How to use AI in construction
How Gridline goes from a
question to a decision.
Gridline learns from the systems you already run and everything that never made it into one, works out how it all connects, and follows each question as far as the evidence goes. HingePoint’s team runs it with you. Here is what that looks like in practice.
Talk to Us ›Start with your systems. We will show you what Gridline finds in them.
Construction intelligence, step by step
Four steps. Our team runs the hard ones.
1
Bring one decision.
Start with a bid you are unsure of, or a bigger call you are working through.
2
We bring in what it needs.↓
Your systems, plus what never made it into one. Nothing gets replaced or migrated.
3
See what it finds.↓
Answers come back with the records behind them, often with something nobody thought to ask.
4
It keeps building.↓
Our team adds the next systems, agents, and workflows as new questions come up.
2
Construction systems integration
Nothing gets replaced. Nothing gets migrated.
Gridline connects to the software your firm already bought: Procore, your accounting platform, your scheduling tool, your document storage, your CRM, your email.
It also learns from the material that never made it into a system at all. Bids, proposals, internal worksheets, the email threads where decisions actually got made. In most firms that is where a surprising amount of the real knowledge sits, and it is the part other tools skip.
Your team keeps working exactly the way it works today. Our team does the work of keeping Gridline fed, cleaning and organizing data as it comes in, so nobody on your side logs into anything new.
Procore
Primavera
SharePoint
Oracle
Email and document storage
Autodesk
Sage
QuickBooks
Microsoft Teams
Yardi
Microsoft Dynamics
2
Built on construction records
It knows a submittal
from a change order, and which job both belong to.
A general AI tool pointed at your files sees documents. Gridline sees a business. It is built around the things a contractor actually works with, and around how they connect to each other.
A change order belongs to a job. It was priced by an estimator, it moved a schedule, and it hit a cost code. That chain is what turns a pile of files into an answer, and and it is the part that has to be built by people who know construction. We call that deep intelligence.
That is why the answer is about your company, not about construction.
3
AI for construction estimating and cost control
The questions your systems could never answer.
A few places a team might start, asked in the words people actually use. Every answer comes back with the records behind it, and most lead to a better question.
Preconstruction & estimating
“
Which of our open bids carry the most margin risk, and why?
The answer
The bids most likely to lose money, with the reason for each, whether that is material pricing, labor exposure or a scope that has cost more than expected before.
Where it came from
Open bids, historical cost data, supplier pricing, closed projects of similar type
“
Have we built this square footage before, and what did it actually take?
The answer
Every comparable job you have delivered, what equipment and scope each one required, and where this bid differs from them.
Where it came from
Project history, equipment schedules, closeout documentation, original bids
“
What did we actually pay for this scope on the last four jobs like it?
The answer
Real costs rather than budgeted ones, by job, with the variance and what drove it.
Where it came from
Accounting system, change orders, subcontractor invoices
Operations
“
Where is this project drifting from budget, and what is driving it?
The answer
The line items moving away from plan, ranked by exposure, with the change orders and invoices behind each.
Where it came from
Project management system, accounting, change orders, schedule
“
Which subcontractors have slipped schedule on work like this?
The answer
Performance across previous jobs by trade and scope, with the projects it drew on.
Where it came from
Schedules, vendor records, project closeouts
“
What changed on this job between the bid and where we are now?
The answer
The gap between what was priced and what is being built, and when each change entered.
Where it came from
Original bid, change orders, current budget
Finance
“
Which open change orders are unresolved, and what are they worth?
The answer
Everything outstanding across active jobs, by value and by age.
Where it came from
Change orders, project management system, accounting
“
Where is our exposure across active jobs right now?
The answer
Cost, schedule and contract risk across the portfolio, ranked, with the jobs behind each.
Where it came from
All connected systems
Leadership
“
Should we keep subbing this scope or bring it in-house?
The answer
Margin, schedule and dispute history for each, and what to expect from working with them again.
Where it came from
Closed projects, financials, contracts, correspondence
“
Where do we consistently make and lose money by project type?
The answer
Performance across your whole book of work, by type, region or division.
Where it came from
Closed projects and financial performance
“
What do we know about this client before we sit down with them?
The answer
Every job, every dispute, every change order, and how the relationship has gone.
Where it came from
Projects, contracts, correspondence, financials
3
Answers with sources attached
You do not have to take its word for it.
One question, all the way through.
