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In this episode of the AEC Business Podcast, Aarni Heiskanen talks with Adeline Chan, CEO and co-founder of Hong Kong-based AAL Innovation, about how AEC companies can move AI adoption beyond isolated pilots and into real organizational change.
Adeline describes how her firm’s consultancy, academy, and creative studio support real estate developers, engineering consultancies, and contractors through AI transformation. She explains why successful companies build internal template libraries rather than relying on isolated “AI champions” and outlines a traffic-light governance framework for managing risk as AI agents and tools spread across an organization.
The conversation covers the long-running debate on data readiness for AI, with concrete examples including an 80% reduction in man-hours on a Shanghai state grid BIM project and a rule-based generative workflow used for KFC store rollouts in China. Adeline also shares her view on measuring AI ROI responsibly, why pre-AI performance metrics should not carry over to post-AI evaluation, and how Chinese AEC tech firms differ from their Western counterparts in pricing, data infrastructure, and market strategy.
The episode closes with her outlook on the next five years of AI adoption in AEC, including the risk of “intent drift” across chains of AI agents.
Connect with Adeline on LinkedIn and visit AAL Innovation to learn more.
Watch the interview on YouTube.
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