For a construction firm, every tender started with the same grind: reading drawings and specifications by hand to build a bill of quantities, then pricing it line by line.
The challenge
Quantity takeoff was slow, repetitive, and error-prone. A single project could take days to estimate, and a missed quantity or a mispriced line could quietly erase a bid's margin. The estimating team had become the constraint on how many tenders the firm could realistically pursue.
What we built
We built a pipeline that reads drawings and specifications, extracts material quantities into a structured bill of quantities, and attaches cost estimates from the firm's own rates. Estimators shifted from manual takeoff to reviewing and refining a draft the system had already prepared.
The outcome
- Estimation time cut by 85%.
- More tenders pursued with the same team.
- Fewer takeoff errors slipping through into priced bids.
"Estimators spend their time on judgement and pricing strategy now, not counting items off a drawing."
The firm turned its slowest pre-bid step into one of its fastest, and freed its most experienced people to focus on winning the right work.
Back to work