Scan to BIM usually comes to us at the moment the drawing office is already fully booked and a point cloud of an existing building or installation is sitting on the server waiting. The file is large, the delivery date is fixed and the drafters who would build the model are tied up in ongoing work.
That is exactly the point at which a client approaches us. We take over the modelling work that follows from the scan, so your own team can stay focused on the substantive side.
We draft and model; we do not do engineering and do not give structural advice. Our role is to turn supplied material into a usable model and into drawings that match what is actually there. That is done from our own office, with our own licences, following the drawing conventions the client gives us. The team scales with the size of the assignment. So for us, scan to BIM is not a standalone product but a form of outsourced drafting with a fixed point of contact.
Cable tray routing in the model, built with parametric families that carry the material schedule with them.
When outsourcing scan to BIM makes sense
Outsourcing scan to BIM makes sense as soon as the volume no longer fits the staffing of your own drawing office. A point cloud of a complete building produces days of repetitive modelling work, and that work is hard to spread across people who also have to serve ongoing projects in between. We take over that part. You keep the substantive choices and the coordination with the end client in your own hands, and we build on what has been supplied. There are also situations in which your own team is better off keeping the work.
If it concerns a small object with a lot of project knowledge that is not recorded anywhere, the handover takes more time than the drafting itself. If the core of the assignment lies in decisions only your own engineer can make, outsourcing solves nothing, because we draft and model and do not do calculations. We simply say so in the first conversation. The balance tips as soon as the work contains repetition. Recurring facade openings, floors with the same build-up and pipe runs that use the same components throughout the building are the parts where we gain speed and where your own drafter is relatively expensive.
A date that cannot slip is also a reason to act, because we can add people from our existing team straight away without anyone having to be recruited first. A client who has doubts starts small. We then take on a clearly defined part of the scan, deliver it and show how accurately and how quickly we work before the larger part follows.
The cost side of scan to BIM
What scan to BIM costs depends on the size of the point cloud, the level of detail you need and the extent to which the building or installation repeats itself. We work on an hourly basis or at a fixed price per project. We decide together which form it will be. If the scope is sharp and the material complete, a fixed project price is convenient, because you know in advance where you stand. If it is still unclear how much of the scan is usable, an hourly basis is fairer, because no risk premium needs to be built into the price.
We only bill net working hours. If a drafter steps away for five minutes for coffee, the clock stops. Meetings that have nothing to do with the drawing do not end up on the timesheet. We work without prepaid hour bundles and without a monthly hours subscription, so no hours keep running in a period when there is no work. Nor do you carry ongoing payroll costs, and in case of illness or holiday we replace someone so the work carries on and no lost weeks disappear from the budget.
What keeps costs down is above all preparation. A properly registered scan, clear drawing conventions and a template that works save hours on our side that would otherwise go into investigation. Reuse also lowers the total, because a smart component that has been built properly once then recurs everywhere without being drawn again. We give a reasoned estimate of this in the first conversation, based on the material available at that point.
No ongoing payroll costs and no idle staff once the peak is over. If one of our people is off sick or on holiday, we replace them and the work simply carries on.
Which clients scan to BIM is relevant for
Demand for scan to BIM comes to us mainly from engineering firms, architectural practices, contractors and manufacturers, and more broadly from companies with a lot of technical drafting work. The people at the table are managers, team leaders and owners. They rarely have a substantive problem with the model, because they can handle that perfectly well themselves. What is on the table is capacity. There are too few hours, there is a peak the in-house team cannot absorb, or there is a vacancy that just will not get filled while the work keeps coming in. At an architectural practice, it is often an existing building being renovated whose drawings no longer match reality. At a contractor, it is more likely to be installation sections that were rerouted during construction and still need to go into a model. A manufacturer is more likely to be looking for an accurate model of an existing set-up to which a new machine has to connect.
In all three cases, the answer is the same: someone who does this type of work every day needs to take it on. Everyone who works for us has more than ten years of CAD experience, and Sam, our team leader, leads the technical side and project supervision. For you, that means one fixed point of contact instead of a series of separate contacts. Barry, our project manager, is usually the first point of contact for a new enquiry, after which Sam takes over the technical side. Our clients are in the Netherlands and our focus is on the Netherlands too, so meetings happen without a time difference and in the same language. In practice, that makes more difference than it seems on paper.
From first conversation to partial delivery
A project starts with a conversation in which we go through the project. The client supplies the details and usually also existing drawings that need revising, in addition to the scan itself. We look at what is usable, where the gaps are and which drawing conventions apply. Those conventions come from the client; we adapt to them, not the other way round.
With enough information, we can start right away. We then deliver in stages. That is a deliberate choice, because a model that only becomes visible at the end also only prompts discussion at the end. By presenting a first part early, we gather feedback on level of detail, naming and structure, process it and continue with the rest.
The rhythm varies per client. On a fast-moving project, we meet every two days; on a calmer one, weekly. Files go back and forth by email. On larger projects, we work with software where you can log in and follow the project, so nobody has to ask in between how far along it is. Every part goes through at least three review layers before it leaves the office.
A drafter produces the work, a second team member checks it, Sam then reviews it as team leader and Barry goes over it last as project manager. As a result, errors stay to a minimum in practice. We respond to a new enquiry within 1 to 2 working days, after which we decide in that conversation what is needed to get started.
Frequently asked questions about scan to BIM
Hand your scan to BIM modelling over to us
Send us your documents and drawing conventions and we will let you know within one to two working days what we can take on and when.