CONSTRUCTION OF PERMANENT CAMPUS FOR IIT Palakkad, KERALA

The Indian Institute of Technology, Palakkad Kerala, was established in 2015. Having begun with just 120 students in July 2015, IIT Palakkad has since grown into an institution that is about 1,200 students. IIT Palakkad aims to become a multidisciplinary institution with 5,000 students by its 10th year. They decided to construct a permanent campus at IIT Palakkad from scratch. 

The main intent of this ongoing initiative is to create an environment that enables students and faculty to engage in the pursuit of knowledge. This will enable them to dream, think, and innovate, becoming change agents for a better world. They initially had problems in organizing and managing their project meta-data, as well as miscommunication with the stakeholders. Which led to poor resolution, data loss, and decreased efficiency. They felt the data was not safe and secure in cloud software.

1) Constructing a permanent campus is a long terms project as the IIT Palakkad started it from the scratch, this is no easy task. From 1,200 students to 12,000 students at capacity.

2) A master plan was developed and started with the Phase-I plan, which is a tenth of the total plan, The volume of the work and project document produced will be millions of metadata and many stakeholders are involved. IIT Palakkad needed a tool to organize, arrange, store, and retrieve documents whenever required without any data loss.

3) The engineering team at IIT Palakkad wanted to provide all the construction data to the future generation so they will be able to make informed decisions about the campus' development.

4) Major initiatives in any large construction firm are to make all stakeholders agree on the common Data Environment and BIM technology.

IIT Palakkad wanted a tool for a better data management system that collaboratively works with the design project, quality control, safety, stakeholders, and overall cost control. The organization decided to implement Autodesk Construction Cloud solutions, which help in connecting stakeholders across the scope of projects and the organization. 

The initial implementation was really challenging. Autodesk and Microgenesis technical teams helped in implementing the software at IIT Palakkad and with their engineering and construction firms. They assisted us with integrating Autodesk Construction Cloud with other design software. 

The Customer will benefit from the savings in time and the reduction of errors on project sites. Autodesk Construction Cloud helps them create a folder structure with permission levels even allowing them to lock/unlock files. Folder-level access control at any time, quickly updating different versions, and comparing the versions file at any stage is essential for managing all construction work. All related data— including drawings, models, and checklists are stored in the background. Users manage project challenges and create issues for review and rework. Multidisciplinary teams work together to create common data environment solutions and build design process – Project Management - all in one place. Collaborate with your team anytime anywhere.

With Autodesk Construction Cloud solutions, IIT Palakkad no longer has a paper-based workflow, NO drawing file sharing in emails, and NO version confusion, and they have totally eliminated data loss. Now they can review 2D drawings, 3D models, and documents from any device, keeping all relevant stakeholders updated on the latest project information. As a result of the successful implementation of Autodesk Construction Cloud, they benefited from a reduction in construction costs, a reduction in construction time, less paper usage on-site, improved quality, and quicker resolution. Raising the issue in a common data environment helped our engineering and construction firms to understand and respond immediately added value to the project.

Post construction, the project data that are stored in the cloud are organized and ready to retrieve for rework. Future projects like sewage treatment plants, water treatment plants, and renewable energy plants can benefit from this insight. Large cloud-based change in government organizations isn’t easy, but with the right plan and partnerships, it is done well. With Autodesk solutions, everyone is in sync, connected to the projects, and receives real-time notifications for the internal and external project teams. Project communication is streamlined. Accelerating project delivery, our engineering and construction firm also implements Autodesk Docs as standard practice for their other projects.

“CII Digital Transformation DX 2022 Award for EWD, IIT-Palakkad” 

The Engineering Works Division (EWD) of IIT Palakkad has received the CII Digital Transformation DX 2022 Award in the Innovative Best Practices category for “Common Data Environment and Building Information Modelling”. 

"MicroGenesis technical team helped us in every way. Whenever we needed support, they were able to resolve the issues immediately and we look forward to continuing to work with them in the future."

 - Dr. Senthilkumar. V, EWD Chairman at IIT Palakkad, Associate Professor.