Hansen Yuncken is Supercharging Efficiency with Connect for Autodesk Construction Cloud

Hansen Yuncken is one of Australia’s largest commercial building contractors. Recent projects include the University of Queensland’s Plant Futures Facility and the Port Adelaide Government Office Development, which was awarded a 6-Star Green Star Design and As-Built Rating.

With a history going back more than a century, the firm has been at the forefront of innovation, not least with its ongoing commitment to digitalisation.

“Hansen Yuncken’s technology mission is to use innovation that promotes teamwork, making it faster and easier to communicate and coordinate complex information,” adds Chris Rosetto, BIM & VDC Manager.

As part of its focus on technology, Hansen Yuncken has been using Autodesk Construction Cloud and its predecessor, BIM 360, for more than a decade.

“We have full buy-in to the ethos behind the Autodesk platform,” says George Darroch, Digital Technologies Coordinator. “We like that it’s a cloud-based, centralised common data environment (CDE) that empowers collaboration.”

George and the wider Operational Technology team at Hansen Yuncken work to deliver Hansen Yuncken’s digital strategy, including the implementation of digital tools used by the business.

Adapting the technology to meet business needs

George notes that while Hansen Yuncken leverages Autodesk Construction Cloud and other Autodesk solutions, over the years, the company has augmented its functionality with plug-ins and third-party solutions.

“We’ve used Autodesk technology to manage our projects for more than 10 years, but we also use other tools to support our client requirements. So how do we allow these platforms to work together and also use Autodesk Construction Cloud wherever possible?” he asks.

George knew that in most cases Autodesk Construction Cloud has the capability to perform the processes that Hansen Yuncken needs it to, but these can be ‘supercharged’ by integrations and APIs, enabled by ACC Connect.

He likens these integrations to a ‘secret menu’ at your favourite restaurant.

“We reached what some might think is 100% of Autodesk Construction Cloud’s capability,” he says, “but there’s actually this secret menu of all these other actions – things you can do programmatically by using the API.”

Hansen Yuncken’s culture of innovation

Innovation is central to Hansen Yuncken’s way of working, says George, and the business actively cultivates its teams’ digital capabilities through upskilling and development.

“Previously I was working in a site coordination role, but I became interested in our systems. The business was well aligned – it wanted to expand its focus on digital capability, and that meant there was an opening for me to work in the digital space,” says George.

As well as working on the integration of the various tools used by the business, the Operational Technology team started to identify opportunities to improve processes for their colleagues working across all Hansen Yuncken’s departments.

“You have to do some doing, but we balance that with creating, improving, bringing change, and supporting the people who ‘do the doing’ all day,” says George.

“They don't have that resource to sit back and think, ‘how can I make this easier for myself?’ They just have to do it, butwe get the privilege of thinking about how to make their jobs easier.”

This is where the integrations available through ACC Connect come in. Thanks to the low- and no-code capabilities of the platform, George was able to create customised integrations and workflows that met the precise needs of Hansen Yuncken’s teams.

“I don’t have a coding background, but with ACC Connect that barrier to entry is low. With minimal introduction to the platform and some self-guided learning, I was able to come in and gain familiarity quite quickly,” says George.

Supercharging Autodesk Construction Cloud through APIs

The range of processes that Hansen Yuncken has been able to optimise spans the whole construction lifecycle, from schematic design management through to onsite delivery and client handover.

Managing Autodesk Construction Cloud project members

Adding new members to an Autodesk Construction Cloud project is a routine task that requires administrative access. However, when those needing access are onsite while administrators are in the office, how can the process be streamlined to avoid unnecessary delays?

The solution, swiftly implemented by George, was to automate the request process almost instantaneously, introduce self-service tools, and accelerate the approval process.

Users can now scan a QR code, which triggers a web form for the user to fill in. Dynamic controls mean that users can only select from a pre-configured list of roles, reducing the chance for error. Of course, there is still the chance for mistakes, so a review step involving a manual check is still in place.

The simple automation of this process has led to significant time savings onsite, George estimates – reducing the process from often taking several hours (and sometimes days) of waiting, to mere minutes. But more significantly, it has made the process easier for everyone involved. “We’ve removed several steps in the process for the end users,” he says. “I’m interested in the technology behind it, but for our staff onsite, none of the technical aspects are particularly important to them. All they need to know is that they don't have to do [those steps] anymore.”

Connecting Autodesk Construction Cloud to Aconex

Hansen Yuncken utilises Aconex as its master document register, but it also needed to ensure that all workflows in Autodesk Construction Cloud have access to the necessary documents.

Maintaining two document management systems in this way presented several challenges, says George.

Mitigating these challenges had, in the past, led to a reliance on manual processes, which were not only time-consuming but also prone to errors.

“The solution was clear,” says George. “We needed a seamless, automated solution that could mirror Aconex documents into Autodesk Construction Cloud without the inefficiencies of manual updates.”

To create the solution, the team took advantage of both platforms’ APIs to create a one-way sync between Aconex and Autodesk Construction Cloud – any updates made in Aconex are automatically pushed to both the Sheets and Files sections in Autodesk Construction Cloud.

“The solution not only improved efficiency but also ensured that all project stakeholders had immediate access to the latest documents, significantly enhancing collaboration workflows within Autodesk Construction Cloud,” confirms George.

UNSW Health Translation Hub

As part of one the largest projects that Hansen Yuncken is currently working on – the UNSW Health Translation Hub – George and his team developed an asset tracking methodology using Autodesk Construction Cloud.

More than 5,000 façade components assets were tracked at every step of their journey – from overseas manufacture and transportation, through to import, assembly, and installation.

Tracking was achieved by assigning each individual asset a unique identifier and QR code. Stakeholders throughout the process were able to rely on a single source of truth in Autodesk Construction Cloud.

“ACC Connect was a critical piece of the puzzle, allowing us to enable disparate stakeholders to contribute to the cloud asset model,” says George.

“Where users in the supply chain weren’t able to be readily onboarded to the Autodesk platform, we could rapidly deploy an Excel spreadsheet integration to retrieve complex shipping dates and delivery information. ACC Connect allowed us to be flexible and bring data from Excel into Autodesk Construction Cloud in real time, ensuring that shipping statuses on the individual façade assets could be seamlessly updated by users outside of our Autodesk ecosystem.”

"ACC Connect allowed us to be flexible and bring data from Excel into Autodesk Construction Cloud in real time, ensuring that shipping statuses on the individual façade assets could be seamlessly updated by users outside of our Autodesk ecosystem.”

George Darroch, Digital Technologies Coordinator, Hansen Yuncken

Unlocking Autodesk Construction Cloud’s full capabilities

For George and the rest of the Operational Technology team, continuous innovation enables them to consistently enhance processes and deliver improvements for their colleagues.

“It’s a privilege to contribute to process improvement,” says George, “ Many people onsite don't have the time or resources to step back and consider how to make their jobs easier because they’re focused on the demanding work at hand. That’s where we come in. We have the opportunity to take a step back and ask, ‘our project teams are all working toward the same goal – how can we make it easier for them?’”