Have we built this square footage before, and what did it actually take?
The answer
Four comparable buildings in the last six years. Each one needed four rooftop units. This bid is priced for three.
Where it came from
The four projects, their equipment schedules, the closeout documentation and the original bids. Every one of them clickable.
The follow-up
“Why does this one only have three?” Gridline returns the scope difference and the point in the estimate where it was set.
Gridline app screenshot (answer with sources) — upload & swap in
That is the difference between a search result and an answer. You can check the work before you act on it.
4
AI for construction management
The answer arrives while the decision is still open.
Three places this shows up in a normal week.
Bid review
The number gets checked against what similar jobs actually needed, before it goes out rather than after.
Project meeting
The cost question gets answered in the room, with the change orders behind it, instead of becoming an action item.
Leadership meeting
The subbing, equipment or expansion question that used to take months gets researched before the meeting, with every number traceable.
Where Gridline stops
What Gridline is not.
×
We do not
Implement your source systems
If you are rolling out Procore, that is somebody else’s job. We come in once you are running it and connect what it holds.
Instead
We connect what you already run.
×
We do not
Replace your reports and dashboards
The reports your team already relies on keep running exactly as they do today. Gridline answers the questions those reports were never built to ask.
Instead
We answer the questions in between.
×
We do not
Make the call for you
Gridline shows you what your own history says, with the records behind it. What to do with that is still up to the estimator, the PM or the owner.
Instead
We put the answer in front of the person who decides.
Gridline does not replace your systems, run your projects, or make the decision for you. It gets the answer to the person who does.
Getting started with Gridline
It starts with a question you could not answer last month.
Talk to Us ›The first conversation is about your systems and what your team keeps failing to find, not about our software.
From there we look at what you have and what shape it is in. That is also what sets the cost, because it depends on how much data there is and how it is stored rather than on a seat count or a rate card.
Then we connect, and your team starts asking. Many firms start with bids, because that is where a missed detail costs the most.
Others start with a bigger decision already on the table. From there our team keeps adding systems, agents and workflows as new questions come up.
Construction data ownership
You own your data.
All of it.
Gridline is built on your own records, and what it learns from them belongs to your firm rather than to a vendor.
Nothing is contributed back to a public model. The value that builds up as more of your history gets connected is yours, and it stays yours.
AI construction software FAQ
Questions
we get.
The ones that come up in almost every first conversation.
Do we have to move our data into Gridline?
No. Gridline reads your records where they already live. Nothing is exported, migrated or copied into a new platform, and your team works in the same systems tomorrow that they worked in today.
Does this replace Procore, Sage or SharePoint?
No, and it only works because you have them. Gridline sits above the systems you already bought and connects what each one holds. If you replaced one of them next year, Gridline would connect to the new one instead.
What systems does it connect to?
The ones construction firms actually run. HingePoint has built integrations with Procore, Sage, QuickBooks, Autodesk, Primavera, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Yardi, Oracle and Microsoft Dynamics across 25 years of client work. If you run something not on that list, it is a question for the first conversation rather than a dead end.
Do we need to clean up our data first?
No. Messy is the normal starting condition, and a cleanup project that has to finish before anything works is how most data efforts quietly die. Gridline learns from what you have now, including the bids, worksheets and email threads that never made it into a system.
Does it respect who is allowed to see what?
Yes. Gridline follows the permissions already set in your source systems. If someone cannot open a document in SharePoint today, Gridline will not put its contents in front of them in an answer.
Is our data used to train anybody’s model?
No. What Gridline learns from your records belongs to your firm, not to a vendor. Nothing is contributed back to a public model.
What if it gives us a wrong answer?
Every answer arrives with the records behind it, and each one is clickable. You check the source before you act on it, the same way you would with anything a person told you in a meeting.
Who runs Gridline day to day?
HingePoint does. Gridline comes as a Managed Intelligence Service: our team manages your data, keeps it clean as new records come in, and builds the agents and workflows that act on what Gridline finds. Your IT team authorizes the connections, and there is no new software for them to maintain. Your team asks the questions and makes the calls.
What does it cost?
It is scoped per firm. Cost depends on how much data you have and how it is stored, not on how many people log in, so there is no seat count and no rate card. The first conversation is what sizes it.
Bring us a question your team could not answer last month.
We will tell you whether Gridline can answer it, and what it would take to find out.
Talk to Us ›