Reflecting on how much has changed in a decade around crafting technology, automation, and design operations how have these trends led to the spotlight on AI?

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“As it pertains to technology specifically in design or AEC, we have a long trajectory of software making into our industry, many decades of it. Currently what we are seeing with AI is that it’s not necessarily new but there has been an extreme change in adoption over the past 1-2 years. That change is centered around accessibility.  

Historically, our industry became comfortable accepting technologies that were expensive and difficult to learn. We equate this to a time where more difficult tools had more buttons, more features, and were only created for a select few.  

At Canoa we believe we are now in the age of simplicity which supports a design revolution based on accessibility. Design tools should be accessible to everyone, easy to learn and enhance the experience of design itself.”

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- Federico Negro 

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Other topics discussed in this panel includes:

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Recognizing the confluence of trends driving a current flight to quality and an increased need for design intentionality in commercial real estate (due to the fact that the vast majority of work in our cities will be retrofit in nature, that the componentry used in interior spaces is fundamentally changing, and that many issues today are environmental in nature) and that AI is becoming fundamental tooling for meeting this demand

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Understanding additional opportunities for AI-enabled efficiency and optimization by looking at personal experience developing and leveraging an AI-enabled design platform to specifically address the FF&E problems in the commercial sector, such as the constant need for retrofitting and the unique scale of FF&E (ex. Implementing AI to bolster image handling with computer vision and using a core recommendations algorithm driven by machine learning to elevate specifications, partnering, threat assessments, etc.)

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Elevating the correlation between the evolution of workplace purpose / end user demands and the increased utility of AI in this context (ex. Enabling designers to amplify their capacity to address the real drivers of space utilization like congregation, community, and knowledge-sharing by virtue of adopting AI tools to handle the analytical components)

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