Funded by: Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR) as part of the Zukunft Bau research initiative

Project duration: 03/2021 - 02/2023

With the increasing penetration of the BIM method in the German and international construction and real estate industry, standardized structures and specifications - both on a formal and content level - are necessary to ensure a clean and transparent description and communication of services within BIM projects. Such services are usually described by the client via BIM use cases within a client information request (AIA), whereby differences can be observed depending on the respective client and their experience with the BIM method. To counteract this, some institutions have started to describe their own best practice process in the form of BIM use cases and make them publicly available in order to be able to directly influence future developments and position themselves as first movers.

The Institute for the Management of Digital Processes in the Construction and Real Estate Industry at the University of Wuppertal has compiled more than 300 published BIM use cases within the DACH region as part of a research project, whereby the publishers can be assigned to different stakeholder roles within BIM projects. Based on an analysis of the research results, it was found that there is no uniform understanding of BIM use cases, neither in terms of structure, content and focus, nor in terms of scope or elements to be described: A simple use of the recorded BIM use cases in BIM projects is inhibited in this respect, as different understandings of BIM use cases and associated content and requirements of project partners can collide here.

The research project "Development of a standardized structure for BIM use cases" serves to develop a uniform understanding of BIM use cases by defining a uniform structure for BIM use cases in order to remedy the aforementioned issue. Structures for BIM use cases are developed both at the level of the individual unit (BIM use case) in the form of a standardized internal structure and at the system level in order to enable the selection of project-relevant BIM use cases based on classification properties. The top-down approach is used to proceed from macro to micro level, whereby mutual dependencies are considered and incorporated bidirectionally. Furthermore, requirements and other factors from solution approaches based on BIM use cases, such as Information Delivery Manuals (IDMs) or Model View Definitions (MVDs), as well as other non-technical application scenarios, are integrated on the basis of reverse engineering. By integrating the above-mentioned analysis results and various partners from the field, a certain degree of applicability and practicability is guaranteed.