This section examines the BIM implementation strategies of two internationally acclaimed design firms, HOK and GHAFARI, and offers strategic BIM recommendations for Chinese design companies based on the current landscape of the Chinese engineering design market and technology.
HOK Corporation: HOK is a global architectural design firm headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. It comprises 26 design offices across North America, Europe, Asia, and Australia, employing over 2,500 professionals. HOK’s core services include architecture, engineering, interior design, architectural landscape design, and urban planning. The company also provides strategic planning and engineering consulting services throughout the entire lifecycle of construction projects. While most of HOK’s offices focus primarily on architectural design, two offices also engage in limited non-architectural design work, such as structural, plumbing, and electrical services. The majority of non-architectural design is outsourced to external consulting firms.
GHAFARI Corporation: GHAFARI is a multidisciplinary design firm offering solutions and consulting services worldwide in areas including construction engineering, manufacturing engineering, and professional human resources. Its diverse client base spans industries such as aviation, automotive, healthcare, education, and government sectors. Headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, USA, GHAFARI operates full-service design offices in Chicago and Indianapolis, employing over 800 staff members.
BIM Implementation Strategy:
A common approach shared by both firms was the establishment of a dedicated Advanced Technologies Group (ATG) to oversee BIM planning and implementation support. At HOK, the ATG represents more than 3% of the total workforce.
HOK Corporation
HOK’s ATG reports directly to the Chief Information Officer (CIO) and manages technology implementation across all offices. It is divided into three departments: IT, CAD/BIM, and Knowledge Management (KM), each focused on supporting individual offices.
Each department assigns personnel to form technical support teams, ensuring most offices have dedicated ATG support. With IT technologies becoming increasingly integrated into design workflows, ATG has shifted away from routine technical support to a more strategic role, including:
1. Evaluating current and emerging technologies and developing clear implementation plans.
2. Understanding the potential benefits and challenges of each technology and aligning them with overall corporate strategy.
3. Managing technological transitions (e.g., BIM adoption) to balance existing and new systems, minimizing productivity disruptions.
4. Prioritizing customer service and support, recognizing client demand for technology transparency and interaction. HOK emphasizes a customer-centric rather than technology-centric approach.
ATG standardizes technology deployment globally through a centralized support team, enhancing efficiency, consistency, and standardization across offices. This approach is critical for large, collaborative projects involving multiple HOK offices worldwide. For example, the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology project in Saudi Arabia, a massive $3 billion development spanning over 36 square kilometers, involves more than six HOK offices working on a unified technology platform. Without shared tools and standards, coordination would be extremely challenging. A universal toolkit facilitates training and technical support.
Since 2005, HOK has transitioned from ADT to Revit, with all new projects now utilizing Revit. Projects started before the transition continue with ADT or AutoCAD. Currently, nearly two-thirds of HOK’s projects use Revit. Although HOK previously used ADT extensively with model-based concepts and customized programs, they chose to switch to Revit due to its greater intuitiveness, power, and BIM capabilities.
Architectural design remains HOK’s primary focus, making Revit Architecture their core BIM software. Only two offices also use Revit Structure and Revit MEP. Other engineering disciplines’ design work is performed by external consulting firms, all of which use BIM. BIM models are freely shared between HOK and these firms; if a consulting firm does not use Revit, models are exchanged in 3D DWG formats (such as AutoCAD solids). Compared to earlier 2D or limited sharing methods, BIM enables earlier detection and resolution of design issues and supports project completion in early stages.
Early cost estimation through BIM allows both clients and designers to make critical decisions sooner.
HOK treats BIM as a standard part of its business, not as a marketing tool or competitive advantage. The firm promotes its design expertise rather than BIM capabilities and does not charge extra fees for BIM use unless clients have specific BIM delivery requirements, such as ongoing model use for facility management. HOK views BIM as a means to complete projects more effectively and accurately, adding value to clients without additional cost. Many clients are eager to adopt BIM but unsure where to start; ATG assists clients in understanding BIM and its benefits.
For HOK, BIM’s greatest value lies not in generating more revenue per project, but in opening new markets, attracting more clients, and improving productivity and efficiency. This enables the firm to handle more projects and deliver higher quality results more quickly, maximizing its core competitiveness.
HOK aims to share Revit models via wide area networks; however, large file sizes pose challenges. Cloud services are currently more conceptual than practical. The current workaround is to divide large models into smaller linked sub-models, but this requires pre-planned division within the project team, limiting workflow flexibility. Team members cannot freely contribute expertise across all project areas. HOK has tested various third-party and proprietary remote computing solutions but none have proven fully effective.
Recruiting and retaining BIM talent remains a significant challenge. Although BIM has existed for several years, proficient professionals are scarce. New graduates quickly grasp new technologies but face a steeper learning curve with BIM, which demands design knowledge prior to drawing skills. Traditional apprenticeships required years of drafting before design mastery, but BIM reverses this sequence. While architecture schools have expanded BIM curricula, this alone won’t resolve the industry’s BIM talent shortage anytime soon.
Beyond Revit, HOK employs and explores numerous other design software tools, following a systematic and rigorous evaluation process led by ATG. Applications undergo screening, research, evaluation, and approval before company-wide deployment.
NavisWorks is widely used for model integration, enabling efficient project visualization for both technical and non-technical users. It supports internal and external collaboration by combining multiple professional models for design coordination and clash detection in heterogeneous Revit projects.
