Cup-of-Water Theory: A Review on the Interaction of BIM, IoT and Blockchain During the Whole Building Lifecycle

The Architecture Engineering and Construction/ Facility Management (AEC/FM) industry plays a significant role in the development of economy. In recent years, the wide application and development of Building Information Modelling (BIM) promote the development of informatization and digitalization of AEC/FM industry. However, due to the limitation of a one single tool and lack of understanding of single source of truth, the problems of the industry cannot be solved completely. Therefore, the revolution and innovation of industry can be stagnated. Internet of Thing (IoT) and blockchain can be considered as two technologies that can be integrated with BIM for AEC/FM industry. The aim of this paper is to understand and analyse the basic principles and the applications of these three technologies in AEC/FM industry through literature review. With the integration of these three technologies, the virtual and realistic object and data during the whole building lifecycle can be managed and stored in a security, transparency and convenient decentralized common data environment (DCDE). Finally, a theory named, Cup-of-Water theory is presented.