WSP builds engineering apps for colleagues without Python experience

Application development engineering Python

WSP takes an important step regarding the professional development of engineering applications by signing a partnership with VIKTOR. With the partnership, WSP enables their engineers to build applications that their colleagues without any programming (Python) experience are able to use as well.

Download the White Paper and get INSPIRED

Learn about trends in digital transformation and how they affect the engineering and construction industry.

WSP empowers their engineers to automate workflows.

WSP has taken an important step in scaling its expertise in engineering automation by partnering with VIKTOR. With this step, WSP has empowered their own engineers to build professional web applications for engineering automation and distribute them worldwide.

"Our goal to is to provide our colleagues with easy-to-use apps that help producing better engineering solutions in less time. To reach that goal, we wanted to professionalize our app development capacities, and I believe VIKTOR is the right partners for us because of their focus on engineering.”

Mark van den Brink
Digital Transformation Lead | WSP

About WSP

WSP is one of the world’s leading engineering and professional services firms. Their trusted professionals are united by the common purpose— to create positive, long-lasting impact on the communities they serve through a culture of innovation, integrity, and inclusion.

WSP exists to future-proof our cities and environment, providing strategic advisory, engineering and design services to clients in the transportation, infrastructure, environment, building, power, energy, water, and mining sectors.

WSP numbers.svg

Partnership WSP - VIKTOR

WSP started a Proof of Concept (PoC) using the VIKTOR platform in 2021, where a group of civil engineers from WSP got basic VIKTOR app development training and created and successfully launched two applications for engineering automation in less than four weeks.

This successful approach is now continued through a partnership and has resulted in multiple engineering automation apps created by WSP, which are continuously used in several projects.

"The VIKTOR platform enables our engineers to develop apps themselves using Python and share them with colleagues in a secure manner. These colleagues don’t require any programming experience to use the apps. So far, we already see significant efficiency gains and that is why we are now continuing at high pace!"

Mark van de Brink
Digital Transformation Lead | WSP

First two applications finished

During the 4-week PoC, the engineers of WSP made two applications: the cross-section app and the fender design app.

Everyone within WSP can use both tools, enabling people without any programming knowledge to leverage their programming colleagues’ expertise without requiring any assistance.

Fender Design app

Wichard Bron, Structural Engineer at WSP, created an app to design the Fender Design app. “Designing fenders is a time-consuming process, as it requires you to continually update and run a non-linear finite element model until finding a solution that fulfils the requirements”, explains Bron.

The Fender Design app connects the different software packages required for the design, such as SCIA engineer and Excel, automatically runs optimizations, and presents the results in the app’s interactive user interface. Bron says, “The app has significantly reduced the time our structural engineers need to get a solution while simultaneously delivering a better design.”

fender app.png

"Thanks to the app, I can make designs 5x faster compared to before and always deliver the best solution for the project on time, even as requirements evolve. Now, instead of spending time on updating models and reports, I use my expertise to solve more challenging problems and provide more value to our customers”

Wichard Bron
Structural Engineer | WSP

Ground levels cross-section app

For most infrastructure projects, like highways, railroads, and dikes, engineers need information about the ground elevation as a basis for their designs. “Finding the right data source, extracting the data and formatting it into the format used in your design software can take days if done manually” – explains Martijn Kriebel, Flood Risk Consultant at WSP. “Luckily, I have programming skills and created Python scripts to make this task easier”, he continues.

The problem is that not everyone on the team knows Python, so colleagues constantly needed Martijn’s help to get this information so they could continue their projects. “That’s why I decided to create the cross-section app, to allow my colleagues to easily define a trajectory on a map and automatically get cross-sections of the ground elevation based on different databases themselves.”

The app was a great success. Martijn later expanded it for other purposes, such as extracting the hydraulic head from groundwater models to calculate the hydraulic gradient on a dike or determining the local soil build-up by extracting 3D underground information.

UI of Cloud-based Python Cross-section tool

"Before, I was one of the few persons that could use the Python scripts that create the cross-sections. My colleagues depended on me for projects and I was really becoming the bottleneck in the process. Thanks to the VIKTOR app I made, now everyone in the team can do this without needing me nor any programming experience.”