For energy analysis, HOK currently relies mostly on external consultants, as no software has yet been standardized internally. BIM and sustainable design integration remains challenging because BIM models often require simplification or reconstruction for analysis tools. Energy modeling also involves numerous assumptions and specialized expertise. Many sustainable design decisions are qualitative and must balance other factors such as project profitability. Therefore, claims that BIM alone can directly support sustainable design are often misleading.
Conversely, BIM’s ability to support early-stage cost analysis is highly valuable, helping investors make timely decisions. HOK’s internal construction services team uses quantitative data extracted from Revit models for preliminary cost estimation, but detailed cost analysis is typically performed by contractors who create highly structured Revit models.
One of ATG’s three departments is Knowledge Management (KM), addressing the vast need for structured information within the AEC industry. HOK’s KM strategy focuses on converting unstructured data into organized, accessible knowledge, including project data, design expertise, best practices, key design decisions and their rationale, and historical documentation. This serves not only as a design reference and business intelligence for leadership but also as a critical function of KM. HOK combines third-party solutions with internally developed customized tools, with most internal development currently centered on KM.
Conclusion
HOK integrates BIM comprehensively rather than using it solely as a differentiator. The firm remains customer-focused, meeting client needs rather than pursuing signature design styles. This customer-centric approach extends to BIM use, focusing on project-specific requirements over creating unconventional building forms. HOK has cultivated extensive BIM expertise to support advanced design work.
HOK envisions BIM as a key enabler for Integrated Project Delivery (IPD), representing a significant transformation in construction. They anticipate new technologies will further integrate design and construction processes and promote systematic project delivery methods. HOK’s BIM adoption has proceeded independently of vendor-driven marketing hype.
GHAFARI Corporation
GHAFARI benefits from extensive experience in manufacturing and automotive engineering, industries that have employed 3D technologies for nearly two decades. They integrate 3D/4D software with lean design and construction methods, enabling direct digital information exchange along the supply chain.
This approach creates comprehensive digital models containing all design disciplines, allowing early detection of clashes and facilitating near-collision-free solutions. Benefits include more accurate engineering data exchange, reduced site changes, stricter contractor proposal reviews, improved information flow, higher design quality, and minimized construction delays due to rework.
GHAFARI’s dedicated IT team supports company-wide technology infrastructure but does not serve as a specific BIM modeling department. Within this team, the ATG promotes and applies new design technologies and delivery methods, particularly 3D/4D technology and lean design/construction. ATG oversees BIM deployment and helps project teams leverage BIM to improve workflows. Project architects and engineers retain full control over BIM use, tailoring technology to achieve project goals.
GHAFARI views BIM not simply as a CAD evolution but as a transformative technology affecting workflows, responsibilities, delivery methods, and deliverable detail levels. Technology is regarded as a tool serving project goals, not an end in itself. GHAFARI seeks BIM applications with commercial value tailored to specific delivery methods. Given the variety of projects, they carefully evaluate BIM’s benefits case by case. The advantages of BIM become especially clear when models support downstream construction phases.
Accordingly, GHAFARI’s BIM application extent varies by project needs. Implementation decisions define project objectives, analyze workflows, and determine required technologies, including the most appropriate software tools. Some projects use BIM only in early conceptual design to quickly generate and compare design alternatives through powerful visualization. BIM models provide area calculations to verify compliance with project requirements. All plans, elevations, and sections derive from validated 3D models.
As projects progress to detailed design, GHAFARI reassesses BIM’s suitability, especially for integrated structural and MEP designs. The level of BIM detail depends on project requirements, GHAFARI’s scope of services, client interest in BIM, and potential downstream model use.
As a large design consulting firm serving diverse clients and offering broad services, GHAFARI supports multiple BIM platforms. No single software currently satisfies all project demands, prompting ongoing evaluation and selection of the best technology for each project. They typically employ multiple platforms and connect them via industry standard formats where possible.
GHAFARI’s current software suite includes:
¾ Autodesk products, including AutoCAD, AutoCAD Architecture, and Revit series;
¾ Bentley MicroStation and Bentley BIM products, such as Bentley Architecture, Bentley Structural, Bentley HVAC, Bentley Design series, and related tools like Interference Manager;
¾ Various intelligent modeling tools used in manufacturing, including CATIA and ProE;
¾ Autodesk Navisworks and Bentley Navigator for model integration, clash detection, and simulation;
¾ Multiple 3D structural analysis and design software, including RAM and Risa Technologies;
¾ Bentley’s ProjectWise for project management, especially for multi-firm collaborations and integrated BIM delivery;
¾ PDF as the standard format for electronic document delivery unless clients specify otherwise. (Standard delivery format: BIM model + PDF documents)
For early design exploration, GHAFARI rarely relies solely on graphical models and has not extensively used tools like SketchUp. The firm has strong Revit expertise and adopted it before Autodesk acquired the software in 2002. GHAFARI effectively uses Revit for design development and producing all relevant documentation—including floor plans, elevations, sections, reports, and high-quality visualizations—to communicate with clients.
Depending on project complexity, early conceptual models are further developed using Revit or Bentley BIM solutions through construction documentation, especially for structural design and MEP coordination. Platform choice depends on project nature and client preferences.
GHAFARI sees no reason to limit itself to a single platform. Interoperability is crucial, not only for internal multidisciplinary collaboration but also for working with contractors, suppliers, builders, and stakeholders using various tools. GHAFARI expects BIM vendors to enhance support for open standards and hopes these standards remain flexible enough to exchange data at appropriate detail levels for project tasks. They cite the CIS/2 standard for steel structures as an excellent example, enabling data exchange between analysis, design, and construction phases with suitable detail and format.
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