Construction productivity has been declining for decades. Housing is more expensive, projects take longer, and contractors are stretched thinner than ever. In a recent conversation, Bobyard’s founder Michael Ding sat down with Joe Lonsdale, General Partner at 8VC, who led Bobyard's recent Series A, to unpack why this is happening and where technology can actually make a meaningful difference.
Check out the full video below:
Here are a few key takeaways that stood out from the conversation:
1. Takeoffs and estimating are uniquely broken and fixable
Most parts of construction improve incrementally. You can’t make someone swing a hammer 10x faster, but estimating is different.
Contractors spend enormous amounts of time manually reviewing drawings, measuring quantities, and defining scope—often just to decide whether to bid a project at all. That work is repetitive, tedious, and constrained by human time.
As Michael explains in the video, takeoffs and estimating may be the only place in construction where software can be 10x or even 100x better than the status quo, and AI is what finally makes that possible.
2. Productivity isn’t about replacing people, it’s about leverage
A major theme of the conversation is that construction is fundamentally about craft. The industry doesn’t suffer because people don’t know how to build—it suffers because skilled people are buried in low-leverage workflows.
Software matters when it gives experts leverage.
By automating the most monotonous parts of estimating, contractors can:
- Bid on more projects
- Spend more time building relationships and winning work
- Focus on higher-value decisions instead of manual measurement
In practice, Bobyard customers have been able to bid 3–5x more projects simply because estimating no longer consumes their entire week.
3. AI works in the real world of construction drawings
Landscaping and site work present some of the hardest technical challenges in construction tech: massive drawings, inconsistent symbols, and little to no standardization between architects.
This isn’t simple detection or classification. It’s open-ended interpretation.
In the video, Michael walks through why Bobyard focused here first and how training models on millions of real drawings allows AI to understand scope and quantities in a way that previously required decades of human experience.
4. Better tools enable better outcomes for everyone
Joe frames the conversation around a bigger question: productivity isn’t just an industry problem, it’s a societal one. When construction gets more efficient, housing becomes more affordable, infrastructure improves, and quality of life rises.
What’s compelling about Bobyard’s approach is that it doesn’t sideline builders—it partners with them. The goal isn’t to replace judgment or craft, but to give contractors back their time so they can focus on doing their best work.