Why DAAB Members Need AI to Tackle the Data Deluge

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Dispute Avoidance/Adjudication Boards (DAABs) sit at the sharp end of modern FIDIC-style contracts. When a mine expansion or rail corridor slips into conflict, the board must sift mountains of evidence and deliver a reasoned decision often inside an 84-day window after the dispute lands on its desk.

That deadline hasn’t changed, but project data has exploded. Every RFQ email, daily progress report, drone survey, BIM revision, variation notice and scheduling update ends up in the disclosure bundle. On a multi-billion-dollar EPC, it isn’t unusual for the archive to run to tens of thousands of PDFs, spreadsheets and native files—more than any three-person panel can read line-by-line. The result is a widening gap between what must be understood and what can be digested by humans within the contractual timeframe.

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Reading five projects’ worth of documents—inside one project

This is precisely where AI pulls its weight. By feeding the entire disclosure set into Hevi’s secure cloud-hosted platform, a DAAB gains an always-on research assistant that:

• Ingests every file in minutes. Drag the disclosure bundle into Hevi and the platform extracts text, dates, named entities and clause references while preserving all original filenames and folder paths for audit purposes.
• Surfaces contract-critical events instantly. Ask, “Show me every notice tied to Clause 20.1” or “Find the earliest email mention of gypsum vein obstruction.” Hevi’s large-language models are fine-tuned on heavy-industry contract language, so the responses come back in seconds each one linked to the exact page or line in the underlying document.
• Builds a live chronology. Instead of scrolling through 300 “progress update” emails, the board can generate a sortable timeline that aligns notices, responses, engineer determinations and site diaries in one view.
• Lets you go deeper, not faster. The real payoff is not time saved but scope expanded. Early adopters report they now review roughly five times more material in the same working weeks than was possible with manual triage alone. That broader base of evidence gives greater confidence when drafting a decision or crafting recommendations to steer the parties away from arbitration.

Fit for purpose, fit for privilege

Security matters when the stakes reach nine or ten figures. Hevi keeps every byte inside an Australian-hosted, tenant-isolated environment; no data is routed through public APIs. The platform also logs every question asked and every source opened, so panel members can show their methodology if a decision is later challenged.

Because AI answers are hyper-linked back to primary sources, a board member can paste excerpts straight into a draft determination and attach the pinpoint citation without hunting through folder trees. That transparency is vital for credibility and helps ensure neither party can argue that key exhibits were overlooked.

First steps for your next board appointment

• Pilot on a live issue. Upload the latest tranche of progress reports and test queries that mirror the questions you’ll need to answer.
• Tag decisives as you go. Pin key exhibits so they surface instantly when you build your reasoning section.
• Keep eyes on the horizon. With the grunt work handled, the panel’s time shifts from document triage to deeper analysis, scenario modelling and proactive dispute-avoidance guidance.

Ready to see what reviewing five times the evidence base feels like—without extending the sitting schedule?

Book a private demo with the Hevi team and explore how AI can slot seamlessly into your DAAB workflow while keeping every page, footnote and privilege intact.

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