Early Adopter Opportunity: Hey Julia Makes Construction AI Intuitive and Simple

Stack Construction Founder Phil Ogilby Looking for Contractors to Try HeyJulia.ai

Stack Construction Technologies Founder Phillip Ogilby is launching HeyJulia.ai, which marries construction artificial intelligence (AI) with a voice interface for the field.

As construction software vendors scrambled to add artificial intelligence (AI) to their product stack, either to impress investors or the market, they mostly picked the low-hanging fruit first.

While some applications explored AI-driven analytics as a guide-on-the-side for decision makers, most focused on intelligent help, querying, or other tools that allow users to “ask the software questions.”

This may seem like glorified enterprise search. But with the right context and presentation, just surfacing information from construction software at the right time, to the right people, drives tremendous value. Construction is rife with surprises—who needs to know about that change order, and how does it impact the day’s work? Are there tool, equipment or employee or site constraints foremen need to work around? What progress have crews completed against the scope on a specific day?

This information is all contained in a construction management software application used in an office setting by back-office employees and management. Ogilby’s team also designed HeyJulia.ai to be updated by workers in the field, who may lack an appropriate setting, skill set or aptitude to engage with the software. Yet these are the people who possess real-time insights on what’s going on at each site, on each project.

Software aimed at contractors currently incudes construction AI assistance and features for a variety of use csaes, including project management, field delivery, finance and equipment management via connected equipment/telematics. How will HeyJulia.ai drive value as a third party application integrated with these applications?

Intuitive Construction AI

Some construction vendors are dealing with the technology disconnect by leveraging simpler technology. Construction equipment management software vendor IVO Systems makes heavy use of text messaging to communicate with field crews, in part to ensure field workers can access communications on the simplest of mobile devices and older operating systems. The other rationale, as I learned from IVO CEO Eric Christiansen, is traceability. When a crew member receives the text message, it’s easy to prove they were notified of where they were supposed to be, when and with what equipment.

As he moves on from his day-to-day work with Stack Construction Technologies, which he founded, Phillip Ogilby is leveraging an even older technology—voice. With HeyJulia.ai, he pairs fully modern large language model (LLM) not with texting, but the voice function, of cell phones and mobile devices.

Why voice? One term that Ogilby used repeatedly in our April 2026 briefing was “hands-free.”  In the field, the environment is not conducive to typing or even using a tablet computer. And many applications accessed on a mobile device will have systems requirements for hardware and operating system. This makes bring-your-own-device (BYOD) difficult, so contractors can face additional cost for compliant devices.

Hands-Free Construction AI

“The idea here is to catch losing projects early and turn them back into winners,” Ogilby said. “We’re targeting the superintendent on the job site … you really don’t know what’s going on at your job site, but your superintendent does.”

Mobile interfaces for use in construction and other field-based work have gotten simpler and more streamlined. But competing demands and the aptitudes of each worker dictate that often, they enter as little information as possible in any system.

“We’re capturing a tremendous amount more data with voice than you could ever do in a traditional kind of iPad setting.”

HeyJulia ingests estimates and then sends managers in the field a twice-daily text that initiates a voice call with Julia, who provides guidance on what needs to be done during the day, materials required and collects insights about what was accomplished. The application leverages features of the handset including the camera, and field workers can capture images to illustrate progress or explain project variances.

The unstructured voice data is turned into structured data in real-time dashboards that provide live insights into production rates, progress, and job health. Even the back-office-facing application focuses on intuitive usability,  relying on a red/yellow/green schema to separate the critical few from the irrelevant many.

A worker interacting with HeyJulia in the field will have some ability to influence the project scope, based on site conditions. But as formal change orders materialize, the back-office is responsible for operationalizing them in the system.

“HeyJulia is certainly listening anytime there's a change order opportunity,” Ogilby said. “It gets added to the to the daily logs and the reports for that specific day. And we try to escalate the issue whenever we can. But modifications to the actual skillful work need to be done in the office, and we don't let the field currently modify that, really.”

Substantive changes to the project happen in HeyJulia’s plan section, where office-based management can modify the plan based on approved change orders.

“Inside of HeyJulia, there's a plan section for use in the office,” Ogilby said. “In this back-office interface, HeyJulia also handles crew dispatch and coordination, including scheduling, notifications, and navigation links to streamline field logistics.

HeyJulia can monitor production progress against the estimate, which not only helps keep projects on track but contributes to more accurate past project data to support more accurate estimating.

Ogilby said the HeyJulia roadmap goes beyond field communications to “front office AI”—including inbound call handling for contractors, making the application the receptionist as well as the field coordinator. The product roadmap includes inbound call handling, appointment setting, bid capture, and broader knowledge base functionality—creating a full office-to-field communication layer.

Who Is It For?

“The front office components can be a fit for any construction related organization,” Ogilby said. “We spend the time up front to customize the solution to handle all of the inbound communications and insert the information, be it leads or bid opportunities, into their back office solution of choice.  Job walks and Punch lists built from a conversation with HeyJuila are ideal for all types of contractors.”

The ideal customer profile for HeyJulia is commercial contractors with more than $1 million in revenue  involved in multi-day projects. Contractors fitting these criteria may be candidates for early adoption, and according to Ogilby, these early customers will see HeyJulia integrated with their pre-existing estimating and construction management software.

Ogilby will focus on integrations for contractors running modern, API-first construction software due to ease of integration. FIND OUT WHY HERE ON THE EXPLAINER BLOG.

BOTTOM LINE: Recent years have seen new software applications come to market for field communication—Raken, Assignar, Fieldwire by Hilti, eSub and others. These traditional software products could face disruption from an application like HeyJulia, which places fewer demands on field workers and avoids manual data entry. Given Ogilby’s long history in construction software, early adopters can look forward to an engaged and capable partner. Those interested in adopting technology new enough to truly distinguish themselves in the market may want to opt into the early adopter phase.