KTP funding success: Collaboration with AECOM on market forecasting

AECOM, a global infrastructure and engineering support services firm, has identified significant gaps in the commercial market for construction industry forecasting tools. Existing products, which aim to provide an economic analysis of the industry, suffer from a range of limitations and inaccuracies because they do not fully embrace the microeconomic, sectoral and macroeconomic influences on business performance. Furthermore, forecasting outputs are often reported following national statistics conventions, which is not always beneficial in a business context.

The team, led by Professor Michelle Baddeley, will harness academic capabilities in economic analysis and econometrics to develop more innovative and accurate construction forecasts. They will use insights from behavioural economics, as well as micro-, macro- and industry economics, as the foundation for the forecasting methodology. These innovative forecasts will be developed initially for the UK construction industry, but with plans to extend the capability to other industries and global regions, including emerging markets.

For AECOM, this advanced forecasting capability will create an opportunity to report at a greater level of detail, adopting an approach tailored to the way real global businesses respond to their markets and clients.

The partnership, which has been awarded over £250,000 in funding, is sponsored jointly by AECOM and Innovate-UK (formerly the Technology Strategy Board) and supported by UCL Advances.