The Client Ask: Can FTG AI Connect to Autodesk Build?
A construction client came to Fletcher Technology Group with a direct question: could FTG AI connect to their existing Autodesk Build environment?
That question mattered because Autodesk Build was already where their project-management activity lived. RFIs, submittals, issues, files, drawings, project records, and coordination work were not sitting in a generic document folder. They were part of the operational system the project team used every day.
A generic chatbot would not solve that problem. Public AI might help draft an email or summarize copied text, but it would not understand the client's project environment, permissions, SharePoint Online data, Autodesk Build records, drawings, specifications, correspondence, and active project state.
The point was not to add AI beside the project-management system. The point was to make FTG AI useful inside the way the client already runs projects.
Why FTG AI Was the Right Starting Point
FTG AI is designed as a private AI platform that can be tailored to a client's Microsoft cloud, security boundaries, and business systems. That is the difference between a static public AI tool and a platform that can become part of a real operating workflow.
For this client, privacy and fit mattered as much as raw AI capability. Their project data included drawings, contracts, specifications, submittal history, RFI trails, project correspondence, schedule-sensitive decisions, and operational context. That information needed to stay under their control.
Construction Ops became a custom module on top of FTG AI. Autodesk Build stayed the system of record. SharePoint Online stayed the collaboration and document layer. FTG AI became the private intelligence layer that could reason across both.
Private by design
The assistant runs in the client's Microsoft cloud pattern instead of sending project context into unmanaged public AI tools.
Built around their stack
The module connects to the systems already used by the project team, including Autodesk Build and SharePoint Online.
Operationally useful
The goal is not novelty. The goal is faster project coordination, better records, fewer missed items, and clearer source-backed answers.
Construction Ops: The Coordination Workload, Automated
A project engineer spends a large part of the day coordinating documents and decisions: chasing submittals, drafting RFIs, checking specifications, tracking closeout items, preparing reports, and keeping project records current.
Construction Ops was designed around that workload. The module gives the project team a project-aware assistant that can answer questions, draft coordination artifacts, and surface risks using the client's own data.
| Capability | What It Helps With | Why It Matters |
|---|---|---|
| Spec and contract intelligence | Ask questions against specifications, contracts, subcontracts, drawings, and supporting files. | Answers can be grounded in the project documents instead of generic construction knowledge. |
| RFI assistant | Draft RFIs from conflicts, missing information, field questions, or drawing/spec coordination issues. | Project teams spend less time starting from a blank page and more time reviewing the right question. |
| Submittal assistant | Build and review submittal context, flag product-data deviations, and help identify missing information. | Submittals move with better source context and fewer avoidable back-and-forth cycles. |
| Reports and minutes | Turn project notes, meetings, or field observations into daily reports, minutes, and action items. | Records become easier to produce while the project is active, not reconstructed later. |
| Change-order support | Identify cost or schedule impact signals from RFI responses, correspondence, and source trails. | Potential change items can be captured earlier with clearer supporting context. |
| Closeout tracker | Generate closeout checklists and track missing manuals, warranties, as-builts, and turnover items. | Closeout becomes a managed workflow instead of a last-minute document hunt. |
| Risk digest | Summarize RFI aging, submittal lead times, unresolved items, and schedule-sensitive risks. | Leadership can see where friction is building before it becomes a project delay. |
Every AI-generated artifact should remain reviewable. FTG AI can draft, summarize, and prepare records, but production workflows should keep the project team in control of what gets pushed, copied, exported, or published.
From Chatbot to Virtual Project Engineer
The client can now query their Autodesk Build data through a private AI experience and use Construction Ops as a virtual Project Engineer.
That changes the shape of project questions. Instead of asking someone to manually search through drawings, folders, RFIs, submittals, and meeting notes, the team can ask questions such as:
- Which open RFIs are aging and may affect schedule?
- What does the specification require for this material?
- Are there submittals tied to this drawing area that are still unresolved?
- What changed since the last project update?
- Which closeout items are still missing?
- What source records support this change-order narrative?
SharePoint Online adds important context. Many construction organizations keep contracts, correspondence, meeting files, reports, templates, spreadsheets, and owner documents in Microsoft 365. When FTG AI can reason across both Autodesk Build and SharePoint Online, the assistant has a fuller view of the project environment.
The key design principle
Autodesk Build remains the system of record. FTG AI is the private intelligence layer that helps the team ask better questions, draft better records, and see the project context faster.
