Our philosophy
Enabling innovation in development to accelerate the sustainability transition in the built environment.
The pandemic has emphasised important realities
Well-being is crucial. We now acknowledge that our well-being is both fragile and deeply tied to nature and our built environment.
Decisions have long-term consequences. We now see more clearly that good, early decisions prevent problems later.
Change can happen quickly. We now know that social and digital change can move rapidly.
We need to get more from less. We now recognise more urgently the need to get more from the infrastructure and natural resources we already have.
Sustainability in the built environment
SociumX believes better outcomes for people and nature must be the focus of the existing built environment, and of its future development. The benefits of coordinating within the built environment mean we can:
Deliver desirable outcomes for people and nature
Integrate new assets properly into the existing system
Unlock value from what we have already built
Provide the resilience and capacity for regeneration that society requires of its infrastructure
Encourage innovation and unlock the potential of digital transformation across the built environment
Earn the trust of people and communities who engage with the built environment
Global collaboration of outcomes
At the global level, the Sustainable Development Goals provide a blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all - a balance between environmental, social and economic outcomes.
Strategic priorities. Our strategic priorities should align with global goals, informing, for example, ‘net zero’ targets and built environment strategies.
Local requirements. Decision-makers in the built environment must satisfy national priorities and address local requirements - the needs of the users, the communities and the environment.
Effective interventions. Investment decisions are more effective when they are aligned with delivering outcomes at the local, national, and global levels.
The built environment is a system of systems
The built environment has become a complex system of connected assets and networks. The natural environment is even more complex and interconnected than the built environment.
For as long as we want people and nature to flourish together, we must keep built and natural systems working healthily in balance. It will become impossible to meet our evolving needs unless we address the challenges of finite resources, pollution, biodiversity loss, the impacts of climate change and the transition of the whole economy to net zero greenhouse gas emissions.
At SociumX, we can see that the built environment is a deeply interconnected system of systems and further interconnections will add further to this as digitalisation progresses and we link up the physical and digital worlds.
Digitalisation in the built environment
We need technology and digitalisation to deal with the complexity of building systems and enable the effective integration of new assets into the existing systems. Outcome-focused collaborative delivery models leverage input from across the supplier ecosystem, bringing together engineering and technology to deliver intelligent solutions.
Digitalisation is fundamentally about enabling people:
• to manage information effectively
• to improve processes
• to apply technology wisely
Technology alone is not the solution to the challenges we face, but technology applied wisely is a key enabler, therefore, we need purpose-led technology.
Purpose led technology
Managing the built environment as a system of systems with a focus on delivering better outcomes requires greater integration across the industries that serve the built and natural environments.
The fourth green industrial revolution is built around the concept of bringing physical and digital worlds together. These data-driven ‘cyber-physical systems’ are now possible with the advances in computing power, however, we need to minimise their carbon emissions too.
As the built environment becomes increasingly cyber-physical, we need to improve capabilities and tools to intervene effectively in complex systems.
Capabilities - systems engineering, complexity science, information management and data science.
Tools - internet of things, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, robotics and connected digital twins.