A new coalition of four firms is making a joint open call for technology solutions that could advance new, and changing, COVID-19 safety standards – with the promise that workable findings and best practices will be shared with the industry at large.

The NEXT Coalition, formed by Black & Veatch, DPR Construction, Haskell and McCarthy Building Cos., launched the Construction Safety Challenge, a call for close-to-market technology that addresses evolving COVID-19 safety standards and can be quickly developed, scaled and deployed.

Mike Myers, president of McCarthy’s Southern California region, says the coalition was formed three weeks ago when Black & Veatch, which launched its similar concept-call IgniteX COVID-19 Response Accelerator in March, reached out. Myers calls the partnership a “no brainer” because its mission—to drive ideas and innovation—aligns with McCarthy’s belief that safety happens through collaboration.

“It’s open source, so we are trying to reach anyone and everyone as quickly as we can, because the challenge is right now,” says Myers. Once ideas are submitted, they are divvied to one firm that will test and evaluate the technology and report back to the coalition with its feasibility findings. Each firm will fund its own tests. The coalition is not a profit center; funding of full development and implementation of ideas has not yet been determined.

Brett Spence, a member of Black & Veatch’s innovation strategy team Growth Accelerator, is excited about the possibilities around contact tracing and notes that concepts by tech giants like Apple Inc. and Google Inc. could be useful, but not necessarily applicable if groups don’t use compatible technology. While too soon to tell, Spence also sees promise in ideas around ozone cleaning and temperature checks installed in restrooms. For any concept, time is of the essence.

Spence说：“我们没有时间孵化一年。”联盟将接受新的合作伙伴，并希望与整个行业分享可行的发现。“在确保人们的安全方面，我们都不应该担心诸如竞争之类的事情。我们真的应该一起驾驶解决方案，看到它实际上发生了，尤其是在我们生活的疯狂世界中，它如此迅速地发生。”

该联盟正在寻找可能包括筛查，移动应用程序，消毒，可穿戴设备，联系跟踪和PPE的技术，该技术适用于安全政策合规性，筛选，跟踪和跟踪，实时通信，事件跟踪和数据分析。Haskell建筑技术经理Hamzah Shanbari希望参赛作品来自建筑行业初创公司，这些初创公司正在旋转和调整概念和工具，以满足COVID-19的需求，需要对产品量表的帮助。

McCarthy’s Myers points to a need for advancing PPE, especially as summer approaches. Where face coverings are required, workers face complications like fogging eye protection and possible heat exhaustion that could spurred by PPE meant to protect them. Sanitation and social distancing technology development is also need, and Myers says changes due to automation and other innovations could have long-term industry impact.

Michelle Gray, DPR Construction safety leader in Sacramento, Calif., notes that current COVID-19 protocols are reactive, not proactive, and were implemented to immediately protect people, keep projects online and the workforce working. Now, Gray says the industry has the chance to devise ways to protect workers and ensure preparedness for disruptions.

“The beauty of open-source safety is people might see simple things from a different perspective and create a great tool or technology to meet a known or unknown need,” says Gray.