Year in Infrastructure 2025 – that’s a wrap

By Chief Customer Officer Angela Harvey

Bentley’s Year in Infrastructure (YII) is an industry calendar highlight – a celebration of innovation and excellence, and an opportunity to soak up insights shared by experts.

AI’s transformative influence

Throughout YII 2025, the unifying thread in almost every conversation was the transformative impact of AI, weaving together discussions on innovation, productivity, and the future of global infrastructure.

Bentley Systems Chief Executive Officer Nicholas Cumins said the Going Digital Awards submissions for 2025 sent a clear signal that AI was transforming infrastructure.
Source: Bentley Systems

Bentley Systems Chief Executive Officer Nicholas Cumins said during his keynote that nearly a third of submissions and half of shortlisted finalist’s projects for this year’s Going Digital Awards incorporated some form of AI – a sharp increase in just one or two years.

‘What’s striking is how diverse these AI applications are. AI is emerging across design, construction, and operations – touching every phase of the infrastructure life cycle and the outcomes go well beyond time savings,’ he said. ‘They are showing us better ways of working. Infrastructure professionals are using AI not just to automate but to optimise decisions and outcomes in ways we could not have achieved before.’

At Seequent we share Bentley’s commitment to responsible data stewardship and customer ownership of their data – meaning they choose if, when and how they expose their data to AI.

Going Digital Awards 2025

The Going Digital Awards are always a highlight at Year in Infrastructure (YII), and this year was no different. Going Digital Awards winners are selected by a panel of independent industry specialists, making these true industry awards. It was an absolute pleasure co-hosting the awards ceremonies. The pride and enthusiasm of the finalists and winners was contagious!

Fervo Energy won the Subsurface modelling and analysis category for its Cape Station geothermal project in Utah.
Source: Bentley Systems

The breadth of Seequent’s capabilities was reflected in the nine finalist projects using our software, often alongside Bentley software.

Fervo Energy won the Subsurface modelling and analysis category for its Cape Station geothermal project in Utah, noted for coming in 18% under budget. Their use of advanced 3D modelling with Seequent and Bentley tools improved well placement, performance, and local economic impact.

Other category finalists, Anglo American and Flux Energy, showcased digital innovation in mining and geothermal energy, achieving major efficiency gains and cost savings.

Two other Seequent customers were also winners in other categories on the night. PT Kereta Api Indonesia (Persero) was awarded a win in the Rail and transit category for its smart rail infrastructure project using AssetWise Linear Analytics, and PT Wika Tirta Jaya Jatiluhur (WTJJ) won in the Water and wastewater category for its SPAM Regional Jatiluhur I project, which aims to improve water management for the future.

Founders’ Awards

The Founders’ Honors are special awards chosen by Bentley Systems’ founders to recognise outstanding projects, individuals, and organisations for advancing global infrastructure and supporting economic growth and sustainability. Six Seequent customers were Founders’ Awards recipients on the night. My congratulations to the following customers for their outstanding contribution:

See all finalists and winners here.

Unearthing the Future: How Mining and Technology work together

This year’s YII programme included a mining industry breakout.
Source: Bentley Systems

Seequent hosted a mining industry breakout session looking at how technology is reshaping mining. My thanks to panellists Professor Christopher Jackson, David Skilling, Liv Carroll and Mark Campodonic.

I led a discussion exploring the surging global demand for critical minerals driven by geopolitics, the energy transition, and the surging demands AI places on the minerals supply chain. This increased pressure, along with stricter ESG goals highlighted the importance of a mindset shift within mining companies to fully unlock the potential of emerging technologies.

The session also emphasised the critical role of attracting and upskilling talent, cross-sector knowledge sharing, and engaging stakeholders to build trust and demonstrate mining’s positive contributions to society.

‘Mining is not the fastest industry to innovate and to change. It’s more like a big old tanker, that you turn the wheel and it takes a while to shift.’ Carroll said. ‘And that is a little bit problematic because we see that the waves of innovation and the impact of that innovation has grown and the waves are actually, the frequency of the waves are much shorter.’

Ultimately, the conversation underscored that while technology is a key enabler, true progress depends on people embracing new ways of working and a shared commitment to shaping a sustainable, resilient future for mining and infrastructure.

Navigating uncertainty: Proactive resilience in transportation

The transportation industry panel, co-hosted by Seequent Segment Director for Civil Pat McLarin, right, discussed topics including AI and infrastructure resiliency.
Source: Bentley Systems

Seequent’s Segment Director for Civil, Pat McLarin, co-hosted the transportation panel which brought together owner operators, engineers and contractors to discuss how they are embracing AI not just to respond to disruption, but to rise above it. Panellists Mike Pearson, Holger Kessler, Rafael de Santiago and Andy Kaiyala discussed the challenges of having to deliver more, in less time, on budget and with resource constraints.

‘These days we are not delivering only a bridge or a road, there’s a package and that package comes with data because we need to enable digital twins in the future,’ de Santiago said.

The session explored how better data, smarter planning and insights are helping shape projects to avoid overdesign, reduce risk and enable infrastructure which adapts to range of changes including extreme weather and population growth, supporting faster delivery and infrastructure resilience.

Kaiyala shared an example of a large project in Austin, Texas, where a ‘model centric’ approach enabled the team to visualise two separate projects underway in the city, surfacing a potential issue that was then able to be addressed.

‘One way to summarise resiliency would be rapid access to the right information I need to make a good business decision,’ Kaiyala said. ‘All this data and information we are talking about has existed somewhere on somebody’s computer or on a piece of paper on somebody’s desk but it’s the ability to aggregate that information into a place where every stakeholder on a project or a programme or a Government agency or across the spectrum of users, where every single individual has the opportunity to access that information rapidly, and then make a good decision. We haven’t had that before.’

It was an exhilarating week seeing how technology, alongside human ingenuity, is shaping the future of infrastructure.