China's engineering project management software status quo and development countermeasures?

The use of information technology to transform and enhance the construction industry is the objective requirements of the development of China's construction industry. At present, the quality of China's engineering project management software and the actual level of application is far behind the developed countries. Therefore, summing up the current situation, looking for gaps, explore a development path suitable for China's national conditions, used to guide the research and development of software to promote the depth of the practical application of China's project management to improve the level of information technology to achieve the industry, the industrial structure of the high degree of significance are of great practical significance.

Project management software

2.1 Definition of the concept

Project management software (hereinafter referred to as project management software) refers to the construction of the project as the core of the construction process, time schedule control as a point of departure, the use of network planning technology, the construction process of progress, costs, resources, etc., for the comprehensive management of a class of application software. It includes five main functional modules: schedule management function, resource management function, cost management function, report generation and output function, auxiliary functions (mainly refers to the interface with other software, secondary development, data confidentiality, etc.). This concept originates from the analysis and generalization of similar products abroad, such as P3 (Primavera Project Planner), Microsoft Project, Harvard Total Project Management, Harvard Project Manager. in a broad sense, project management software In a broad sense, project management software includes a variety of applications related to project management work, which can be involved in progress, cost, resources, quality, risk, organization and other aspects of the project management software is the general term.

2.2 Development Overview

The research and development of domestic project management software began in the 1970s, and has undergone two major transformations (see Figure 1).

The first, in the early 1990s, was marked by a change in the main body of research and development from the users themselves to specialized software companies. In the 70's and 80's is mostly the user units to develop their own single-function primary products, that is, their own needs, their own research, their own development, their own use, is a completely small production mode, in the last two decades, the development of slow. early 90's, the market economy has led to dozens of high-tech private enterprises specializing in building management software development, software began to embark on the socialization, specialization, commercialization The rapid development of the road.

The 90's is a decade of rapid development of domestic construction management software, project costing, quantity calculation, steel batching, plan making, tender making software and other new products emerged in large quantities, the price is gradually reduced, the function continues to improve, the interface is user-friendly, easy to operate, versatility, utility enhancement.

The second time, the end of the 90s, marked by the product from the stand-alone version to system integration. Such as the design of the project construction program, budget, quantity calculation, progress planning, resource planning, cost management, transactional management, etc., integrated to form an organic whole. The operating environment from a single user to expand the network multi-user, to a certain extent, the realization of the enterprise's internal data **** enjoy.

Entering the 2000s, project management software research and development has stagnated. The reasons for this are manifold, both market factors and technical factors, both the impact of the external environment and their own conditions, such as the impact of joining the WTO, changes in user needs, network technology, database technology, communication technology advances. Where is the direction of project management software development? How about the inevitable trend? How to deal with? These issues in front of many people in the industry.

3 Current Situation of Domestic Project Management Software

3.1 External Environment Analysis

3.1.1 Opportunities

(1) Positive policy environment. In July 2000, the State Council issued the "Encouragement of Several Policies for the Development of the Software Industry and the Integrated Circuit Industry" in the areas of investment and financing, taxation, industrial technology, export, income distribution, talent attraction and cultivation, intellectual property protection, etc., to give the software industry a better chance of success. The State Council issued "Several Policies to Encourage the Development of Software Industry and Integrated Circuit Industry" in July 2000, which gives preferential policies in investment financing, taxation, industrial technology, export, income distribution, talent attraction and cultivation, and intellectual property protection. The Ministry of Construction is leading the development of general standards such as the General Standard for Construction Enterprise Management Information System Software and the General Standard for Construction Information Platform Data to standardize the behavior of the information market in the construction field. Provinces and cities, local construction committees, quota stations and high-tech development zones, and actively implement the party and state policies, to develop a series of preferential measures to cultivate and foster the development of local software enterprises.

(2) huge market demand. Project management software as an industry-specific software, its development and the construction industry itself is closely related to the rise and fall. According to statistics, China's existing construction enterprises of all types of more than 10 million, hundreds of thousands of project managers, in addition to project supervision, audit, construction bank, the first party and other units are management software users, the long-term software needs should be in the 1 million sets, but now the total sales of software less than 20,000 sets. After joining the WTO, affected by various factors, China's economy will show rapid growth, the overall scale of domestic investment in construction to expand, which will create a good opportunity for the development of the construction industry, but also will be sure to pull the industry software market demand growth.

(3) the wide application of information technology in the construction industry. 20 century after the 1990s, China's construction industry application of information technology has made rapid progress in the development of the popularization and promotion of project management software provides the necessary conditions. Mainly in: 1. website construction from scratch, forming a government website, industry website, enterprise website three levels. 2. widely used computing software and tools software. 3. in the construction of the promotion of the application of information technology as a feature of automation control technology, has achieved better results.

