The Revolution in Quality and Cost Calculation

The Design2Cost solution from Nemetschek moves quantity determination and cost calculation forwards in leaps and bounds. Design2Cost not only integrates the Building Information Model and the TAI solution, Design2Cost also consists of intelligent content for the designer and the cost estimator, as well as the construction logic to manipulate complex relationships between the different construction components.

With Design2Cost, users not only obtain CAD, cost planning, TAI and construction data from a single provider, but can also achieve considerable increases in productivity and profitability. This makes Design2Cost far superior to traditional cost estimation and calculation methods.

Software

Design2Cost combines Nemetschek's CAD software Allplan BIM, a TAI solution and Nemetschek's Allplan IBD (Intelligent Building Data). The TAI solution acts as an interface between Allplan, the TAI solution and the Allplan IBD. The exchange of all relevant information is ensured enabling the creation of well-founded bills of quantities, including a quantity framework for cost calculation and tendering. Allplan IBD is a flexible building database consisting of CAD libraries and building elements containing predefined components with the corresponding items of work and price information.

Content

Design2Cost creates the bridge to an integrated design and cost management process and increases your efficiency by integrating knowledge databases and Intelligent Building Data. The Intelligent Building Data consists of optimized CAD component libraries for Allplan BIM with the appropriate element descriptions for the positions and calculation rules for quantity take-off. Not only does it provide building components, textures and symbols, it also offers perfectly configured building elements.

Methodology

Design2Cost provides different standard calculation methods. The cost calculation can be carried out using cost indices, comparison projects, priced bills of quantities, national standards, and construction elements. Cost elements can either be defined by the designer or estimator or may even be drawn from national price databases that contain construction work items. Whichever method is used, the seamless integration of the Design2Cost solution provides an extremely efficient basis for precise costing no matter what design phase the project is currently in.

Conclusion

The Design2Cost solution marks the first major improvement in the quantity and cost calculation process.The integrated approach supports the tendering and accounting process and thus enables information to be shared across disciplines. This results in reduced workload, ensuring information flow and improving the quality of information in the form of analyses. Not only are the tasks of draughts persons, estimator and schedulers incorporated, their changes are traceable as well.

Both the designer and the cost consultant can work more efficiently and accurately – reacting quicker to construction variations and changes to the design, enabling them to provide more qualified cost information to all parties involved in the project.