Due to its similarity to industrialized products, the offsite construction industry is seen as a focus for the transformation of Construction 4.0. Many digital technologies have been applied or have the potential to be applied to realize the integration of design, manufacturing, and assembly. The main objective of this review was to identify the current stage of applying digital technologies in offsite construction. In this review, 171 related papers from the last 10 years (i.e., 2013–2022) were obtained by collecting and filtering them. They were classified and analyzed according to the digital twin concept, application areas, and specific application directions. The results indicated that there are apparent differences in the utilization and development level of different technologies in different years. Meanwhile, the introduction, current stages, and benefits of different digital technologies are also discussed. Finally, this review summarizes the current popular fields and speculates on future research directions by analyzing article publication trends, which sheds light on future research.
Building information modeling (BIM) and virtual design and construction (VDC) are useful management processes and methodologies to enhance project communication and coordination. Over the past few decades, researchers and practitioners have made efforts to promote the adoption of BIM and VDC in the construction industry. However, currently, the promotion and adoption of BIM and VDC are relatively slow in North America. This paper focuses on developing an approach to drive the adoption of the technologies through cooperation among project stakeholders and proposing a method of collaboration through a case study. In this paper, the authors surveyed and interviewed a major Canadian general contractor on its implementation of BIM and VDC in construction projects. The was to benchmark the status of BIM and VDC applications in the Atlantic region of Canada from a general contractor’s perspective. Both surveys and interviews were conducted with various project participants throughout the organization. Based on the results, a “Digital Construction Framework for the Future” is proposed to increase the adoption of BIM and VDC. This research can provide a general understanding of BIM and VDC adoption in this particular general contractor and areas of improvement in transitioning to a more digital working construction environment.