Autodesk's 2027 State of Design & Make report is out, and it's worth your time. It draws on 5,500 leaders across architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, and media to show where the industry is heading.
At IMAGINiT, we work with roughly 36,000 accounts and hold thousands of meetings each year with AEC firms, contractors, and owners across North America. The report does a strong job of showing where the industry stands, but it says less about what firms are actually doing in response. That's the color we want to add here: where the report matches what we're hearing, where the North American story goes further, and how firms are tackling these challenges today.
Start by defining your own starting line
The report highlights "Pacesetters," the 11% of organizations leading in digital maturity, AI, and sustainability at the same time. It's a useful benchmark, but maturity is self-defined. For one firm, digital transformation means moving from 2D to 3D. For another, it's starting BIM, adopting AI, or simply moving data to the cloud. That may explain why the share of firms calling themselves digitally mature fell from 63% to 44%: the goalposts keep moving. Before comparing yourself to anyone, decide what maturity means for your organization.
1. AI: real interest, real costs, uneven progress
For the first time, technology, including AI, has overtaken cost as the top organizational challenge. Three-quarters of leaders plan to increase AI investment, yet the share who say they're close to their AI goals has held at 40% for two years.
That matches what we hear. There's real fatigue as every vendor claims AI, and real pressure to keep up with competitors. Costs are rising too, from tokens to the often-overlooked expense of connecting and accessing the data AI needs. Most of the value today comes from automating text-based work: standards checks, code verification, and specification comparison. The bigger opportunity, AI that reasons across geometry, schedule, and cost, is still ahead.
The firms making progress are tightening governance, deciding what they actually want AI to do, and being deliberate about what their AI learns from. The biggest project or the most profitable one isn't necessarily the best design to learn from.
2. The constraint is people, not technology
More leaders cite skills gaps (56%) than cost (37%) as their biggest barrier. In North America, that shows up as retiring experts, fewer graduates entering design, and people moving into leadership with less experience. Add AI, and a new risk appears: work can be produced faster than people have the judgment to question it. When AI output isn't validated, errors travel downstream as rework, delays, liability, and damaged relationships.
The encouraging part is how firms are responding. They're investing in training before adding more tools, pairing senior staff with younger employees to capture hard-earned knowledge, doubling their intern programs, partnering with universities, and hiring programmers, data analysts, and AI specialists. Many are also extending their capacity beyond North America. A few years ago, that meant outsourcing modeling to third parties; today, firms that have built trust in that work are acquiring or investing in teams overseas and in South America, within the rules owners set for where project work can be done. Most importantly, the strongest firms are making validation part of their culture: if you can't explain it, it doesn't leave the building.
3. Connected data is the foundation
The report's Pacesetters are far more likely to connect systems through APIs (91% vs. 60%) and assign clear ownership of their data. We're seeing the same shift. A year ago, the conversation was about centralizing everything in a data lake. Today it's about connecting the tools people already use, reducing duplicate data, and letting teams work in the applications best suited to their work.
Connection matters beyond the office, too. Designers are being asked to provide more data downstream so fabricators can prefabricate and validate what can actually be built, and manufacturing practices are finding their way into AEC through modular and prefab construction. The report sees the same convergence: AEC firms' use of manufacturing design tools grew nearly 30% in a single year.
Disconnected workflows have always cost time. Now they cost money too, because every gap means more tokens, more tools, and more recreated data. The firms getting ahead start by assessing their workflows, finding the gaps, and then connecting them.
4. Owners are changing the rules
This is the biggest gap in the report. Owners are increasingly defining the platforms their projects run on, planning data for 50 to 100 years of operations, and asking how AI is used on their projects and whether their information is protected. Some are starting to ask questions that could change how design work is valued.
Many owners also tell us they wish their partners challenged them more, bringing ideas before being asked. That's an opportunity for design firms and contractors willing to lead the conversation.
The opportunity isn't only better ideas; it's new deliverables. Lifecycle-ready data, consistent scans across a portfolio, and early visualization that carries into a digital twin are all things owners are asking for, and things firms can deliver and be paid for. If owners do start valuing design work differently, new deliverables are how firms protect and grow their value.
Define what success looks like
Just as maturity is personal, so is ROI. Some firms will measure hours returned to their people; others will track fewer RFIs and change orders, better retention, or AI costs kept under control. What matters is choosing your measures before you invest, not after.
The report offers a strong global view. The North American story adds urgency around people, cost, and owners. If you'd like to compare notes on what you're seeing in your organization, we'd welcome the conversation.
State of Design and Make Report
Author: Alan Morse | VP AEC / Construction Sales
