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A Toronto‑based tech firm’s AI platform is slashing the time electrical contractors spend manually modelling and routing during pre‑construction—a phase where electrical systems are laid out and where early mistakes can translate into field changes and scheduling delays.

According to marketing director Johnnie Kern, Augmenta’s automated modelling, routing and co-ordination tool is averaging three times the speed of manual methods, while its accuracy reduces work‑order changes and material waste.

Electrical contractors often work under pressure during pre-construction, relying solely on “source and destination points,” which forces them to revise their conduit raceways once onsite, he says.

Those are modifications that can slow the project down, disrupting work flows for mechanical, plumbing and finishing trades.

Kern says some of Augmenta’s customers use its platform to run miles of 3D co-ordinated conduit in large-scale projects, such as data centres, hospitals, schools and other large institutional buildings.

“This (AI modelling) helps to make sure that all of their electrical raceway design systems are co-ordinated with the other trades,” he points out.

“Our customers generate a solution (with AI) that they can value engineer, based on the number of bends, materials and other options.”

He adds when a contractor’s job includes “a staggering amount of linear feet of conduit,” routing that manually can be a “very tedious process.”

Typically, the AI‑driven modelling is performed in Autodesk Revit, he says.

Kern is not aware of any other companies that are using AI to generate electrical 3D designs for BIM.

He says electrical contractors on two schools in Michigan say with Augmenta’s AI platform they reduced waste by 15 per cent on the first job and they used 95 per cent of conduit from modelling on the second contract.

Founded in 2018, Augmenta chose to model “the hardest problem first, electrical,” at the end of the pre-construction process to illustrate that automated outputs are truly constructible, says the marketing director.

“If there are mistakes prefab teams will see them right away.

“We’ve talked to the top 20 contractors in the country that have backlogs for years. They are looking for any solutions that will help.”

Kern says the company understands the skepticism to AI in the design and construction world.

“This is a complicated 3D environment.”

But the company, run by computational design experts, has been working on the problem for years. 

Unlike generative AI, he says Augmenta’s computational AI platform combines proprietary algorithms with “bleeding edge machine learning to handle the geometric complexity of a 3D environment.”

Augmenta has worked with large-scale contractors in Canada and the U.S. 

Toronto is a key market, adds Kern.

A cornerstone to success is forging partnerships with contractors, engineering firms and others in the construction industry.

“This has to function (rout) as if it was (done by) an electrician, a modeller with three decades of experience.”

Kern says modelling solutions for mechanical and plumbing trades is the next step for Augmenta.  Hurdles remain but when the three trades are co-ordinated, it will result in “more significant” waste reductions, “a high level change to the economics of construction as a whole.”

“Our North Star is being able to get to a place where there are fully co-ordinated building systems across all the trades.”

The company has faced a number of challenges, stops and starts and “messy learnings, but all that goes into the commercially mature offering that we have today.”

As a testimonial to the company’s work, its inclusion in the 2026 Global Cleantech Top 100 list highlights Augmenta as one of the world’s top private companies advancing clean technology.

“We’re excited that they, focused on sustainability, can see the potential impact of what we are doing.”