Gaining a competitive edge through AI with Willmott Dixon Construction

28 hours

Freed up per bid for value-adding activity

6-figure

Delivering a six-figure predicted cost saving

100%

Users unlocked time for other value-adding activities on a bid

Willmott Dixon is one of the UK’s largest privately-owned construction and interior fit-out companies. It invests heavily in its work-winning community, employing teams across the UK to write around 180 bids each year.

Core Services Provided

Digital Consultancy & Innovation

UX & Design

Software & Product Engineering

Our task

In 2023, Tribus and Willmott Dixon launched The Knowledge Hub, a ground-breaking digital platform for consolidating business and project information. Providing access to national expertise and crucial resources, The Knowledge Hub allowed Willmott Dixon to provide more in-depth responses to bids/tenders. It also unlocked a new opportunity for the business, providing a platform from which to use AI to enhance its new business outcomes and the lives of those behind them.

In 2025, Willmott Dixon tasked Tribus to create an AI application that would optimise The Knowledge Hub and address key opportunities and challenges, including:

Saving time: Repurposing time spent on administrative tasks for value-adding work.
Protecting IP: Reducing the risk of colleagues using valuable intellectual property on publicly available AI tools.
Improving wellbeing: Reducing repetitive tasks and giving people time to focus their experience on adding real value.
Maintaining a competitive edge: Ensuring expert time was used for driving innovation.
Creating a tool that people will actually use: For the Knowledge Hub AI to succeed, it had to meet the needs and expectations of those using it.

Our approach

Saving time
The application created efficiencies throughout the bidding process, from sourcing information to peer reviews. By combining information from uploaded tender documents with The Knowledge Hub’s content, it allowed Willmott Dixon to maximise the benefits of AI quickly, with seamless integration.

Time-saving features/functions included:

An AI chat/search feature that finds/edits business data using natural language, reducing search times from minutes to seconds.
Document ingestion that uses AI to populate bid evaluation criteria, project/customer details, and extract the necessary questions to reply to the tender.

Protecting IP
Through our exploration, we deduced that a customised product was crucial. Whilst generative AI tools such as AutogenAI and Chat GPT did exist, they were inadequate as they wouldn’t protect the company’s IP or restrict data to Willmott Dixon’s information.

Tribus also built a secure platform to house and guide AI journeys within The Knowledge Hub (rather than opting for an integrated tool as originally requested), as it would help future-proof the project against potential feedback loops and copyright law violations. By using an LLM hosted in AWS, it guaranteed a level of privacy, ensuring the dataset wouldn’t be shared, stored, or trained upon.

Improving wellbeing
Alongside features that alleviated time pressures and made it easier to find information, the application also provided support and peace of mind through:

An AI stakeholder review, acting and replying as instructed to help audit completed tenders.
The ability to identify information gaps, rather than filling them in (hallucinating) like off-the-shelf tools.

Maintaining a competitive edge
By automating some of the manual processes, expert time was redirected to focus on value-adding activities. This included developing creative, customer-centric, work-winning content, increasing opportunities to improve win rates, and contributing to growth.

Creating a tool that people will actually use: To inform the application’s design, a user group was engaged for in-depth workshops and provided ongoing feedback for proof-of-concept testing. To further support the application’s integration in workflows:

Users were upskilled on the power of AI.
AI guidelines were created.
Ongoing surveys are conducted to gather user feedback and inform product evolution.

Where things developed

Working beyond the brief, Tribus has provided both technical and strategic business consultancy to enhance the final product and maximise the opportunities it presented. This has benefited Willmott Dixon in numerous ways.

Business integration

Whether it was holding workshops to upskill users on the power of AI, or creating AI guidelines, Tribus worked to support the implementation of the platform within the wider business.

Data governance

Using our technical expertise, we’ve built a platform which uses AI entirely within a secure environment, so that no data is sent to third parties or systems.

Timely delivery

Tribus acted as an agile, responsive, proactive delivery partner to deliver this project within a matter of months, rather than years.

100% users unlocked time

Our results

Developed in six months from inception to launch, Tribus’s AI application has enabled Willmott Dixon to optimise The Knowledge Hub and unlock opportunities. The cost savings are also predicted to return the company’s investment within just seven months of implementation. Results from the work-winning team in the first months of using the application include:

Saving time

The tool has streamlined the process, allowing teams to focus their expertise on creating better solutions for customers.

Protecting IP

Risks of colleagues sharing IP with competitors are reduced.

Improving wellbeing

100% saved time in sourcing evidence for bid responses. Additional support and security provide further peace of mind.

Maintaining a competitive edge

100% say the AI tool has unlocked time for other value-adding activities on a bid, enabling them to increase the quality of responses.

Creating a tool that people will actually use

Originally built for work-winning teams, the tool is now used across the business, resulting in thousands of sessions in its first two months.

Don't take our word for it

"The product Tribus has developed is a world away from where we first started. The team’s constant drive to deliver the best possible solution has resulted in something that we are so incredibly proud of." Hayley Coe, Head of Knowledge, Willmott Dixon