3.1.2 Challenges

(1) The groundwork for project management is weak. The application of software to have certain conditions, the current project management in China to affect the application of software and development of the main issues are: 1. Management work has not been standardized. For example, a variety of reports, information, data and the division of various cost items, a variety of texts, etc., the degree of standardization is not high. 2. The arbitrariness of the work process, non-procedural work and interference, so that the advanced planning methods, control methods and procedures are difficult to use, it is difficult to show their effects. 3. The overall management level is low, and managers at all levels are not yet able to grasp the modern means and methods of management. Weak management of the groundwork not only limits the demand for software applications, but also further widens the gap between domestic project management and the international level.

(2) the challenge of foreign competitors. At present, foreign software to enter the Chinese construction market are MS-Project, P3 and so on. These software is powerful, specialized, highly visible and flexible in marketing. For example, P3 software has a very high visibility in the international community, and has gradually become the standard software in the engineering project management industry. The World Bank also recommends the use of P3 software in large-scale projects. After joining the WTO, foreign software enterprises will enjoy national treatment, export subsidy policy, government procurement will be restricted, China's product market should not only be open, the service market is also open accordingly, the software market will be completely open, the domestic software market is becoming increasingly competitive. Moreover, after joining the WTO, the increase in foreign-funded construction projects, construction market liberalization, foreign engineering design, contracting, consulting units will increase the influx of MS-Project, P3 and other market share.

Domestic software is generally more in line with the needs and habits of domestic users in terms of function setting and operation mechanism, such as dual-code network diagrams, front line function, etc. However, in terms of user interface, report generation and operation mechanism, MS-Project and P3 are more suitable for domestic users. However, there are still big gaps in user interface, report generation and output, data exchange, secondary development, etc. And these software are not possible to be used in international engineering projects at present.

3.2 Analysis of internal conditions

3.2.1 Advantages

(1) Mature technology. After nearly 30 years of development, the domestic project management software has been developed to apply to both company and project levels, and the technical level of some software has reached a new height, impressing foreign counterparts and laying a technical foundation for the development of information products suitable for national conditions. For example, Beijing Menglong Company's intelligent management system Pert, Dalian Tongzhou Company's project plan management system TZ-Project.

(2) High market share. Preliminary estimates indicate that the market share of domestic software is more than two-thirds. In addition, the user to purchase the software, you need to be trained to learn to master the use. Once skilled in use, they tend to continue to buy subsequent products, rather than switch to other companies of similar products. This consumer characteristic is favorable to the first software companies to occupy the market. A variety of reasons for the domestic software companies have been the first to occupy the market, establish sales channels and user trust in them.

(3) Localization of services. The value of software is ultimately expressed in the traditional industry services, the core of the software industry competition is the competition for services. Domestic software companies after more than a decade of market development, has hundreds of thousands of users across the country to establish a more complete service system, in-depth to the highway, ports, construction, municipal, railroads, water conservancy, electric power and other fields, can quickly respond to user requirements, to provide comprehensive consulting and training and maintenance services, which is a foreign company can not be done in the short term.

(4) Talent advantage. The average salary of domestic software developers is lower than the international level, is 1/30 ~ 1/20 of the United States, which can greatly reduce the cost of software development. In addition, the operation of the domestic construction market is not standardized, the user's needs vary greatly, and domestic R & D staff familiar with the market, and users easy to communicate with the development of products more in line with "China's national conditions.

3.2.2 Disadvantages

(1) Brand and quality. The number of domestic project management software, but there is no one like P3 as a well-known brand. Dozens of software development units "each occupying a hill", the domestic market shows a small, scattered, fragmented pattern. In the research and development process generally lacks a rigorous testing process, software changes and version of the frequent upgrades, resulting in increased costs and maintenance difficulties, bringing users a lot of unnecessary trouble. Moreover, due to the lack of an effective software development management system, the change of a key designer often seriously affects the entire production process of software products. In the function module, the domestic software focuses on schedule management, in resource management, cost management is far behind and foreign software. In addition, the domestic software are unable to realize the network environment of heterogeneous database interconnection, no open secondary development interface to the user.

(2) small scale, insufficient development funds. Domestic software enterprises are currently the main source of funds to the enterprise's own investment, venture capital and government investment in three main. Most of the enterprises lack normal means of financing, just rely on the accumulation of operating profits development. Small-scale enterprises, the lack of "heavyweight" enterprises, research, design, development and market development capabilities are limited. According to statistics, enterprises with less than 50 employees account for about 40%, enterprises with 50 to 100 employees account for about 50%, only two enterprises with 100 to 200 employees, and zero enterprises with more than 200 employees.

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