Balfour Beatty has featured in UNLEASH, where Chief Information Officer, Jon Ozanne, shares how the organisation’s £7.2 million investment in Microsoft 365 Copilot, one of the largest of its kind in the UK construction and infrastructure industry, is already supporting employees and helping to drive productivity across the business.

In the interview, Jon explains that “Historically, construction has been slower to adopt digital technologies compared to other industries. AI gives us the chance to change that. Copilot acts as an intelligent assistant – not replacing human expertise, but amplifying it with the right support to work smarter and more efficiently”.

Unlike publicly available tools, Copilot operates securely within Balfour Beatty’s compliant IT environment, supporting smarter, faster and safer outcomes across hundreds of projects. The company is also trialling AI-powered “smart agents” to automate manual processes and improve quality and safety, starting with early-stage inspection reviews.

The benefits of Microsoft 365 Copilot are far reaching with 75% of early adopters at Balfour Beatty believing it improved their work, 78% finding it enhanced their communication, and 77% exerted less mental effort on mundane tasks. In addition, 66% said they would be more likely to take a role in the future where Microsoft 365 Copilot was available because of their experiences with the tool.

Read the full interview with Jon Ozanne in UNLEASH here.

Image: Balfour Beatty Chief Information Officer, Jon Ozanne