GHAFARI Associates Accelerates Design, Reduces Costs of Six Buildings for General Motors Corp

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GHAFARI Associates Accelerates Design, Reduces Costs of Six Buildings for General Motors Corp

Tuesday, 27 January 2009

EXTON, Pa. – Jan. 28, 2009 – GHAFARI Associates, LLC, and General Motors Corp. (GM) won a 2008 Be Award of Excellence in the “Innovation in Industrial Facilities” category for Enabling Integrated Project Delivery Using ProjectWise and BIM. The project is featured in the new publication “The Year in Infrastructure 2008,” available online from Bentley Systems, the leading company dedicated to providing comprehensive software solutions for the infrastructure that sustains our world, at www.bentley.com/YearInInfrastructure2008.

Beginning with a pilot project in 2004, the six design-build projects required GHAFARI Associates to provide architectural and engineering services in a highly collaborative environment. Successful project completion required the ability to coordinate GM and GHAFARI engineering workflows as well as those of several other design, engineering, and construction disciplines. Currently, the project team is sharing more than 80,000 documents, 2D and 3D model files, and more than 85 gigabytes of data, all of which need to be updated and maintained by numerous project participants in multiple geographic locations within the United States and Mexico. Through its use of Bentley’s interoperable software, including Bentley’s BIM products for design and detailing work and the ProjectWise collaboration system for document sharing, distribution, and control, the project team was able to integrate across all design phases, save printing costs, reduce errors and omissions, and deliver design and construction drawings on all six projects below cost and time-to-market estimates.

“The design-build team used lean methodologies enabled by Bentley’s innovative BIM and ProjectWise technologies on these schedule-driven projects,” said Samir Emdanat, director, Virtual Design and Construction, GHAFARI Associates. “Team members from offices in the U.S. and Mexico consistently achieved breakthrough results, proving that integrated project teams can meet delivery target costs and schedules effectively while also improving quality and job-site safety. Bentley’s comprehensive 3D modeling software was used to define facility geometry and this, coupled with an effective collaboration system, was the key to our success. The projects showcase our ability to incorporate BIM and apply integrated project delivery principles to save time and reduce costs.”

For additional information about Bentley’s BIM products, visit http://www.bentley.com/BIM. For additional information about Bentley’s ProjectWise collaboration system, visit www.bentley.com/projectwise.

About the Be Awards

The Be Awards of Excellence, which are judged by independent panels of industry experts and presented at an evening ceremony during the annual Be Conference, honor the extraordinary work of Bentley users improving the world’s infrastructure. These projects set benchmarks and showcase the imagination and technical mastery of the organizations that created them.

To learn about the hundreds of innovative projects nominated for the Be Awards of Excellence during the past five years, visit www.bentley.com/YearInInfrastructure and read Bentley’s “Year in Infrastructure” annual publications. For information about how to enter projects for consideration in the 2009 Be Awards of Excellence competition, visit www.bentley.com/BeAwards.

About GHAFARI Associates, LLC

GHAFARI Associates is a provider of full-service architecture, engineering, and consulting services. The company has built a solid reputation based on responsiveness, quality design, and advanced technological innovations including 3D high-definition surveying and 3D building information modeling. GHAFARI serves a variety of domestic and international markets, including automotive, aviation, commercial, education, government, healthcare, industrial, and research and development. The company deploys 3D Building Information Management (BIM) across the design, fabrication, and construction supply chain to deliver projects faster, better, safer, and at a lower cost. Using 3D high-definition surveying (HDS), GHAFARI provides complete, accurate, and efficient modeling at a lower cost than conventional methods.

About Bentley Systems, Incorporated

Bentley is the global leader dedicated to providing comprehensive software solutions for sustaining infrastructure. Architects, engineers, constructors, and owner-operators are indispensable in improving our world and our quality of life; the company’s mission is to improve the performance of their projects and of the assets they design, build, and operate. Bentley sustains the infrastructure professions by helping to leverage information technology, learning, best practices, and global collaboration – and by promoting careers devoted to this crucial work.

Founded in 1984, Bentley has more than 2,800 colleagues, offices in more than 50 countries, annual revenues surpassing $500 million, and since 1993, has invested more than $1 billion in research, development, and acquisitions. Nearly 90 percent of the Engineering News-Record Top Design Firms are Bentley subscribers, and a 2008 Daratech study ranked Bentley as the world’s #2 provider of geospatial software solutions.

For additional information about Bentley, visit www.bentley.com