How Deep Space is Empowering Mid Sized Builders with Luke Johnson

Andrea Ciaffi

Hi, Luke, welcome to the Digital Construction Podcast.

Luke Johnson

Goodnight, mate.

Andrea Ciaffi

In this episode, we sit down with Luke Johnson, co-founder of DSpace, to explore how AI platform and tech startups are reshaping the delivery of projects. We'll also talk about what it really takes to drive digital adoption across one of the most complex industry, the construction industry.

Andrea Ciaffi

But before we start, Luke, I have an asperger for you. What is the best piece of advice you've ever received in your career?

Luke Johnson

Someone told me, don't fall in love with your creation. So when you're building things and you think something's really cool, sometimes you can get blinders on and you can really start to ignore what reality is. And it kind of ties in with the thought of not letting ego rule some of your decisions because otherwise you're in a state of reaction and not necessarily thinking strategically.

Luke Johnson

So those two things have really Helped me in my career, yeah.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, and your career, Luke, has been very interesting because you started from being your BIM guru, BIM specialist, and then eventually you became a founder. So you've done lots of different things in your life. But looking back at your career, what moments most shaped your perspective on how we do digital?

Andrea Ciaffi

In construction.

Luke Johnson

Yeah, I think some of those things are really, I like to think of mistakes that I've made and those as really learning experiences. And so very early on, I was a draughts person in the early CAD to BIM days, and we were drawing a stairwell.

Luke Johnson

And I draw everything and, you know, went out to construction and things. And then eventually you find out, oh, the stairwell is a bit too narrow. for whatever reason, you know, because of the building code.

Luke Johnson

And so that helped to reinforce to me that, you know, the things that we're doing in this virtual space, they're going to become a reality and they have to, you know, really meet the needs of what's out on site. The other one that I, it was another learning experience was when I was doing BIM coordination, clash detection on a hospital project.

Luke Johnson

And I had discovered lots of clashes and sent out lots of reports. And then the project manager said to me, why do we have a clash on site? And I said, I've sent all the reports. He said, no, you needed to communicate to me these things because now I could have stopped paying these subcontractors and we could have sorted things out a different way.

Luke Johnson

And that showed me that. You know, communication of some of these things is so important to get that virtual coordination out onto site.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, definitely. And of course, you worked in multiple BIM roles and sometimes you work in BIM, think, I should start my own business, I should start my own tech company. But how do you, what do you think, how do you think this role prepared you?

Andrea Ciaffi

The role in BIM prepared you to actually start and found a tech company?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, it gives you some good steps or leaps forward, I guess, when you're in BIM in a traditional BIM role. Often the solutions are not readily available and you have problems to solve and maybe they're big problems and so you have to quickly build some scripts or solution or some workflow.

Luke Johnson

And so that's how you kind of I guess learn, oh, I can build things that are useful. It's a different step then to go into founding a tech company, but there's kind of a linked skill set.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, definitely. And it often starts with the problem, right? So you feel there is something that is bothering you, but what was the problem that kept on bothering you enough that you knew you had to solve it?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, one of them was issue management or, you know, basically that communication issue we talked about earlier, because going back maybe 10 years, maybe a little bit more, there wasn't really many good solutions to actually, you know, discover some problem in the 3D environment, communicate it, track it to completion.

Luke Johnson

There are good solutions out there now. But back then, it was some really antiquated ways of like trying to turn these model clashes into something that gets actioned. And so that was a big problem. And it does tie back into a broader issue of communicating, you know, status and getting things closed out.

Luke Johnson

Later, so maybe Five to 10 years ago, data management became the bigger problem. We're generating so much data in so many different platforms and over so longer periods, but it wasn't getting managed very well, it wasn't getting captured or checked. And so that was a bigger problem, I think.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yes.

Luke Johnson

And that was one that we really attacked in deep space initially.

Andrea Ciaffi

And for somebody hearing about this space for the first time, how do you describe it?

Luke Johnson

It's an all-in-one AI construction management software and it has a kind of backstory in design and BIM management, but the current product is really targeted around mid-sized commercial builders and solving the whole construction business really in one platform.

Andrea Ciaffi

And sometimes we think about all of the, when you launch a new product in the market, you're probably trying to solve a pain point and address an issue. But when you start to thinking about this deep space, what type of industry pains convinced you that a unified platform was necessary?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, unified platform is necessary because people have a lot of app fatigue. So they have so many different apps and, you know, they have to install them, they have to manage them, they have to cheque them. It becomes very tiring and they, you know, ultimately something gets forgotten or missed.

Luke Johnson

So that's one problem. The other one is the silos of data that are getting generated. and they're not connected, they're not talking to each other. And so it's very hard to capture the whole context in one view. And so those two issues actually tie into basically higher costs and implementation issues, which are complexities that come from having too much software in your business.

