AMSTERDAM, Netherlands – Bentley Systems Inc. announced that it has acquired U.K-based Pointools Ltd., in order to integrate point cloud processing in innovative ways throughout its product portfolio. Point cloud inclusion
supports Bentley’s commitment to advance information mobility with integrity
across design and operational workflows. Point cloud scanning devices are fast
becoming commonplace, so images are now cost-effective to capture, but have
served only for temporary and task-specific purposes because the scale of the
data files overwhelms both storage and query accessibility. Now that Bentley is
uniquely overcoming these challenges, point clouds, as a fundamental data type,
can usefully serve the function of an “as-operated” 3D model for every
infrastructure asset.
Through its acquisition of
Pointools, Bentley is able to go beyond embedding the powerful Vortex engine in
MicroStation, to assimilate point cloud processing and data management through
the ProjectWise and AssetWise platforms, extending point cloud value
through all Bentley solutions, applications, and workflows. At the same time,
with the introduction of the V8i (SELECTseries 3) upgrade, the
Bentley Descartes image management software now becomes the leading information
modeling environment for advanced 3D image and point cloud editing and
processing. By eliminating point cloud distribution and adoption obstacles through
i-models and ProjectWise, Bentley’s project team collaboration and work-sharing
platform, “hands-on” information mobility can now be delivered and secured
from design to construction and operations – and back again for reuse in
rehabilitation, upgrade, and retrofit workflows.
As Bhupinder Singh, senior
vice president, Bentley Software, explained, “With Pointools, we have developed
a breakthrough capability – unlocking the value of the gigabytes or even
terabytes of point cloud data – to surmount the ‘big data’ problem of point
cloud users. A unique new ProjectWise capability will stream on-demand to
Bentley applications only the subset of point cloud data being viewed or
queried. This functionality is what has been needed to allow point clouds to fulfill
their potential as an intrinsic, fundamental data type in information modeling
workflows.
“A software generation ago,
through Bentley Descartes, we delivered comparable innovations to make
large 2D raster image processing feasible for infrastructure engineering
workflows. Combined with the ‘delta file transfer’ functionality already in
ProjectWise, Bentley will now more comprehensively enable collaborative work
sharing. A new ProjectWise point cloud management and streaming service
will be introduced before the end of the year. With our acquisition of
Pointools, its innovative technology, and added in-depth knowledge of point
clouds, watch for additional pioneering capabilities.”
Commenting on the acquisition, Tom
Greaves, managing director, SPAR Point Group, said, “Acquiring Pointools
is a coup for Bentley; the timing is excellent. The match up of
hardware-neutral Pointools with Bentley’s open, single platform strategy
is going to liberate value beyond design to construction and asset management
for Bentley users just as they are demanding and getting more and better data.
Point clouds need a seat at the data table with information modeling, GIS data,
equipment catalogs, project documents and maintenance databases – Bentley sets
a place for point clouds with this acquisition.”
CEO Greg Bentley said, “On behalf
of my colleagues at Bentley, I welcome our new team members from Pointools. We
look forward to enabling our users to benefit from the growing potential value
of point clouds captured by ever-advancing scanning technology. Going forward,
point clouds need no longer be throwaways, and, importantly, owner-operators
can be supported by ‘as-operated’ 3D models. This is a key contribution to
information mobility with integrity for better-performing, safer, and
resilient infrastructure.”
Added Faraz
Ravi, Pointools co-founder, “My colleagues and I are very excited about
joining the Bentley team at a time when infrastructure professionals are
quickly recognizing the tremendous value of point cloud data and adopting it
across a wide range of workflows. In my new role at Bentley I look forward to
helping realize the vision of powering next-generation point cloud workflows
throughout the Bentley portfolio of products.”
Pointools’ super-fast Vortex engine is ideally suited to the demanding
requirements of architectural, engineering, and construction projects due to
its unrivalled ability to handle the very largest point cloud datasets,
comprising billions of points, and from virtually every scanning source.
The Pointools POD file format retains key information pertaining to the
origin of the point cloud data (provenance) including scanner type, original
scan file name, scan date, scan location, and scan keywords. This information
can be indexed and searched to more quickly locate models when managed,
referenced, and maintained in Bentley’s ProjectWise collaboration and
work-sharing platform.
Bentley Makes Point Clouds Valuable Across Full Infrastructure Lifecycle Through Acquisition of Pointools Ltd
November 8, 2011
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