Barcelona Win: Speckle Automate Powers Team to Hackathon Victory

AEC Tech Recap; Automation, Collaboration, Innovation

Last weekend’s AEC Tech event proved again how vital automation, collaboration, and innovation are to the building industry.

The Who, What, Where, and Why

Hosted by BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group and McNeel Europe, and supported by CORE studio at Thornton Tomasetti, the event brought together top AEC talent to share ideas (and show off Speckle’s new merch).

Our Community Lead, Johnathon Broughton, spoke on “Empowering the Next Generation of Professional Computational Designers”, sharing insights on discipline in computational design and unveiling Speckle Automate — a tool that runs your workflows automatically whenever a new model version is published in Speckle.

You can try Automate early by joining our Hackathon in June.

Hackathon Highlights

Speckle had a strong presence during the hackathon, helping teams use our platform to create innovative solutions.

• 4 out of 8 teams heavily relied on Speckle, saving significant time in a high-pressure environment.
• One team won Best Overall Hack with a project powered by Speckle Automate and our 3D viewer.

Best Overall Hack – “C”
A platform integrating Rhino and Speckle to let designers share models and analysis for objective design comparisons.

OpenBid – Speckle meets VIKTOR
An open-source bid management solution using Speckle for data sharing and VIKTOR for the interface and analysis.

Symposium Standouts

Several presentations inspired us over the weekend:

• David Mans (CORE Studio) — Showcased Ellipse, a BI-focused cloud app, plus new Grasshopper plugins TTToolbox 2 and Adobe Illustrator Toolkit.
• Vanessa Steeg (McNeel) — Explored Rhino’s diverse uses, from jewellery design to BIM.
• David Andres Leon — Advocated for computational literacy and lowering the barrier to digital adoption in AEC.
• Begoña Gassó (Modelical) — Shared UX-driven product development insights and a real-time Digital Twin for telecom towers.
• Sandra Regué (011h) — Discussed how digital tools can accelerate sustainable construction.