Andrea Ciaffi

And when we think about all of the different stakeholders in the construction industry, we have engineers, consultants, we have builders, and even within the category of builders, we have the small one, the medium one, the large one. And sometimes we tend to think that the mid-sized builders tend to be a little bit more underserved by the current tech.

Andrea Ciaffi

So my question is, one, would you agree with that? And 2, why do you think is there underserved at the moment?

Luke Johnson

I think it's definitely true that they're underserved. I think that that issue has come about because SAS companies, you know, gravitated towards, let's say, large checks. You know, they wanted to get big renewal numbers. And so those dollars were coming from tier 1 contractors.

Luke Johnson

And, you know, you only had to have a few of them to kind of keep your SAS company alive. And so they generally didn't kind of focus back down into that mid-market. Now, that's kind of led to the situation we're in now. If you look at that mid-market, you know, you have typically one general manager or one kind of owner of the business.

Luke Johnson

They're very, very busy. They don't have a large team focused on tech. You know, they may not even have IT people in-house. They're trying to make quick decisions that, you know, result in the best approach for their business. And so really they, you know, they're hungry for something better, but it needs to be a right fit and it needs to be easy enough for them to implement.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, and when you think about starting a new, like a startup for the construction industry, it's a very tough space because one, it's an industry that is very resistant to change and you always really need to balance innovation with practicality because they want to see results very quickly.

Andrea Ciaffi

But when you started this journey, what surprised you the most about launching a Tech startup in the construction industry.

Luke Johnson

Yeah, I mean, we did it the way a similar a lot of companies start is we had a consulting business that had clients, we solved a problem, we turned it into a product. But then you eventually realise the difference between that consulting model and a proper software as a service model is very, very different.

Luke Johnson

You know, a SaaS model has to be a repeatable process. You have to have a lot of potential customers, you have to reach them, you have to implement quickly. Whereas in a consulting model, you have fewer customers, you spend a lot of time with them.

Luke Johnson

And I think a lot of startups trip over at this point because it's quite jarring to make the switch from this consulting model and into a proper SaaS model for your business.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, and when you think about what's difficult from the founder point of view, what are the biggest barriers that you think founders face when they try to sell technology to contractors or small builders?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, that word selling is a bad word, you know, in construction, isn't it?

Andrea Ciaffi

Mm.

Luke Johnson

And a lot of the times you sit with, you know, perhaps someone you want to sell to, and they've been promised a lot and a lot of people have under-delivered over the years, you know, so they feel a bit burnt out. They feel a bit burnt out from, you know, trying something and spending some money that's failed in the past.

Luke Johnson

They're also very time poor. So those are some real challenges. But what it comes back to is establishing trust. We've spent a lot of time working on getting face to face with customers, meeting them in person, even if they're a two, three hour drive, we've been going to visit them.

Luke Johnson

And that's really a way to establish this level of trust that we can help you and your business in the long term.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, and sometimes as a founder, you kind of have to sell a vision, right? You just, you can say, yeah, here is this thing that does the same thing that you were doing before. You need to sell a vision so they can jump on board.

Andrea Ciaffi

But how do you balance these visionary ideas with the real world job site realities that they have to face?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, we've lived through it. So our CEO, Ricky, he put together a really nice integrated prototype and it was it was a it's a beautiful vision to show people of like how your entire business is under this one roof.

Luke Johnson

But when it then comes down to it and we're implementing now with real customers, it's more about, you know, individual workflows, what they're doing today, how it's going to help them today to do, you know, site notes and meeting minutes and manage their documents.

Luke Johnson

And so you have this kind of this big picture of this is what things are going to be like and it's going to be a good result. But this week and tomorrow and next month, we have to actually solve the real workflows that.

Luke Johnson

you know, people are dealing with, otherwise it won't be sticky enough.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, and now I really, I'm very keen to hear your point of view when you when you start thinking about adoption of technology, because I think it's a pretty fragmented tech ecosystem with different products trying to do different things. We have cultural and technical barriers, people are not ready, people that don't want to implement it, now we also have the eyes making.

Andrea Ciaffi

things even more complicated. And when you speak with tier one companies, they of course, they need to make sure that they sell the vision to their clients and say that they are adopting technologies. But from your point of view, what's the current state of technology adoption across construction companies?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, I think Tier 1 are facing some really big challenges because they have adopted quite a lot of software over the past decade or so to the point where they're now trying to reduce their software stack. So that's a real challenge because they have, you know, established systems and thousands and thousands of staff.

Luke Johnson

So how are they going to do that? You know, how are they going to migrate into a simpler future. That's one problem. They also have internal pressures because they have so many staff. People are excited about building the solution for the business, you know, and building it in-house for us, you know, for these tier 1 contractors.

