A stadium is designed to capture attention, yet one of its most fascinating elements is often ignored: the roof.
Surespan, a UK manufacturer, has worked on some of the world’s biggest construction projects, from SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles to the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.
It makes roof hatch and floor access covers — a small but integral part of major infrastructure projects.
The installation process isn’t always easy. On-the-ground technicians rely on the knowledge of Surespan’s in-house engineers, who are often thousands of miles away at the company’s headquarters. Security is also a concern as the company handles sensitive information, especially when working on government designs.
Previously relying on phone calls and emails, Surespan wanted to find a faster way for its employees to collaborate as it scaled its business globally. It turned to two tech solutions: a new security model to access installation files and augmented reality headsets to enable real-time communication on remote projects.
While one engineer at Surespan told Business Insider that the construction industry could be traditional and resistant to new technology, the methods had saved the company tens of thousands of dollars.
Building a secure connection
Last year, Surespan set up an operational base in Argentina as part of its plan to expand its business in South America. But it wasn’t a smooth setup: It experienced what Thomas Davies, the company’s commercial director, described as a “nightmare situation” when the team in Argentina couldn’t access critical design files for three days.
It had been using a virtual private network to manage digital connections.
“VPNs function on an implicit trust model,” Spencer Summons, the founder of the cybersecurity firm Opliciti, said. “This approach can be likened to giving a user the keys to your office building, trusting they won’t enter restricted areas.”
As Surespan expanded, its in-house VPN became less reliable and required support from contractors to set up in new locations. The VPN also routed traffic through congested centralized points, which led to slower connections. When the new base opened in Argentina, the company struggled to keep up with the increased setup demands, which is why the team on the ground had to wait three additional days to access essential digital resources.
Robert Fletcher, Surespan’s IT lead, wanted to find a faster way for users to connect to resources regardless of their physical location. “You have to give everyone, whether they are in the office, on a remote construction site, or traveling, dependable, secure access to company resources while juggling different time zones and differing local IT infrastructure quality,” Fletcher told BI.
With the help of Zscaler, a cloud security company based in San Jose, California, the company switched to zero-trust network access, a security model that requires continuous authentication and provides a more direct connection.
Summons told BI that ZTNAs work on a “never trust, always verify” basis. He said that businesses are increasingly seeking secure remote access solutions to protect their resources as they scale. When they’re working across countries, he added, security becomes even more pressing, as certain regions are more vulnerable to cybercrime.
A 2024 survey from Gartner estimated that 63% of organizations worldwide had fully or partially applied a zero-trust strategy.
While VPNs give users full network access after initial authentication, ZTNAs allow access only to the resources that they need and continuously authenticate. The tech, Summons said, is “akin to having numerous security guards checking IDs at each entry point, ensuring access to certain rooms and areas is granted only to those who are authorized and verified.”
Fletcher said Surespan’s new system had provided employees access to crucial resources, like design software and project files. He added that since the company switched, issues such as connection drops and slow speeds had largely disappeared because the ZTNAs connect users directly to the applications they need, rather than routing them through a busy central data center.
Bringing virtual assistance to the field
Much of Surespan’s work requires on-the-ground expertise, with field technicians working on-site to install the company’s roof and floor hatches. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the company trialed AR headsets to connect workers on the installation sites with Surespan’s engineers.
“With travel restrictions hitting hard, we needed a way for our experienced engineers, often based here in the UK, to remotely support our teams in installing complex access solutions on sites across the globe,” Mikolaj Wisniewski, a senior engineer at Surespan, told BI.
The field technicians use voice-controlled headsets made by RealWear, an AR company based in Vancouver, Washington. The headsets allow engineers at the Surespan offices to see the installation site in real time. Users can also share documents, annotate views live, and provide step-by-step instructions for the technician in troubleshooting, inspection, or complex installation procedures.
The method wasn’t popular at first.
“As with any new technology, there was some resistance at first due to the learning curve and skepticism about wearing the physical headset,” Wisniewski said. “Construction can be quite traditional, and some team members were more comfortable with the old ways of doing things — physically being on-site or just sticking to phone calls and photos.”
Despite the initial reluctance, Wisniewski said, the team was won over when they actually used the headset. Today, the tool is deployed whenever remote expertise is needed quickly.
“Our site teams and our central engineering and support functions are now much more connected,” Wisniewski added. “We receive instant visual context rather than having to deal with lengthy email chains or possibly unclear photos, providing immediate visual context.”
Wisniewski said the AR headsets had saved the company more than $54,000 in flights and accommodation, which would otherwise have been required for engineers to travel to installation sites. The technology has also resulted in fewer project delays, he said.
“It breaks down geographical barriers and enables much richer, faster collaboration,” Wisniewski added. “The entire organization feels more responsive and connected when an engineer in the UK can provide direct guidance to someone on a site thousands of miles away.”
