In early 2020, Matterport was just a few years into the company’s foray into the construction industry as they looked to expand their areas of interest beyond their traditional realm of real estate. As part of that quest, they made an announcement of a new integration with Procore, who was – and still is – one of the top management platforms available in the construction industry. With the integration, Procore users could now integrate 3D models from Matterport into their project management view.
The companies have remained in collaboration in the intervening time, and last week the duo introduced a new collaboration. In an announcement from Matterport, it was announced that Procore users will now be able to use features like RFIs, Observations, and Coordination Issues – all parts of the Procore ecosystem – directly within a Matterport 3D digital twin. They say this will create “a visual system-of-record for site conditions that anyone on a project can track.”
With this latest integration, Matterport and Procore are looking to combat one of the main issues which can arise in construction projects. As the former indicates in their announcement, traditionally these workflows involve either 2D drawings and/or complex CAD imagery. That can be fine on a smaller scale, but as potential issues start to pile up and the project increases in complexity as work gets underway, these drawings and imagery begin to lose value and the likelihood of mistakes leading to costly rework increases.
Many of those misunderstandings and miscommunications can be avoided when everyone is looking at the same, up-to-date and accurate 3D model, which is the ultimate result of the latest stage of this collaboration. Now, stakeholders on a project can transition between their Procore workspace and Matterport model, allowing for better and more reliable progress tracking, quality control, and streamlined closeout processes.
Matterport is no longer a stranger to the construction industry, as their simple model generation technology is appealing to certain areas of projects, especially to scan smaller areas for renovation purposes. Users can create these 3D models using just their lidar-enabled phones or a Matterport camera, with Matterport’s AI helping to create photorealistic “digital twins.” Earlier this year, they made big news with the introduction of their Genesis initiative, which uses generative AI to identify, manipulate, and model components.
These kinds of models are, of course, not what is needed on every construction project, as there is only a certain amount of accuracy you can get with models derived mostly from a personal phone or other smaller devices. That said, individual projects don’t always require the high levels of accuracy of, say, a terrestrial scanner, and the models derived from Matterport can often provide everything needed, acquired with more accessible technology and shared in ways that can be more easily accessed by stakeholders of all technological knowledge, something that is made even easier given an integration with such a widely used platform like Procore. In their announcement of this news, Matterport indicates that their “digital twins,” when combined with detailed point cloud data generated per scan, can reduce site survey and BIM creation costs by as much as 70 percent.
“Since Matterport took its first steps into the industry, it became evident that our solutions share a common mission: to improve the lives of everyone in construction,” said Kris Lengieza, vice president of global partnerships and alliances at Procore, in a press statement. “As the construction industry continues to adopt digital-first tools, Matterport’s integration into the Procore Platform provides the visual site context teams need to help resolve issues quickly and keep projects on time.”
"In industries as hands-on as construction, Matterport provides unprecedented accessibility to stakeholders, empowering anyone to virtually step on site at any stage in a project,” added Jay Remley, Chief Revenue Officer, Matterport. "This expanded integration is the latest step in merging the immersive experience of Matterport digital twins with the project management efficiency of Procore. As partners, we’re providing design and construction professionals everywhere with the tools they need to finish projects faster, with fewer on-site resources.”
