When it comes to construction one may not think about the heavy lifting that technology can do to ensure that projects are able to come full circle — that is until TracFlo came to life!
Khalid David — founder of TracFlo — hails from a family of construction work and knows the pain points that are faced by both contractors and consumers.
“I typically ask people if they’ve ever done a kitchen or bathroom renovation,” said David in an interview with AfroTech. “You’ll discover that it starts at one price and ends up at another price and that’s because there are always unforeseen changes. That’s a part of the construction industry.”
Whenever something is being built, like the commercial skyscraper in the downtown area of a particular city, the changes in tow can often cost tens of millions of dollars. With TracFlo, contractors are able to track and manage project costs in a one-stop shop, which saves them both time and money.
The Fix
David was raised by a family of tradesmen, so he knows the power of hard work, yet, he has always had a passion for making the lives of others easy through the tools and resources that technology provides.
“What we’re really doing is digitizing construction payments, but we’re doing it in a mobile way,” David explained. “I compare it to the same way that you may use Zelle, Cash App, or Venmo to split a bill among friends, but instead we’re doing that across multiple stakeholders. We’ve created a platform that’s completely different from how most construction payments are handled today.”
Bridging The Gap
The construction industry has been one of the last to adapt to technology in a way that makes its projects a bit more efficient.
“For the longest time, the construction industry has been a mobile industry,” he said. “This means that projects always happen on-site and while like most industries we were getting desktop computers in our offices, it wasn’t until we had mobile data-rich devices that we could really bring that software on-site for us.”
According to David, the industry is experiencing what he calls a tech evolution where everyone has a smartphone.
“Now the people who are out there on-site finally have the digital tools needed,” David said. “They’re tradesmen, so they mainly work with their hands and the first time that a computer has become part of their day-to-day has been through the smartphone. So, that’s where we’re at, this precipe of helping our sort of antiquated industry transition to have that software on-site.”
Now, thanks to TracFlo, construction workers can manage their projects from start to finish all from the comfort of a mobile app.
Click here to learn more about TracFlo.
