Fundraising Announcement: A New Chapter for SketchDeck.ai

I'm excited to share that we've closed a new round of funding, led by Boreal Ventures with participation from BDC and BKR.

fundraise announcement 1

When we started SketchDeck.ai, the goal was simple: take the most tedious part of a steel estimator's day and give those hours back. Hundreds of estimators later, LIFT is doing exactly that. Our customers are turning around bids faster, staying consistent across estimators, and winning work they wouldn't have had time to chase before.

This round is about doing more of that, and doing it in more places.

Two things we're focused on:

Accelerating the product roadmap. We just launched LIFT-Delta for revisions management, and it's already saving customers entire days per project. There's a long list of things we want to build next, and this funding lets us move on it faster.

Expanding into other parts of the value chain. Takeoff and estimating is where we started. It's not where we stop. There are other stages of a steel project where the same combination of AI and workflow design can take friction out of the day, and we want to build there too.

I also want to share that JD Saint-Martin, Partner at Boreal Ventures, is joining our Board of Directors. JD helped scale Lightspeed Commerce past $1B and has spent his career building products that deliver real value to customers. He's also a founder, which means he understands the work from the inside. We're lucky to have him in the room as we take on the next stage.

Thank you to Boreal Ventures, BDC, and BKR for backing this next phase. And thank you to our customers, who have shaped every part of the product. The feedback, the trust, and the honesty about what's broken in the industry, none of this works without that.

We'll see a lot of you at NASCC this week. Booth #1127. Come say hi.

Daniel Kamau
Founder & CEO,
SketchDeck.ai

Introducing Revision Management with LIFT-Delta

Revision Management is now live in LIFT. It automates the manual work of comparing drawing sets, updating takeoffs, and documenting what changed, so fabricators and erectors can respond to rebids and change orders in minutes instead of hours.

Why Revisions Are So Painful

Revisions are part of every steel project. An addendum lands mid-bid. A change order comes through after award. An RFI triggers a drawing update mid-project. Each one forces the same interruption: stop what you're doing, find the revised drawing set, compare it to the one you already worked from, and figure out what actually changed.

On average, it takes around four to five bid cycles to win a job, and that doesn't include post-award change orders. Every one of those cycles ends with the same manual comparison work, under deadline pressure, while the rest of the pipeline keeps moving.

And it's not only estimators feeling it. Project managers and contract administrators live in the same revision cycle after award, when change orders and RFIs keep coming and the quantities need to stay accurate for billing and procurement.

For most teams, this means hours of manual comparison, an incomplete audit trail of what changed, and the constant risk of pricing at the wrong number because something slipped through.

What Revision Management Does

Revision Management automates the full cycle: identifying changes between drawing versions, updating the takeoff, and generating the documentation you need to bid or respond to change orders at the right price.

Upload a revised drawing set and LIFT compares it to your previous version. Every added, removed, or changed member gets flagged. Your previous work carries forward. You review only what's different. See the full Revision Management overview.

The core capabilities

Version comparison. Add a new version to an existing job, upload the revised drawings, and arrange the pages to produce a complete revised set. LIFT handles the version history automatically.

AI-powered change detection. Rather than transferring markups manually or re-analyzing from scratch, LIFT compares the two drawing sets and makes the changes for you. Processing takes roughly one to two minutes per page.

Quantity panel with change status. Every member in the takeoff is marked as added, changed, or deducted. You see the full picture of what moved between versions without hunting for it.

Overlay validation. Turn on the overlay to visually confirm the changes LIFT identified. Hover over a member to see a record of what changed, for example, from W250x33 to W360x33.

Page alignment tools. When pages don't align perfectly between drawing versions, a combination of click-and-drag and keyboard controls lets you fix alignment quickly to ensure accurate comparison.

Delta Report with tonnage summaries. A built-in summary shows net tonnage added, deducted, and changed by member type. On one beta job, this surfaced 150 tons added, 90 tons deducted, and just over 200 tons removed as the net change of moving to lighter members, all directly from the export.

BOM export with change status. Every line item in the exported BOM includes its status (added, changed, or deducted), giving downstream teams a clean record of what moved. The export is built to align with Tekla PowerFab and common internal estimation workflows.