The Architecture: Private AI Around Real Project Systems
The Construction Ops module follows the same architectural philosophy as FTG AI: keep the data under the client's control, index the right project sources, enforce permissions, and generate source-aware answers.
Reference Flow
Azure foundation
Azure OpenAI, AI Search, storage, SQL, Key Vault, identity, logging, and usage controls.
Project systems
Autodesk Build is the project-management system of record. SharePoint Online provides additional project context.
Human control
AI assists the project team. It does not remove review, professional judgment, approval, or record-control requirements.
This is where custom application development matters. The value is not just that FTG AI can answer questions. The value is that FTG AI can be shaped around the client's own systems, security model, terminology, data structure, and workflows.
Adding Field Reality to the Project Record
The PDF concept also outlined a natural next layer: reality capture. The module can reason over project documents, but the most valuable operational question is often what the actual status of the work is right now.
For construction teams that already use hard-hat 360-degree capture workflows, the field routine does not have to change. A superintendent can walk the site, capture current conditions, and let the project intelligence layer compare field context against plans, specifications, previous captures, and project records.
That turns capture from a visual archive into an AI input. Over time, that can support progress updates, deviation flags, safety observations, draft RFIs, and daily-report preparation.
Reality capture is not required for the first useful version of Construction Ops. It is a strong extension once Autodesk Build and SharePoint Online context are already connected.
A Phased Rollout Path
A custom AI module should not try to automate every construction workflow on day one. The safer path is to deliver value in phases and keep each phase measurable.
Phase 1: Read and Reason
Connect Autodesk Build, index project specifications and contracts, connect SharePoint Online context, and enable project Q&A with source-backed answers.
Phase 2: Capture and Draft
Use the indexed project state to draft RFIs, submittal support, reports, meeting minutes, weekly summaries, and project dashboards for human review.
Phase 3: Proactive Operations
Add change-order support, closeout automation, risk digests, cross-project reporting, and optional reality-capture intelligence as the system matures.
Every push-to-record feature should include a controlled fallback. Even if a project is read-only or an API boundary is still being finalized, the module can still generate useful drafts, exports, summaries, and source-backed recommendations.
Why This Is an FTG AI Differentiator
Public AI is static. It does not know the client's Autodesk Build environment, SharePoint structure, project records, document permissions, RFI history, submittal log, or preferred operating model.
FTG AI is different because it can be tailored. It can become a private AI platform for the client's environment instead of a generic tool sitting outside it.
For this construction client, the differentiator was not only private chat. It was custom app development: connecting FTG AI to Autodesk Build, SharePoint Online, project-specific document intelligence, review workflows, and construction operations.
The future of business AI is not one generic chatbot for every company. It is private AI that understands how each company actually works.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is FTG AI Construction Ops?
Construction Ops is a custom FTG AI module built for construction operations. It connects project-management data, Autodesk Build records, SharePoint Online files, and project documents into a private AI assistant experience.
Does this replace Autodesk Build?
No. Autodesk Build remains the system of record. FTG AI acts as the private intelligence layer that helps users query, draft, summarize, and coordinate around the project data already managed there.
Why is this different from public AI?
Public AI tools are generic and disconnected from a company's live project systems. FTG AI can be tailored to the organization's Microsoft cloud, security model, Autodesk Build data, SharePoint Online content, and specific workflows.
Can FTG AI connect to SharePoint Online?
Yes. In this module, SharePoint Online content is part of the broader project context, allowing the assistant to reason across project-management records, drawings, contracts, correspondence, and supporting files.
Does FTG AI automatically update project records?
Production workflows should keep human review in the loop. FTG AI can draft RFIs, summaries, reports, risks, and other project artifacts, then support controlled publishing, copying, exporting, or review before records are updated.
How Fletcher Technology Group Can Help
Fletcher Technology Group builds private AI modules around the systems companies already use. That includes Microsoft 365, SharePoint Online, Azure, line-of-business applications, project-management platforms, document repositories, and industry-specific workflows.
For construction and field operations, FTG can help assess project data, define the right module scope, connect source systems, design retrieval and permissions, build workflow-specific prompts, implement review controls, and deliver a private AI assistant that fits the business.
Have a workflow FTG AI should understand?
We can help turn FTG AI into a private assistant for your systems, documents, and daily operations.