The inaugural Construction Innovation Forum concluded successfully on Tuesday following a series of thought provoking debates involving big name companies on some of the key trends and challenges confronting the construction sector in the Gulf today.
More than 150 construction industry professionals gathered at the Westin Mina Seyahi hotel in Dubai for the half day event, which was held in association with Cimolai Rimond and under the patronage of the UAE Ministry of Infrastructure Development.
The theme of innovation ran through the entire programme, starting with a keynote speech delivered by Dhaen Obaid Almheiri, Chief Innovation Officer at the Ministry.
The headline panel saw representatives from a number of leading companies – including Cimolai Rimond, Daemaar Group, Al Shafar General Contracting (ASGC), Thomas & Adamson and Sobha Group – discuss the challenges and opportunities facing the construction sector as Expo 2020 Dubai approaches.
The second panel produced a lively debate about the nature of sustainable building practices in the Gulf. Experts from Cimolai Rimond, Multiplex, AESG, Arcadis, BuroHappold and Linesight shared their insight on the topic which is one of the three central themes of Expo 2020 Dubai.
After the networking coffee break Justin Whitehouse, Managing Director | Indirect Tax Middle East, at Deloitte delivered a presentation on the implications of incoming VAT for the construction sector. He concluded with the message that companies should waste no time in preparing themselves for the tax which is all but certain to be introduced at the beginning of 2018 in most parts of the GCC.
The programme continued with a panel on the growing role played by technology in construction. As expected BIM was central to the discussion between experts drawn from six leading companies – Trimble, Bentley Systems, Autodesk, Aecom, Faithful+Gould and ALEC Building.
The event concluded with a discussion of building fire safety in the UAE, which mainly focused on the implications for construction industry stakeholders of the recently introduced fire safety code of practice. Fire safety experts from AESG, NICEIC and Transpro took to the stage to give their thoughts on the topic.
The Construction Innovation Forum was held in association with Cimolai Rimond with platinum ally Du, developer partner, ARADA, gold allies Daemaar Group and Hill International and silver ally BASF.