Digitalizing Workflows: How RIB 4.0 Helped Herbosch-Kiere Streamline Input and Maximize Output  

Company Name: Herbosch-Kiere NV 

Location: Belgium & the U.K. 

Industry sector/s: Infrastructure 

Products used: RIB 4.0 

With RIB 4.0 we gained a clear overview of performed quantities and costs, including all information required for client reporting and control. 

Sam Vervoort, BIM Manager 

The Customer 

Herbosch-Kiere NV specializes in complex infrastructure works in and around water. The firm has built a reputation for reliability and expertise, growing into a trusted player within the construction sector as part of the Eiffage Group. They operate from offices in Antwerp and London, carrying out assignments throughout Europe and the UK. They are active in various fields, including hydraulic engineering, maritime construction, waterway construction and maintenance, offshore energy projects, foundation engineering and ship salvage, land remediation, and environmental projects.  

The Mission 

Working in some of the most demanding environments in construction, precision and coordination are not optional for Herbosch-Kiere. Yet their teams were faced with heavy manual data entry, transfer, and duplication, which impacted precision. They had multiple teams working with different tools, leading to labor-intensive exchanges of information across departments. This impacted coordination, too. Identifying the fragmentation of their existing systems and manual data exchange processes as the cause of slow information flow, limited transparency and control, set them on course to solve these challenges by combining data input and information flow into one system. 

The Solution 

Herbosch-Kiere decided to replace the outdated software that no longer served their purposes with digitalized project workflows. A joint venture with a German partner introduced them to RIB iTWO, which showed strong potential to support their transformation. This marked the starting point of their digitalization journey – they reduced the number of systems in use and optimized their data input and exchange by creating a hybrid workflow using RIB iTWO for estimation in seamless synchronization with RIB 4.0 for execution and control. Implementing a single, connected environment from contract to project delivery improved the firm’s efficiency across the project lifecycle. 

The Result 

Herbosch-Kiere teams use less manual effort as data is entered once by the responsible department. Information is instantly visible across all teams, always providing clear visibility of the project. Manual data transfer, duplicate input, and unnecessary communication have been eliminated. They use fewer tools, have less rework, and information flows seamlessly from estimation through execution into project control. Having set up the proof of concepts, they are also planning to implement full procurement workflows within RIB 4.0, resource scheduling, equipment and warehouse management, and enable site personnel to set up work reports – to further reduce input admin and enhance efficiency. 

Optimized Workflows and Streamlined Processes for Better Control 

Like many organizations at this scale, Herbosch-Kiere ran a fragmented software landscape with multiple tools, manual data entry, and manual data transfers between teams. They had no single source of project truth to work from. Their story is about what happens when an organization decides to fundamentally change how they work, how information flows, how teams collaborate, and how informed decisions are made on complex projects. 

Outdated estimating presented an opportunity to optimize processes and triggered them into action. Their existing workflows entailed one team sharing spreadsheets with another where someone on that team would manually enter the data into a different system. From duplicated efforts came increased risk of errors and limited transparency. 

Herbosch-Kiere started out simply by first replacing the outdated estimating software with RIB iTWO. The tool’s capabilities regarding project control soon became clear, but due to the very specific parameters for handling price revision on Belgian public sector projects, they turned to RIB 4.0 – it offered all the necessary tools in one system to support Belgium’s complex rules. 

There was a centralized management of index values which were updated on a monthly basis and the project specific price revision formulas could be built using these configured parameters. 

Sam Vervoort, BIM Manager 

How RIB 4.0 Centralized Control and Project Management 

RIB 4.0 opened up new possibilities for them, laying the foundation for a hybrid solution with estimating managed in RIB iTWO and project execution and control managed in RIB 4.0. They now had the capabilities to manage the configuration of parameters and formulas for accurate price revision calculations with plenty of flexibility to boot, paving the way for them to tackle other issues as well. 

Previously, Herbosch-Kiere struggled to bring all relevant information together into a single view – this undermined project control. RIB 4.0 solved this problem by connecting workflows, providing easy access to all data inputs, including planned cost flows from estimating and performed costs. The information was then synchronized into RIB 4.0, while project follow-up and control were managed in a single environment. They also found that they could import their actuals data from the accounting system. In the final analysis, it meant reducing manual inputs across these workflows, keeping unnecessary communication to a minimum. 

Having established a working recipe for estimating and project control with RIB 4.0, Herbosch-Kiere was keen to tackle other pressing issues. 

• Improving the reporting of installed quantities – previously managed via spreadsheets and manual data transfer into the controlling system, with RIB 4.0 they scored a clear overview of performed quantities and costs, including all the information required for client reporting. 

• Improving how site personnel managed inputs for performed quantities – they could already add a lot of detail to reports and calculate installed quantities, but then RIB 4.0 was adapted to use the detailed inputs for performed quantities per BOQ item. Now they can use different calculation formulas, link comments and dates, and even filter different details based on the periods or BOQ item, or a combination of the two. 

Plans performed and build costs are easily accessible, and the data input is reduced, and information flows more smoothly across our different departments. 

Sam Vervoort 

Adopting Digitalization for Better Information Flow and Outputs 

Getting different teams involved and giving them ownership and training in the use of the system helped get them onboard with transformation. It gave them an opportunity to offer their perspectives on how to improve processes, and they started to see the potential for their own workflows. 

Seeing that the system can handle what they ask for is always a big plus. When teams shared success stories with one another, it triggered others to explore the system for their own benefit. They found that the system offers a lot of flexibility in creating different kinds of reports and enables them to replicate a lot of their required deliverables. 

Vervoort acknowledges that fragmentation is a prevalent issue in the construction industry. His advice to other contractors facing challenges with fragmented systems and manual processes is to start with a good mapping of the various processes within their business, including existing workflows. They should make a thorough analysis of where potential enhancements can be considered to create a solid step-by-step process. He recommends having a dedicated project team with different profiles to follow this process, to bring different perspectives to bear and combine into the overall implementation – it will ensure that the solution flows across departments. 

He can’t stress enough how important it is to take a systematic approach to digitalization and keep that as the backbone of implementation. Things are constantly changing – before diving into new issues that pop up, you need to take time to rewrite the script, so to speak. It must always be clear what the goal is and that it is achievable one step at a time. Ultimately, it’s about building trust between processes and teams to change to this new way of working. 

The system offers a lot of flexibility in creating different kinds of reports and with support from the RIB team, we have been able to replicate a lot of the deliverables we used to handle. 

Sam Vervoort, BIM Manager, Herbosch-Kiere NV