Rene Morkos - Alice Technnologies - Productive AI Podcast with Troy Angrignon
In this episode, I speak with René Morkos (Ph.D.) René is an inventor, founder, adjunct professor at Stanford University, and CEO of ALICE Technologies. He invented the world’s first Generative Construction Simulator and Optimizer and obtained his Ph.D. in artificial intelligence applications for construction as a Charles H. Leavell fellow at Stanford University, where he currently serves as an adjunct professor in the Civil and Environmental Engineering department. He is a second-generation civil engineer with over 15 years of experience in construction, divided between industry and academia. His operational experience includes working as a project manager in Afghanistan, underwater pipeline construction, automation engineering on a $350 million gas refinery expansion project in Abu Dhabi, ERP system implementations, and various Virtual Design and Construction projects. He founded ALICE technologies, the world's first construction optioneering platform, in 2015 and continues its mission of reducing the cost of construction by 25% globally to allow for lower costs of living.
Links
Company: https://www.alicetechnologies.com/
LinkedIn: / renemorkos
ChatGPT: https://chat.openai.com/
Wikipedia article on Operations Research: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operati...
Timeline
00:00 Intro
00:23 Introducing René
03:09 Building landing strips for F-16s
03:24 Stanford Ph.D.
03:58 Space is underutilized in construction
04:40 Hold my beer
05:09 Our first big deal
05:26 Construction is inefficient
06:04 Algorithmic conversion
07:19 Construction is innovative, just not cross-functionally
08:01 Parametric design
10:51 Combining operations research and construction
12:16 There is beauty in complexity
14:46 Codifying constraints is the key
16:24 Buildings and bridges are the same thing
17:46 Process modeling first, robots second
18:49 Construction is following behind manufacturing
20:06 ChatGPT as turning point
20:55 What elements of AI is Alice using
22:02 Advice to young founders