed website. This research lab focuses on the digitalisation of oil and gas operations and is (in my opinion) one of the most advanced research programs on infrastructure digital twins - mainly because the oil and gas sector has been doing ‘digital-twin’-type applications for more than 20 years. In this episode, we’ll be answering some big question like:  What can we learn from the Oil and Gas sector who have been developing ‘digital twins’ for over 20 years? What are some of the current research challenges being tackled by the Sirius Centre? How is the centre collaborating with industrial partners to put this expertise into practice? Digital Twin links & more information: More About the Sirius Labs @ University of OsloSirius Labs Beacon ProjectsSirius Labs Research ProgramsDavid Cameron (LinkedIn)Will Needham (LinkedIn)Liked this episode?Hover over the image below and click on the Pinterest logo to Pin to Pinterest: Make sure you head over to FutureDistributed.org for all the latest content, remember to tell your friends and colleagues that this show is available to listen to for FREE in any app that supports podcasts. If you like what you heard today, make sure you like and subscribe and follow my daily journey on Instagram (@thefuturedistributed). And finally, have you ever heard the phrase ‘the Future is Here, it’s just not evenly Distributed Yet’ - well let’s do something about that. Intro music by Vidian.