Can Anything Supersede Excel in AEC?
April 27, 2026 —
Aarni Heiskanen - AEC BusinessIf there’s one piece of software that dominates the business world across industries, it’s Microsoft Excel. Can AI finally dethrone the mighty spreadsheet?
Memorable Spreadsheet Moments
Everyone has memorable spreadsheet moments. I have a few. For example, my then-architecture firm was involved in more than a dozen housing developments abroad. I developed an Excel workbook that took the required number of households as input and automatically generated a breakdown of buildings and their apartment types for AutoCAD. This was urban planning and architectural design done with a spreadsheet.
I also developed business software using Excel for project portfolio management. The prototype was later scaled into a commercial SaaS that is now used globally.
Another memorable moment was when a property owner told me their Excel file grew so large that it ran out of rows and columns. That must have been before 2007, when the maximum number of columns on a sheet was still just 256 and the maximum number of rows was 65,536. The current limits are 1,048,576 rows and 16,384 columns, which I hope no one will exceed.
Read the full story...Reprinted courtesy of
Aarni Heiskanen, AEC BusinessMr. Heiskanen may be contacted at
aec-business@aepartners.fi
Chambers USA Recognizes Hunton’s Insurance Coverage Practice in 2026 Guide
June 29, 2026 —
Hunton Insurance Recovery BlogHunton is pleased to announce that its insurance coverage practice was recognized nationally for Insurance: Dispute Resolution – Policyholder in the recently released 2026 Chambers USA guide. The team also received state rankings in Florida (Insurance: Dispute Resolution), Georgia (Insurance), the District of Columbia (Insurance: Policyholder), and Massachusetts (Insurance).
In addition to the insurance team’s group recognition across multiple states, the 2026 guide included individual rankings for
Lorelie “Lorie” S. Masters (USA Nationwide and District of Columbia),
Latosha M. Ellis (District of Columbia),
Michael S. Levine (District of Columbia),
Koorosh “KT” Talieh (District of Columbia),
Walter J. Andrews (Florida),
Andrea DeField (Florida),
Cary D. Steklof (Florida),
Lawrence J. Bracken II (Georgia), and
Geoffrey B. Fehling (Massachusetts).
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Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP
Four Families Now Live in the Season Six Rock the Block Homes in Grantsville, Utah
April 20, 2026 —
Hamlet HomesSALT LAKE CITY, April 20, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- The premier of Rock the Block season seven aired last Monday and is set in Las Vegas, Nevada. Rock The Block is HGTV's highest rated show. Last year, season six was set in Utah and had HGTV's highest rating yet, with over 14 million viewers. All episodes of season six were filmed in the Worthington Ranch community in Grantsville, Utah. The four homes on the show were built by Utah builder Hamlet Homes. During the show, the location of the four Rock The Block homes had to be kept secret and were surrounded by a locked gate. After over a year of being inaccessible, the Utah public was invited in May 2025 to tour the homes and help raise money together for charity. On May 30-31, 2025, Hamlet hosted a 'Rock The Block Party' where the public was able to walk through the homes made famous by the show.
Hamlet Owner, VP of Marketing & Design Tami Ostmark shares stories from the show and her perspective of what it's like to be the builder on a national show like this. Ostmark was on set almost the entire time. "As expected, there were times when there was tension on the set. All four designers were super competitive with each other. It's amazing that the production team was able to produce the show as well as they did. I'm very impressed," said Ostmark.
Another interesting point related to the show is how much work the local builder is responsible for. Some nights as many as 30 Hamlet team members worked through the night to keep up with the pace of production. "Each designer provided their own trusted carpenters to do finishing work. In two of the cases, designers' flew their favorite carpenters in to carry out their visions. Given the quick turnaround, it's not always practical for finishing work to be permanent. Sometimes, it just needs to look appealing on camera," said Ostmark. This is frequently referred to as 'TV Magic'. "When the show was over, Hamlet re-did any areas that required extra attention". The show really does shoot in only 7 weeks as depicted. This creates a fast pace that was very exciting to be a part of", continued Ostmark. All four of the homes featured on the show have since been purchased; four Utah families currently call them home.
ABOUT HAMLET HOMES
Hamlet Homes (www.hamlethomes.com) crafts quality customer-oriented townhomes and single-family homes located in attractively designed communities in Utah and Idaho. Since the company's founding in 1995, Hamlet has built over 5,000 homes in 80 communities. The company is a proud recipient of many awards on Sustainable Business & Design, Quality Builder Awards; recognized both locally and nationally. Named by the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce as the 'Veteran Owned Small Business of the Year, in 2019'. Hamlet has since been named several times to the Professional Builder's Housing Giants List and annual HOME AWARDS Best Customer Experience. Most recently in 2026, Hamlet was named Utah's 'Best of State for Real Estate Development and Utah Businesses 'Best Companies to Work For' for the 6th consecutive year.
Las Vegas Partner Jeffrey Saab and Team Leader D. Ryan Efros Secure a $0.00 Settlement on a Multimillion-Dollar Construction Defect Case!
