BIM

BIM (Building Information Modelling) as a knowledge domain studies building information as a structured, shared model spanning the life cycle from design to demolition: geometry linked to attributes, information requirements (EIR/AIR) and the question of how a model built for the construction phase remains usable in the operational phase. It concerns information standards and model governance, not one specific application.

FM inherits the BIM model at handover, but most models are designed for the construction phase and lack the attributes FM needs (supplier, warranty, maintenance interval). Without this knowledge domain, FM does not set information requirements in advance and receives, after the fact, a model that does not match the management process.

• Were the FM information requirements (AIR) set before construction started, or discovered as missing only at handover?
• Is the model maintained after handover through renovations, or does it silently age into a historical document?

• ISO 19650 series — information management using BIM across the full life cycle.

• Information requirements (EIR at tender, AIR in use) should be set by the party that will operate the building, not solely by the design party.

• CAFM & Information Management

• BIM capability (a Part 3 capability): the operational skill of setting information requirements, managing models and linking them to CAFM. This knowledge domain supplies the underlying standards and method on which that capability rests.

• Demand organisation

  The client role must set the AIR before the design process, otherwise it is too late to still adapt the model.

• ISO 19650-1 and -2:2018 (information management using BIM); ISO 19650-3:2020 (operational phase).

The standards section arrives in Part 7.

• BIM confused with digital twin (a separate knowledge domain in this cluster): a BIM model is an information structure, a digital twin is a maintained, often real-time-linked counterpart of the building in use. A BIM model can be the basis of a digital twin, but is not one without an active link to current operational data.
• A BIM model used as a marketing visualisation without the underlying information structure that makes it usable for management.

The handover from BIM to usable FM data (BIM-to-FM) remains weak in practice: many models are archived at handover instead of linked to CAFM, and the cost of model maintenance during operation is rarely budgeted.

• ISO 19650-3:2020, operational phase of the built environment.