What This Means for Your Team

For estimators, revisions stop eating hours. A revised drawing set comes in, LIFT processes it, and the updated takeoff is ready to review in minutes. No more rebuilding quantities from scratch to catch what changed.

For project managers and contract administrators, post-award change orders and RFIs become tractable. The quantities stay current, the audit trail is automatic, and billing and procurement have the documentation they need without a separate scramble.

For the business, rebids and change orders can be turned around at the right price, with confidence, instead of with whatever could be pulled together under deadline pressure.

Built with Customers, For Customers

Revisions have been the single most-requested feature in LIFT for over a year. Almost every estimator we sit with brings it up unprompted. We heard it enough times to know it was costing customers real money across the entire life of the project.

Several of our customers have been running Revision Management in beta for the past several months on real projects with real deadlines. Their feedback pushed us in directions we wouldn't have gotten to on our own, and shaped what we're shipping today.

The real credit for this release goes to them. To the customers who kept raising their hand, kept telling us where the pain was, and kept giving us feedback on the early builds. That's how good products get made.

Next Steps

Revision Management is available for every LIFT customer, new and existing. Reach out to your CSM or contact us to get access.

We're showing it live this week at NASCC 2026 in Atlanta. Stop by Booth #1127 to learn more.

Book a demo to see Revision Management on your own project drawings.

We’re at NASCC 2026

The SketchDeck.ai team is heading back to NASCC: The Steel Conference in Atlanta, April 22-24 as a Gold Sponsor. Stop by Booth #1127 to see LIFT in action and get a sneak peek at our newest upgrades.

Our most requested features get their first public demo

We’ve been listening. The features our customers have asked for most are coming to LIFT, and NASCC is where you’ll see them first. We’re not ready to share all the details yet, but if you’ve ever wished LIFT could do more with revisions and addenda, you’ll want to stop by.

Our team’s on-site all three days

Our team will be on-site all three days, including CEO Daniel Kamau and members of our sales and customer success teams. Whether you’re a current LIFT user or just curious about what AI-powered takeoffs look like on real drawings, we’d love to talk.

Skip the booth line and book a dedicated walkthrough

Want to skip the booth line? Book a meeting with our team ahead of time and we’ll walk through LIFT using your own project files.

See you in Atlanta. Booth #1127.

From PDF to Takeoff- How LIFT Automates Steel Estimating (2 Minute Demo)

Steel estimators know the pain of manual takeoffs all too well. Spending hours clicking through blueprints, counting every beam and column, tracking studs and camber, and hoping you haven't missed anything critical. The traditional estimating process is time-consuming, error-prone, and creates a bottleneck that limits how many bids your team can complete.

What if you could transform that entire workflow? Instead of spending hours or even days on a single takeoff, imagine completing the same work in just minutes with higher accuracy.

Bill, a former steel estimator who now works with SketchDeck.ai, walks through exactly how LIFT's AI-powered takeoff software revolutionizes the steel estimating process from start to finish.

Watch How LIFT Works in 2 Minutes

Why Manual Steel Takeoffs Are Holding You Back

Before diving into how LIFT works, it's worth understanding why manual takeoffs create such significant challenges for structural steel fabricators.

Traditional takeoff methods require estimators to manually review every page of a drawing set, identify each structural element, record dimensions and specifications, and organize everything into a bill of materials. For a complex project with hundreds of pages, this can take days of focused work.

The manual process also introduces multiple opportunities for human error. Miss a few beams on page 47, and your bid could be thousands of dollars off. Work late into the night to meet a deadline, and mistakes become even more likely.

Most importantly, manual takeoffs limit your bidding capacity. If your estimators are buried in repetitive counting work, they can't focus on higher-value activities like analyzing complex connections, optimizing material selections, or pursuing new opportunities.

How LIFT Transforms the Takeoff Process

LIFT uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate the most tedious parts of steel takeoff work. Here's how the process works from uploading a drawing to exporting your final takeoff.

Step 1: Upload Your Drawings and Let AI Do the Detection

Getting started with LIFT is straightforward. Upload your PDF drawings into the software, and the AI immediately begins analyzing your project.