Luke Johnson

And sometimes that then becomes unstuck because they spend a lot of money, a lot of time, they build something internally, they don't realise how hard it is to maintain that or scale that. And then sometimes those initiatives, you know, can lead to some disappointment.

Luke Johnson

Tier 3 and kind of this mid-size, they have quite a unique opportunity because some of them are coming off paper. Some of them are coming off spreadsheets. They don't have a lot of software typically, maybe one or two things. Maybe they've got a safety platform and maybe some kind of correspondence or CRM platform.

Luke Johnson

And so they can make changes quicker and reshape their business for the future. In, in, in a very short, you know, frame of time, which is pretty cool.

Andrea Ciaffi

And sometimes when you look at the different companies, you can see for anyone who has worked in any companies in construction, you will see that there are different teams that have different level of maturity in terms of digital maturity. And some teams adopt digital tools, some teams develop digital tools.

Andrea Ciaffi

But from your point of view, why do some teams embrace new tools while others? To resist them, or try to resist them.

Luke Johnson

I think it has to come down to leadership. And, you know, I've been a part of businesses and I've worked with people in businesses who are incredibly innovative, but they just are at the certain level of their role where they can't influence or they can't make it happen across the business.

Luke Johnson

And whereas if you can meet someone in their leadership role, maybe in a management position, you can explain to them, you know, the answer and they can make a mandate or they can actually move it into the business. That's really the only way for this type of change to happen, you know, quickly and in a way that, you know, has reduced internal friction.

Luke Johnson

That's really something that we've learnt over the past few years.

Andrea Ciaffi

And sometimes you think you see these themes and there is always somebody who is the digital guru of the team that try to develop new tools. They think, oh, I just have to develop it and everybody will use it. But I'm sure you probably face this challenge.

Andrea Ciaffi

There is a big difference between developing software and actually adopting software. What's the difference from your point of view you can explain to anyone who actually wants to start this journey?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, yeah. So I had an interesting role for quite a few years in a company called Revisto, as well as an implementation director over there. So I've dealt with a lot of these situations. But, you know, you can have a really wonderful tool and you can present all of these features.

Luke Johnson

You know, you talk about features. There's, you know, 20 different things it can do. But really, a person who has a day-to-day job, something they have to do, they can only absorb a few things at a particular time. And so that implementation has to meet that customer where they're at.

Luke Johnson

You know, this is my problem today, and this one feature, if you want to say, of the software helps me today, then that becomes quite useful. And then you have to remember to go back to them and say, do you know about this thing?

Luke Johnson

And do you know about that thing? And then it becomes more of organic growth at that point. But it's quite, let's say, naive to come in and say, I have this massive tool that does everything, and tomorrow you're going to use everything. It really doesn't happen.

Andrea Ciaffi

Yeah, there needs to be a progressive

Luke Johnson

Yeah.

Andrea Ciaffi

disclosure of these features. And how do you convince engineers and

Luke Johnson

Correct. That's right.

Andrea Ciaffi

architects and side teams to try a new platform? Because at the end of the day, you build a new platform and you have to, we say sell is a bad word, right? But how do you convince them to adopt it?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, everyone has their own concerns and so you have to know your audience. So I kind of, you know, I come from the engineering architectural background. I know that you have probably more work than you have time to do and you know, you have to execute things in certain deadlines and so compressing your time or like efficiency is really the thing that you're interested in.

Luke Johnson

And if you know something's going to take three to four days, but in deep space you can do it in a couple of hours, you're going to be gravitating towards that solution. Whereas when you go out on site, the situation becomes a bit different.

Luke Johnson

You know, is it simple to use? Is it helping me de-risk something? When the safety manager walks on site, can I hold up the site app and show him the information he needs to see? You know, the different audiences have different things that really make them want to adopt these platforms.

Andrea Ciaffi

And sometimes tech companies, they heavily rely on champions, like people that champion that technology within their organization. Have you found any unexpected champions of technologies on projects or within companies that are your customers?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, it happens regularly because, you know, people are, ultimately, they want to do better and they want to have a better work-life balance and things like this. And so if they can see the vision and if they can start to get some value, we've seen quite a few people from these different businesses, you know, pick up and start sharing things internally.

Luke Johnson

Some of those champions, they're very understanding and they can see that, you know, you are building something big and that's going to be complicated and there's going to be some challenges along the way. But they're quite, you know, helping come along the journey by giving feature requests and things like that.

Luke Johnson

So it's really, really cool.

Andrea Ciaffi

And in addition to Deep Space, you also run Black Greg. It's probably going to explain what's the relationship between Black Greg and Deep Space, but I understand it's the firms that provide all kind of digital consulting, right? So can you share with us what you do and what your team do at Black Greg?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, so we talked about some of the backstory of building Deep Space from that consulting environment and into the SaaS environment. Along the way, we've built some excellent relationships with customers who have really big projects and quite complicated businesses, and in order to allow Deep Space to kind of thrive and scale.

