Ingenii Engineering Firm

About INGENII | Consulting A/E Firm

Mission Statement

INGENII's mission is to deliver greater value to our customers through the use of inventive approaches to delivering engineering and architectural services that optimize the use of available technologies, to increase productivity and minimize operating costs.

History

Structural Engineering FirmINGENII, LLC (INGENII ENGINEERING, PSC in Puerto Rico) has been providing professional services in a unique, quality oriented and cost effective manner to a variety of Clients since 2001. While INGENII has been principally a Structural Engineering Firm, it has, since its inception, provided 'Full A/E Services' for many of its projects clients' request. INGENII has accomplished this by forming full service project teams that can provide design services based on the project needs. This approach provides INGENII's Clients full design accountability from a single source. INGENII has expanded its core capabilities to include Architectural, Mechanical and Engineering services. INGENII strives to match our staff experience with the projects need. We do not simply assign our engineers and architects to the next project. When necessary, we will go outside the firm to build a team around client's project needs. INGENII will continue where necessary to further supplement its offerings with the right subcontracted professional experience and expertise necessary to satisfy Client wishes and needs.

Founding Philosophy

Over the past decades, competitive bidding has become the principle method used by private sector companies to procure architectural and engineering services. This method was intended to ensure that the client received the most competitive price for architectural and engineering services. However, this method has produced some unanticipated consequences. To remain competitive, many consulting engineering and architectural firms have reduced scope in order to remain competitive. The resulting loss in quality of design and contract documents can be observed by the increased frequency of engineering and construction change orders. Additionally, there is another less obvious consequence with significant economical impact to the total project cost.

Steel Structure HaitiThe architectural and engineering engineer is always obligated to provide a design that complies with the minimum requirements of the applicable building codes. This creates a lower bound on the construction cost, but not an upper bound. Consequently, design consultants can bid competitively by reducing scope through overly conservative design assumptions that result in higher material usage and, hence, higher construction costs. In an effort to further limit scope, design consultants may also reduce the level of detail included in the construction documents. This inevitably results in higher construction costs either in the initial bid (as contractors factor up bids to cover unforeseen conditions) or in construction change orders. Thus, one can conclude that architectural and engineering fees have a direct inverse relationship to total project costs, meaning clients cannot guarantee the most economical engineering design by selecting the engineer with the lowest price. From the perspective of the owner, the best design is the one that meets all design objectives and which costs the least to design AND build.

"Accepting a commission with an inadequate fee for the project requirements, just to get the job, is a disservice to the firm and the profession, as well as to the client. If we do not spend the time necessary to adequately perform the work, or if we take shortcuts to reduce design time (i.e. design conservatively to produce designs that will work without extensive analysis), we may cut back on our own overhead; but we may thereby add to the project cost. This is not necessarily in the best interests of the owner."

Jay H. Paul, President
Structural Engineers Association of Illinois, March 2002

INGENII was founded on the philosophy of reducing overhead costs, instead of engineering scope, as a means to maintain a competitive fee structure and, simultaneously, to increase the value INGENII provides to our clients by developing more economical designs. Advancements in communications technology and the availability of economical high speed internet access allows INGENII to significantly lower operating overhead through the establishment of a virtual office in addition to our main office.

INGENII’s Engineers and Architects are able to maintain continuous real time contact via the internet to facilitate the type of robust communication and exchange of ideas necessary for developing architectural and engineering designs and maintaining project coordination. INGENII project team members have the ability to exchange documents, perform reviews and create redline drawings by sharing control of documents over the Internet and throughout the world.

Our clients currently have INGENII engaged in projects projects throughout the USA, Asia, Europe, Australia, Canada, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

Staffing

INGENII has a staff of eight full-time structural engineers with over 110 years of cumulative experience in addition to four licensed Architects, an Interior Designer highly specialized and a mechanical engineer, to staff designs of for commercial, industrial, pharmaceutical and power generating facilities. INGENII has six Licensed Structural Engineers on staff, and seven of INGENII's engineers are Licensed Professional Engineers in the State of Illinois. INGENII's Principals are Licensed Professional Engineers in thirty additional states and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. Through their membership in NCEES, INGENII's Principals have the ability to acquire a PE/SE license in any state on limited notice.

INGENII's Senior Architect has over 35 years of experience including 30 years of working in the design of Pharmaceutical Manufacturing facilities (in Puerto Rico and the states) as well as other Life Science facility projects. Our Architects are supported by Architectural Designers with AutoCAD and Microstation skills and experienced in a variety of project types.