AI and digital transformation are the future of the Design and Make industries

Autodesk President and CEO Andrew Anagnost discusses AI and the digital transformation of the Design and Make industries in 2024—and what the future holds for them.

Autodesk Video

April 10, 2024

AI presents a solution to capacity problems in manufacturing by enabling people to achieve more with fewer resources, addressing challenges related to workforce, materials, and finances.
The increasing accumulation of unused data highlights the untapped potential for leveraging data insights to drive innovation and sustainability in projects, emphasizing the need for better data organization and utilization.
The adoption of AI facilitates collaboration and streamlines workflows by summarizing vast amounts of project data from multiple models, empowering stakeholders to work together more effectively and uncover new insights.

The demand for “more”—more buildings, more services, more products, more content—is growing at a rapid pace. How can industries keep up with demand while ensuring sustainability? AI can help.

AI is transforming the Design and Make industries, giving professionals greater insights into their collected data and helping professionals do much more with less. Watch the video to learn what Autodesk President and CEO Andrew Anagnost says about the state of the Design and Make industries and what the future holds for them. Then read the 2024 State of Design & Make report to get the details.

View transcript

In the world of making things, we have a massive capacity problem. There is not enough people, materials, or money to make or remake or rebuild everything that needs to be made or rebuilt. AI can help solve some of these capacity problems. It can help people literally do more with less.

And people are also accumulating massive amounts of data. And most of that data goes completely unused. But they see the potential now that if they can get their data in order, there’s probably something there that can do incredible things for them. People are requesting more sustainable outcomes for the projects that they commissioned, and as a result, they’re going to have to know how much embedded carbon is in this part of the project, how much lifetime carbon is produced by this part of the project.

They have to be able to move to an environment where they can simulate everything with regard to how the building product or infrastructure piece is going to perform in the future over a long lifetime. If you’re not starting to do that now, you’re not ready for the world you’re going to be competing in in 10 years.

There’s usually more than one model on a particular project. There is the architect’s version of the model. There’s the engineer’s version of the model. There’s the manufacturer’s version of the model. There’s the construction professional’s version of the model. AI can summarize massive amounts of information in a way that no human being can and allow people to collaborate and work together in ways they’ve never been able to work before.

Our customers are going to see things they’ve never seen before. They’re going to have insights they were never able to surface before. That’s what AI is going to be able to do. And I can't think of a customer in our ecosystem that doesn’t need that.

We’re at a real cusp of being able to change a lot of things that are happening in our industry. And I wake up every day excited about that and wanting to be part of making it happen.