Aiforsite
Introducing productivity thinking in the construction site management
A React Native mobile app for Managers on Construction Sites
Founded in 2016, Aiforsite is a globally operating Contech company located in Espoo, Finland. The company’s mission is to solve the construction industry's productivity problem.
Aiforsite provides its clients with a one-stop solution that improves construction productivity. It includes an AI-based remote monitoring as well as video and positioning data technology. The automatic, real-time situational snapshot mixed with analytics help construction site teams stay on schedule.
The challenge
By adopting mobile technology, Aiforsite wanted to increase productivity as well as build a new channel of revenue. Their idea was to automate capturing and transferring the 360-degree videos taken on construction sites.
This innovation would automate the control of such processes.
The main challenge was to integrate the app with the 3rd party 360 camera’s API and guarantee seamless work on various Android versions.
This required a deep integration with the cameras, the usage of a native camera SDK, and creating a connectivity module between the app and the device.
The solution
React Native: the Aiforsite app is dedicated to site engineers, superintendents and work supervisors. Employees perform regular checks of the construction site recording 360 movies on a pre-planned path which includes a starting and endpoint.
Once recorded on camera, the footage is downloaded to the mobile device and assigned to an appropriate project. Then it’s transferred with all data to the main Aiforsite management platform, where it can be analysed by the user.
Based on captured video and metadata, a supervisor can see a map with displayed employees’ paths on it.
As the flow is fully automated, it affords greater efficiency than manual processes.
Scope - Works Timeline
In a result of technical cooperation, Aiforsite and Startup House mobile team worked to achieve the main objective: (a) to build a new React Native app from scratch and (b) to make the web API ready to serve the mobile application.
The Aiforsite 360 App was to be integrated with the 3rd-party 360 cameras and work with a wide range of smartphones and work perfectly on different types of construction sites, where “dead zones” are often an issue. That’s why the app functions offline.
Process
Startup House provided Aiforsite with a duo of seasoned React Native developers working under client management.
Both internal (Aiforsite) and external (Startup House) development teams worked alongside with the project management performed by the client.
Development began in January of 2022 with Startup House publishing the first Android app version in August.
The results
Startup House has built an Android App in React Native and tested it on 9 types of devices. We expect the number of compatible devices to grow. The next step is to develop the iOS React Native app version.
The Android app is now being rigorously tested.
This product is the first subscription-based product in the offer of Aiforsite.
When working on the project we focused on using the most recent technology pieces.
- Nest.js
- React.js
- React Native
- TypeScript
- Chakra/PrimeReact
- Swift
- Redux
