Data Must Be Analyzed to Keep the Company Alive
At the PropTech Hungary Conference held on May 22, 2025, Building Information Modeling (BIM) had its own dedicated section. While last year’s talks focused more on why it is worth working in BIM, this time the emphasis was on how to effectively implement projects into BIM. One thing is certain: many are already demanding BIM without even understanding the basics.
“Everyone has seen a BIM manager’s workstation: somewhere between lots of monitors and coffee cups sits the BIM manager, digging into some dataset with scripts, trying to figure out if the model received can actually be used for anything,” painted a witty yet realistic picture of the life of BIM professionals Ákos Hamar, co-founder of the Plannerly BIM manager platform. In his lecture, he emphasized that despite BIM’s excellence, information management is no magic bullet: much of the data is unstructured, 96% of it is never used, and projects remain incomparable, stripping away the technology’s main advantage. Hamar argued that following standards is a good direction, but what is really needed are understandable standards. Ultimately, Plannerly helps to consolidate countless documents and hard-to-interpret materials into usable form. “We see that when it comes to contracts, BIM is often not even discussed; frequently all that’s said is ‘yes, I want it in BIM,’ whatever that even means – it’s not even grammatically correct.”
The fact that BIM doesn’t solve every problem has become an increasingly important topic. At the conference, a panel discussion was held to address misunderstandings around the model. The panelists – Balázs Lengyel, Business Development Director at Spányi Partners Zrt.; Zoltán Jánky, Managing Director of NOVU Tervezőiroda Kft.; Gergő Gyimesi, Development Director at the KÉSZ Group; and Gábor Décsi, CEO of Dome Facility Services Group – discussed the benefits of conscious BIM, and how to properly approach building information strategies across different processes.
Décsi Gábor noted that he was already working on what is now called BIM 30 years ago, and Gyimesi added that he too had been doing this for 15 years, though at the time, they didn’t call it BIM either. Building information technologies didn’t appear out of nowhere – they evolved organically, driven by real needs, before the hype-train swept the entire concept away. The discussion touched on issues such as who should own the data in a project, at which point stakeholders should step in, and who should pay for the technology – questions that may seem trivial but are significant challenges for the Hungarian market.
“What we see as members of a European cost planning organization is how differently they work compared to us,” said Balázs Lengyel. “Here, we can’t even put a cost classification on the table. There, full systems exist, and their standards evolve every year. For us, a budget stops at the ‘total’ line. There, the next column is ‘life cycle’ – something we’ve been talking about for a long time but still don’t know how to use properly at the budgeting level.” He went on to point out that emission metrics and client education come later, but progress in Hungary is slow. “You can really do handovers in a month, it can be demonstrated. Why no one wants to pay for it, I don’t know.” Lengyel stressed that the direction is right, recovery will come, but real progress requires decisions – and the market needs to understand this.
Balázs Lengyel, Spányi Partners (Photo: Márton Fejes)
Since life cycle was raised, it was also worth focusing on BIM’s operational aspect. Izabella Gazdusné Wusinczky, Space Manager at Bosch, highlighted that ultimately, operations carry the cost, making optimal performance in everyone’s interest. László Kuczogi, CEO of K-ép Stúdió, stressed that the usefulness of data depends on whether operations can do anything with it – especially since some processes are BIM-based and others are not, leading to fragmented transitions.
Why doesn’t every building already have a digital twin to solve this dilemma? Dániel Joó, BIM Manager at Buildext, explained that often it fails due to the relationship between client and designer: client pressure combined with frequent requests and modifications make early digitalization impossible. The solution would be classification, which currently exists mainly in new builds.
“The key is that from the very beginning, the investor or owner must take responsibility for the financial implications and also have the necessary knowledge – education is very important in this matter,” emphasized Gazdusné Wusinczky Izabella, adding that expanding knowledge is the driver of truly effective BIM-based operations. “We talk about BIM-based operation, but companies don’t even have a BIM strategy,” concluded Dániel Németh, Business Development Director at AFMTEC Services Kft.. Once there is a strategy, planning, construction, and operation all fall into one package. “BIM-based operation is only possible if everything is thought through and all processes are in place.”
After the panel, Dániel Németh also gave his own presentation, sharing a banking case study that demonstrated the advantages of BIM implementation. “What do you think drives the world today?” he asked, holding up his phone. “The answer is data, collected for us by smart devices.” He showed how the renovation of a heritage building began with scanning – that is, data collection – and how a point cloud with millions of points was used to assess the tasks. He noted that the most important lessons emerged during construction itself, when it was possible to compare progress with the original state model.
Dániel Németh, AFMTEC Services (Photo: Márton Fejes)
László Kuczogi also gave a special presentation, together with Kristóf Lábán, Project Manager at Helloparks. They introduced a project as a “model BIM case” – a fully rounded example of how to succeed with BIM at every step. Kuczogi highlighted that for him, BIM means “Better Information Management,” stressing that digitalization should not be an end in itself, but must serve the goal of being useful, successful, and advantageous. Helloparks builds and leases warehouses to industrial partners, and while they previously worked in traditional ways, Lábán admitted that “it was madness” – they wanted to “put things in order.” They succeeded, demonstrating what “better management” really means. The process remained integrated throughout, with all professionals and contractors adapting to it – which is ultimately the whole point of the system.
László Kuczogi, K-ép Stúdió (Photo: Márton Fejes)
Of course, it wasn’t just established big companies at the conference – startups also made their presence felt. Dávid Papp, co-founder and CEO of ARport Hungary, spoke about their augmented reality solutions designed to revolutionize indoor navigation and process management.
Dávid Papp, ARport (Photo: Márton Fejes)
Ferenc Monoki, CEO of SmartBuilder, presented their real-time decision-making and project management support solutions.
Ferenc Monoki, SmartBuilder (Photo: Márton Fejes)
Much was said about education – and where is education more important than at university? At the conference, the first three winners of the BIM Thesis Competition, founded by BuildEXT, presented their work. These young engineering students are preparing for digitalization even during their studies. Third-place winner Angelika Szűcs compared the possibilities of model-based operational support; second-place Béla Nagy created a digital twin model and integrated it into an operations plan; and the winner, Balázs Takács, examined the methodological implementation of road design within BIM.
