Augmented Reality-Enabled Production Strategy Process

Disruptive technologies offer avenues to significantly improve the performance of construction project delivery. While the construction industry is often labeled as conservative and unimaginative with regard to technology adoption, significant strides have been made in recent years – specifically, the use of Building Information Modeling (BIM) for information storage, distribution and communication, as well as Lean construction techniques such as production planning and control (PPC). While the implementation of these innovative technologies and practices individually improve project performance, integrating them together can provide still greater benefits. BIM is certainly useful, but it alone is not a satisfactory answer to the paradox: how does one design and visualize a 3D product in a 2D space? Augmented Reality (AR) is a disruptive technology that can help address this challenge. AR is both an aggregator of information and an information publishing platform which allows users a spectrum of capabilities to 1) passively view displayed information, 2) actively engage and interact with published content, and 3) collaborate with others in real time from remote locations. No extant research effort has comprehensively investigated the opportunities and benefits of the integrated use of AR, BIM, and Lean in the planning process to improve project performance. This paper addresses precisely this research gap. Using insights gained from real-world construction projects, this paper examines the current state of production strategy process (PSP) development – an integral part of PPC, identifies pain-points and opportunities for process re-engineering using AR, and develops an AR-enabled PSP future state.