Luke Johnson

we decided that some of these more complicated projects probably should be managed in an implementation arm, and that's what Black Greg is. So, you know, we basically try and make that onboarding experience very smooth. We help people set up, you know, deep space and other software and workflows.

Luke Johnson

make sure that, you know, we're spending a lot of time with their team, doing things that sometimes you can't do in a SaaS business. You know, the amount of amount of time that you spend in that type of environment is quite difficult when you've got 100 customers versus having like 5 to 10 customers, right?

Luke Johnson

So, but that's what Black Road is, and you know, very tight relationship to deep space still.

Andrea Ciaffi

And previously you mentioned the importance of leadership in pushing new digital solutions, but sometimes they may probably be concerned or risk adverse, and it may be useful to understand what success looks like in some companies. But what type of pattern do you see across companies that actually succeed digitally?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, they have to have courage. You know, you do have to have the courage to make changes. You have to have the courage to spend some money and spend some time on trying to improve your processes. You have to want to improve your processes.

Luke Johnson

You know, if you're happy with how things are, quite often, you know, you're not going to necessarily innovate because you think you already have solved it, you know.

Luke Johnson

So those couple of qualities we see in really all of our customers now is this desire to move into the future together, to do things better, but they also have the courage to make a change and recommend that change to others.

Andrea Ciaffi

And sometimes, like this is probably, this happens probably often in consulting, but even when you try to propose a new tech solution, like sometimes their clients, your clients may not know what their problem is and you need to help them, but do you find that your clients usually know the real problem or Do you have to help them uncover it?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, I think sometimes they are quite buried in the day-to-day of their job. And sometimes there's some piece of software there that is embedded and they feel it can't be disrupted. And, you know, that's my problem is trying to deal with that thing.

Luke Johnson

But really, they need to sometimes step back and say, no, no, your real problem is you know, you're not cloud-based or you haven't, you know, got an integrated stack or whatever it is, you have to have to get people out of the microscopic view into the bigger view sometimes in order to solve the real problem.

Andrea Ciaffi

And of course, we can't have an episode of this podcast without talking about AI, because I think I need to ask everyone what they think about it. It's a very interesting time we are

Luke Johnson

Mm.

Andrea Ciaffi

facing. And where do you think this AI story will have the biggest impact on the construction industry?

Luke Johnson

I think in reducing risk and identifying and kind of mitigating typical problems that we see in construction, whether that be from the, let's say the financial side, putting estimates together, managing the claims process, you know, managing costs to complete, I think AI is really well suited to identify patterns and help to solve them very quickly.

Luke Johnson

Obviously, you have normal knowledge work type things. You know, with AI, I have to review drawings and I have to look at this bit of information. So these are the type of workflows we've focused on in deep space.

Luke Johnson

You know, you can open a drawing in deep space and it'll start telling you what what drawing it is and what's shown on it and what the problems are perhaps with the design and so we're just trying to surface those efficiency gains as quickly as we can.

Andrea Ciaffi

And we are close to the end by one more questions. Like most of sometimes people that work in the construction industry, they have seen so many technologies emerge and they probably they probably disappointed disappoint people because they didn't deliver the expectation and the vision that have been.

Andrea Ciaffi

promised at the beginning, but from your point of view, which emerging technologies are overhyped and which are underestimated?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, I think the over-hyped ones might be some of your virtual reality, augmented reality, VR, AR. I mean, we've seen, I think, even, you know, the metaverse getting killed in the last week or so. And basically, we used to call those things Hollywood, Hollywood BIM, you know, Hollywood tech.

Luke Johnson

It's kind of fun and it's interesting, but it actually never quite makes it into, you know, actual day-to-day of construction. You know, I've had a bit of a, let's say, controversial views over the past year or so on BIM and where we're heading with BIM, because sometimes we thought that that was the answer to everything, right?

Luke Johnson

But to some degree, some of the BIM stuff is even getting superseded by the fact that, you know, we can reality capture very quickly and we can review imagery with AI very quickly. And so, you know, I think that's where we're underestimating the impact of things like reality capture.

Luke Johnson

And like, we've got AI as in LLMs is really what people are talking about is, you know, perhaps some kind of advanced usage of just an LLM, but the next generation is things like world models and other types of models that are, you know, going to jump forwards, I think, into construction quicker as well.

Andrea Ciaffi

And look, we are at the end of the episode. If people want to reach out to you, where can they find you?

Luke Johnson

Yeah, LinkedIn is probably the best place to reach me. Just message me or connect with me on there or respond to a post, yeah.

Andrea Ciaffi

Thanks, Luke. This was a great episode. Thanks for joining us on the Digital Construction Podcast.

Luke Johnson

Thanks for having me.