Bentley Systems doubled down on its emphasis on open data standards and data lakes fpr design and construction during its Year in Infrastructure conference October 8 and 9 held in Vancouver, British Columbia.

"Openness is essential for infrastructure," Bentley CEO Nicholas Cumins told attendees. "If you think of infrastructure projects, they involve so many organizations and there's just no way they will use software from just one vendor."

Cumins said that whether it was the recent acquisition of Cesium, the company's new data partnership with Google for Google Maps data or the two products announced at the conference, OpenSite+ for civil design or Carbon Analysis in iTwin, all of it was a restating of the company's emphasis on open standards and data sharing.  

"Our iTwin platform is open. Our iTwin platform was right from the start, designed to be open. The core of iTwin is open source. It supports more than 2,030 file formats," Cumins said. "From a technology standpoint, we didn't announce something new her when it comes to the corporate path."

Generative Design Arrives

OpenSite+ leverages generative artificial intelligence for civil site design. The software uses a copilot experience that taps into project information stored in documents, known specifications, and 3D site models through natural, spoken language.

“This is the first [product] of its kind in the industry to use generative AI," said Francois Valois, vice president of civil infrastructure at Bentley. "With a severe shortage of engineers and the problem of climate change, the answer is AI."

OpenSite+ can import design changes directly into an iModel without the need for an intermediary file format such as DGN or DWG, unlike other generative design products. OpenSite+ can also answer questions such as "can I build a residential high-rise in this area" or how many parking spaces could be made with this site to fill local requirements. Drawing is automated through OpenSite Designer, an existing platform product based on MicroStation.

Bentley CTO Julian Motte said there is an instance of Microsoft Copilot in OpenSite+ which handles the question and answer processing, but the project data powering the large language model that actually creates designs the designs is from open sources. 

Valois emphasized that OpenSite + can reduce the time engineers spend on lower-value drawing tasks such as placing text or printing and signing documents.

Many civil projects use a 2D overhead view of the overall infrastructure asset while detailing individual buildings, roads and sections of track in 3D, leaving aesthetic considerations for later in the design process. OpenSite+ can generate 2D and 3D views early on, while critical site decisions are still being made. Using generative AI at this stage allows engineers to better explore alternatives to find the best and ones that optimize costs while meeting engineering requirements, he said. 

Valois and Bentley Chief Product Officer Mike Campbell both said that future versions of OpenSite+ will have an option to allow customers to train the generative AI model on their own data. They said the current data used to train it is licensed from existing, open-source libraries. OpenSite+ is in beta testing and will be available next year. Valois encouraged the hundreds attendees to join its technology preview.

Pulling in Google Maps

Bentley also announced, Oct. 9 a new asset partnership with Google. Bentley software users and developers can now use Google Maps geospatial content, including Google’s photorealistic 3D Tiles, for real-world geospatial context and immersive 3D experiences in Bentley's digital workflows. The partnership is not surprising given Bentley’s recent acquisition of Cesium, a leading platform for creating 3D geospatial applications and also the creator of the 3D Tiles open standard used by Google.

Esri, ArcGIS pro, Esri Location Services can all be brought into Cesium JS, Cesium's open development platform. Cesium can also import 3D parametric data from Revit or IFC files into a Cesium 3D tile. The digital twin of the Delaware Memorial Bridge work created by Philadelphia-based engineering consulting firm Pennoni was shown at the conference.

Pennoni is using information from Google Maps, in the form of Google Photorealistic 3D Tiles, and Cesium for Unreal, a plugin that taps the capabilities and renderings produced by Unreal Engine. “Rather than waiting years for a project to be completed, and then capture and post photos, we can show visualizations immediately, in present day,” said Joe Spadea, associate vice president at Pennoni. Cesium CEO Patrick Cozzi was introduced under his new title of chief platform officer at Bentley, and he explained that these kind of uses of Cesium's visualization technology would be a key part of the iTwin platform moving forward. 

"With the acquisition of Cesium we are effectively changing the engineering model from a stand-alone iTwin product to a geospatial model with information about subsurface conditions, ground conditions, local context," Cumins said. He added that Cesium aligns with Bentley’s beliefs on open standards while allowing data to flow from GIS into BIM. 

Embodied Carbon Analysis Integration

Bentley also announced Carbon Analysis capabilities in iTwin. A user’s design data can be analyzed in an iTwin using one of two popular embodied CO₂ calculators, EC3 or One-Click LCA. This can be done at the conceptual design phase or throughout the design process, allowing for more-informed decisionmaking early on.

Designers can see the embodied carbon output as cloud-based heat maps in a live 3D digital twin model powered by Cesium's visualization technology. Bentley Vice President for Sustainability Chris Bradshaw said this allows users to explore sustainable design and material alternatives to create higher-quality designs throughout the design and construction phase.

One of Bentley's oldest and most widely known products, desktop design authoring tool MicroStation, also got an update with new iTwin integration.

Motte said bringing Microstation onto the iTwin platform did not require rewriting or changing its code. MicroStation is still a desktop application, but its data can now be more easily moved on from design into construction and eventually operations through the iTwin platform. Motte explained that one advantage of this is that Microstation 2024 can now integrate real-time GIS information like any other design created in an iTwin.