On June 5, 2000 Graphisoft, developer of the Virtual Building concept of 3D architectural design, announced the introduction of its’ ArchiFM 2000 computer-aided facilities management (CAFM) solution scheduled for release in the U.S. the third quarter of 2000. ArchiFM 2000 which is now available in Germany, Hungary, and Austria will come to market under the joint effort of Graphisoft U.S. and recently acquired Drawbase Software whose leadership in the
Recent CAFM trend analysis from Daratech’s Bruce Jenkins reveals facilities management poised to emerge as a critical tool for helping the new economy companies and in fact, all of the corporate world both defend their competitive advantage and manage changes at Internet speed.
Drawbase President Al Moulton observes, “ArchiFM 2000 is targeted at companies with more than 100,000 square feet of expensive space. Design professionals will use this software to plan and design changes to facilities while users or tenants will make Web-based change requests or access reports. Maintenance personnel will use its Web-based information for planning work orders.”
Jenkins summarizes his analysis by predicting that the combination of two trends: the growing competitive necessity of extremely effective facilities management and the increasing availability of facilities management as an on-line service should lead to explosive growth in the facilities management market opportunity for all participants, for both technology suppliers and service providers. To meet this need and to effectively apply Web-based IT to these functions will depend on having an intelligent 3D object technology base for both component models and complete facilities models.
More information about Graphisoft is available at www.graphisoft.com.
