United States
Podcast Episode
Innovation Expo: Buildots
December 15, 2025
In this episode of STO Building Group’s Innovation Expo series, host Rob Leon sits down with Jessica Herrala, Regional Vice President at Buildots, to explore how AI-powered progress tracking is transforming the way construction teams monitor performance, forecast delays, and make data-driven decisions. From visual AI and object recognition to portfolio-level insights and early risk detection, the conversation highlights how Buildots is helping project teams reduce administrative burden, improve collaboration with trades, and bring greater predictability to complex construction portfolios.
Key Takeaways
Buildots replaces manual progress tracking with AI-powered, data-driven visibility.
- Visual AI enables early delay detection—often saving millions by acting before issues escalate.
- Automated progress tracking is just the starting point; forecasting and decision intelligence are the real value.
- Shared, trusted data drives collaboration between owners, CMs, and trades.
- Portfolio dashboards give leadership real-time insight into risk, mitigation, and performance.
- Accurate progress data improves cash flow, billing confidence, and client trust.
- The partnership positions STO Building Group to lead industry-wide cultural and technological change.
Highlights In This Episode
AI-Powered Progress Tracking Jessica Herrala explains Buildots as an AI-driven progress tracking and delay forecasting platform that replaces manual, error-prone jobsite reporting with data-backed visibility.
Buildots address the long-standing industry gap by automating what teams have historically tracked by hand.
Buildots uses advanced visual AI and object recognition—trained over seven years—to identify and track construction elements down to individual components, colors, and installation status.
Jessica shares a real-world example where Buildots deployed drone-based underground utility tracking in just two weeks—highlighting how quickly AI can move in construction.
The real breakthrough comes when teams trust the data. Early detection of delays has helped customers save millions by identifying issues long before they appear on schedules.
Why Automated Progress Tracking Is “Table Stakes” Progress tracking alone isn’t the end goal—it’s the foundation. Buildots overlay planned vs. actual work using 360° imagery and models every element of the building.
From Progress Data to Delay Forecasting AI-generated production rates enable Buildots to forecast delays before they become visible—showing “smoke before fire” and enabling proactive decision-making.
When trades say something is holding them up, Buildots provides clarity through automated line-of-balance reports, float analysis, and work-ready area tracking.
The platform is moving from a compliance tool to a collaboration tool—bring owners, CMs, and trades together around shared, trusted data.
When It’s Uncomfortable Teams are learning to rely on data over gut instinct, fundamentally changing how projects are run day-to-day.
Buildots’ portfolio dashboard gives leadership instant insight into critical path delays, mitigation strategies, and performance across all projects.
The platform is evolving toward deeper enterprise value, with the ability to layer cost, manpower, and benchmarking across portfolios.
Future capabilities include schedule validation using global benchmarks and asset management through digital twins for owners.
Accurate progress data supports fair billing, reduces disputes, improves cash flow, and builds client confidence in payment decisions.
Buildots helps teams quantify risk when late changes arise—using real data to support difficult but necessary conversations with clients.
A weekly walk with a 360° camera unlocks powerful insights—without adding administrative burden to field teams.
Jessica emphasizes the importance of continued collaboration and leadership engagement to drive long-term cultural change.
Host
Rob Leon
Chief Innovation Officer
STO Building Group
As Chief Innovation Officer, Rob is responsible in finding new and smarter ways to advance our projects, our processes, our services, and the industry as a whole. Rob also acts as a brand manager by coordinating the market strategy for Global Services and provides steadfast leadership, not only among sectors, but across geographic regions to bring the global strength of STO Building Group together with local experience to each client and project in the United States and abroad.
Guests
Jessica Herrala
Regional Vice President
Buildots
Jessica Herrala has more than 25 years of construction industry experience in sales, communications, marketing, strategy, and operational improvement. At Skanska USA she held multiple senior positions, including Head of Public Affairs, Communications & Marketing, Infrastructure Development. In that role, among other accomplishments, she secured $10B in Public-Private Partnership (PPP) projects through the successful development and execution of marketing and communications strategies, campaigns and public affairs work. Herrala also served as VP of Strategic Initiatives and Chief of Staff at The Walsh Group, directing strategic planning and development for a $5 billion unit of the Fortune 500 construction and development firm.
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