April 14, 2026 —
Dolores Montoya - Bremer Whyte Brown & O'Meara LLPPartner
Jeffrey Saab and Team Leader
D. Ryan Efros’ client was a construction supervisor on a palatial mansion. The homeowners claimed millions of dollars in damages and asserted the client was a general contractor (GC) and so responsible for the alleged defects. Jeff and Ryan took more than 15 depositions, reinforcing their trial strategy theme: that the client was not a GC, but Plaintiffs were. They secured significant concessions from Plaintiffs, pressed Plaintiffs’ own negligent construction choices, and made the risk of trying the case intolerable. On the eve of trial, Plaintiffs backed down, settling out Jeff and Ryan’s client for $0.00.
Read the full story...Reprinted courtesy of
Dolores Montoya, Bremer Whyte Brown & O'Meara LLP
New Executive Order on AI Innovation and Security: Key Takeaways for the Construction Industry
June 15, 2026 —
Richard R. Volack & Denis Serkin - Peckar & Abramson, PCOn June 2, 2026, President Trump signed an Executive Order titled “Promoting Advanced Artificial Intelligence Innovation and Security.” At its core, the Order is a cybersecurity and national-security measure rather than a broad regulation of how private companies develop or use AI. It directs federal agencies to harden government systems against AI-enabled cyber threats, establishes voluntary frameworks for collaboration between the federal government and the AI and critical-infrastructure sectors, and strengthens criminal enforcement against the malicious use of AI.
Notably, the Order expressly disclaims any intent to create a “mandatory governmental licensing, preclearance, or permitting” regime for the “development, publication, release, or distribution of new AI models.” Instead, the Executive Order seeks to “promote AI innovation and security” by working with the private sector to modernize government and private-sector information systems and harden them against external threats, protect intellectual property from exploitation or theft, and cultivate American AI capabilities.
Reprinted courtesy of
Richard R. Volack, Peckar & Abramson, PC and
Denis Serkin, Peckar & Abramson, PC
Mr. Volack may be contacted at rvolack@pecklaw.com
Mr. Serkin may be contacted at dserkin@pecklaw.com
Read the full story...
SDV Celebrates 30th Anniversary Press Release
April 08, 2026 —
Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C.Trumbull, Connecticut – Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C. (SDV) is proud to announce the celebration of its 30th anniversary.
Founded in 1996 by three attorneys in a small New Haven, Connecticut office, SDV was built on a clear and focused mission: representing policyholders in insurance coverage matters. Three decades later, that commitment remains at the core of the firm’s identity and has been instrumental in its continued success and reputation nationwide.
Today, SDV is a nationally recognized boutique firm with 50 attorneys serving policyholders across the United States. Building on its longstanding reputation for excellence and client advocacy, the firm is pleased to announce the opening of its newest office in Massachusetts—an exciting milestone that reflects SDV’s continued growth. The new office is led by Managing Partner Anna Perry.
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Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C.
It’s More Than a Feeling: Proving Construction Damages and When You Should Hire an Expert to Help Do It
July 27, 2026 —
Bradley E. Sands & Katie McCracken - ConsensusDocsWhen you win a bid, you might be singing that everything is going your way. Then something goes wrong. The owner hands you defective plans, sits on RFI responses or other critical information, or otherwise upends the work. The costs pile up through no fault of your own. You feel wronged, and you want to be made whole. But a feeling that you got burned is not enough. To recover, that feeling has to become something the law recognizes as damages. So, what are damages, and how do you prove them?
At bottom, contract damages are the money that puts the non-breaching party (i.e., the party that doesn’t breach the contract) in the position it would have occupied had the contract been performed.
Reprinted courtesy of
Bradley E. Sands, Jones Walker LLP and Katie McCracken, Summer Associate, University of Georgia School of Law
Read the full story...Mr. Sands may be contacted at
bsands@joneswalker.com
New York Moves to Tighten Third-Party Practice: Key Changes to CPLR 1007
March 31, 2026 —
Sophia L. Cahill - SheppardEffective April 18, 2026, the New York Legislature enacted the Avoiding Vexatious Overuse of Impleading to Delay (“AVOID”) Act, amending CPLR 1007—the statute that governs third-party practice. The amendment sharply limits when and how defendants can commence third-party actions, curbing the expansive discretion they previously enjoyed and targeting the late-stage impleaders that often upend case schedules.
What Changes
Before the AVOID Act was signed into law on December 19, 2025 (and subsequently modified by Chapter Amendments A9502 and S8809, signed by Governor Hochul on February 13, 2026[1]), CPLR 1007 gave defendants broad latitude to implead “any person who is or may be liable” for all or part of the plaintiff’s claim. CPLR 1007 specified no outside time limit for the initiation of a third-party claim; courts assessed only whether a defendant’s delay was undue—such as impleading months after the note of issue—and whether the plaintiff would suffer prejudice if the third-party action were not severed.
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Sophia L. Cahill, SheppardMs. Cahill may be contacted at
scahill@sheppard.com
