In its latest investment to fill out offerings for project data management, software giant Autodesk has acquired construction technology firm Pype, maker of the Pype AI-analysis and project planning platform. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

“Pype is going to help us on the preconstruction side as well as on the site side,” says Jim Lynch, Autodesk vice president of construction solutions and general manager, noting that the acquired platform will automate RFI and submittal processes "that really helps project managers in the field.” Pype’s system is able to analyze project documents to automatically generate preconstruction submittals and can also produce much of the paperwork required during closeouts.

"Joining forces with Autodesk opens up opportunities to bring in machine learning and AI to automate more workflows,” says Sunil Dorairajan, CEO and co-founder of Pype. “We can now work closer with PlanGrid  and BIM360, which are built for the field. There are a lot of enhancements to look forward to.”

While Pype’s machine-learning analysis of project documents has so far been focused on the preconstruction and closeout phases, further integrations with Autodesk’s suite could broaden its use cases, says Karuna Ammireddy, Pype co-founder and chief technology officer. “We always had this idea of our technology being used in different phases of construction. Now with Autodesk, this technology can be applied to all phases.”

Pype is just the latest acquisition for Autodesk in the project management and data-analysis space to build a unified project-data approach.

“There are some great point solutions on the market that deliver important capabilities around workflow, but the real value comes when you connect these disparate systems,” Lynch says. “The entire industry hasn’t realized the power of connecting these workflows together.”