Building Information Modeling (BIM) is often thought of as nothing more than a 3D representation of a building. However, it goes way beyond a traditional 3D model.

Over the past few years, the necessity of having a BIM model for any building has greatly increased. For new public buildings, it is mandatory in more and more countries to have a BIM model in place.

With the development of the digital building management technologies, the scope of a the BIM model, which is sometimes still thought of as the 3D model of a building, has greatly expanded. The industry often refers to it as the revolution in building management, as it shifted from 3D to 8D. 

3D: If you already have an existing BIM model, you can feed it into ArchiFM and have all your data ready to be managed by our software. Being a spinoff from ArchiCAD, we have built a direct interface with them, so you can easily pull in all your CAD plans. If you have worked with a different software, we can also import your plans in IFC format. In case you do not have a BIM model yet, we have partnered with a world-class building surveying software OrthoGraph.

4D: The 4^th dimension is time. ArchiFM supports scheduling activities, let it be employee schedules, contractor schedules, maintenance schedules, or a combined view of all of them. Facility managers can have an overview of who does what, when, and for how long.

5D: The 5^th dimension is cost. ArchiFM can track the cost structure, the budgets, and the remaining amount of each sub-budget for an entire building and property portfolio and can provide any level of breakdown within. We can analyze data from utility meters to promote energy efficiency, can track cost centers, budget allocation, and by doing so, we support management decision making.

6D: The operation. Let it be soft FM or hard FM works, ArchiFM can support all of them. Whether you need a quick and efficient breakdown maintenance process, or a set of scheduled maintenance jobs, ArchiFM has all the related and customizable functionalities to manage and automate that.

7D: The 7^th dimension is concerned with environmental efficiency. By using ArchiFM, facility managers will be able to significantly reduce unnecessary travel time, energy usage, or paper waste. This dimension goes hand in hand with the 5^th dimension, as we connect to smart utility meters to help to reduce electricity, natural gas, and water usage. This is all safely underpinned by a BIM model channeled into ArchiFM, creating a digital twin of the building

8D: The 8^th dimension is often referred to as the safety dimension, whereby we can monitor the number of people in a room, a hall, or a corridor, and – in case of an emergency – we can guide people to safety by our integration to GIS systems using indoor and outdoor navigation.

A BIM model is not only getting more popular, but fast becoming essential. ArchiFM, with its new release on the way, will be able to support all these features even more efficiently and seamlessly than ever before.