LIFT's machine learning algorithms scan each page of your drawing set, automatically detecting and categorizing main structural members. The software identifies beams, columns, bracing, joists, and other steel elements without any manual input required.

But LIFT doesn't stop at simple detection. The software captures detailed information for each element, including:

Depending on the size and complexity of your project, this automated analysis typically takes just a few seconds to a few minutes. Compare that to the hours you would normally spend manually counting and recording the same information.

The AI works through your entire drawing set systematically, ensuring consistent accuracy across every page. You get comprehensive material counts without clicking through drawings or maintaining complex spreadsheets.

Step 2: Automated Connection Analysis Saves Hours

After detecting main members, LIFT tackles another time-consuming challenge: connection analysis.

Analyzing connections manually requires careful review of each framing condition, counting copes and holes, identifying moment connections, and assigning appropriate labor codes. For a project with thousands of connections, this work can take as long as the initial member takeoff.

LIFT's connection automation features handle this work in seconds. The software automatically:

Run the connection analysis, and LIFT populates all these details across your takeoff. No more manually adding connection information for every line item. No more wondering if you've correctly assessed every framing condition.

This automation is especially valuable for complex projects with varied connection types. The software maintains consistency across your entire takeoff while you focus on reviewing the results rather than gathering the data.

Step 3: Seamless Integration with Your Existing Workflow

One of LIFT's key advantages is how it fits into your current estimating process. The software isn't a replacement for your entire workflow, but rather a powerful tool that handles the tedious parts while integrating with the systems you already use.

LIFT offers flexible export options for multiple industry-standard platforms:

This flexibility means your team doesn't need to completely change how they work. LIFT handles the counting and data capture, then delivers that information in whatever format your downstream processes require.

The integration capabilities also make it easier to get your team on board with new technology. Estimators can continue using familiar tools while benefiting from automated data collection.

Handling Drawing Revisions Without Starting Over

Every estimator knows the frustration of receiving revised drawings after completing a takeoff. In traditional workflows, changes might mean starting portions of your takeoff from scratch or carefully comparing old and new versions to identify differences.

LIFT simplifies change management significantly. When you receive updated drawings, simply upload the revised pages to replace the old versions.

The software includes an overlay feature that displays old and new drawings side by side. You can quickly identify what changed, understand the impact on your quantities, and update your takeoff accordingly.

This revision handling saves tremendous time during the bidding process. Instead of scrambling to rework your entire estimate when changes arrive, you can assess the impact and adjust your numbers in minutes.

Real-World Impact: What LIFT Users Experience

The benefits of AI-powered takeoff software extend beyond just speed. Steel fabricators using LIFT report multiple improvements to their estimating process:

Increased Bidding Capacity: Estimators complete takeoffs in a fraction of the time, allowing teams to pursue more opportunities without adding staff. Some LIFT users report completing 40% more bids with the same team size.

Improved Accuracy: LIFT detects steel on most drawings with 95-99% accuracy. Automated counting reduces the human errors that lead to costly bid mistakes.

Better Resource Allocation: With tedious counting work automated, estimators can focus on higher-value activities like connection optimization, value engineering, and building customer relationships.

Faster Response Times: Complete takeoffs in minutes instead of hours or days, allowing you to submit competitive bids faster and pursue last-minute opportunities.

AI Takeoff Software for Structural Steel Fabricators

The construction industry is increasingly adopting artificial intelligence to solve longstanding productivity challenges. For structural steel estimators, AI takeoff software like LIFT represents a significant leap forward from manual methods.

By automating material detection, connection analysis, and data organization, AI eliminates the repetitive work that consumes most of an estimator's time. The technology handles tasks that computers do better than humans while freeing people to focus on the judgment and expertise that truly require human intelligence.

For fabricators looking to stay competitive, the question isn't whether to adopt AI-powered estimating tools, but how quickly you can integrate them into your workflow.

Getting Started with LIFT

Seeing LIFT work with your actual project drawings is the best way to understand its capabilities. The SketchDeck.ai team offers personalized demos where they analyze one of your own drawings and provide a free project in LIFT.

This hands-on approach lets you evaluate the software's accuracy with your specific drawing types, understand how it fits your workflow, and see exactly how much time it could save your team.

Ready to transform your steel takeoff process?

Book a free demo today.