Concept of Value Engineering in Construction Industry

Nowadays, Value engineering (V.E.) is considered as a tool of construction management that can help companies to improve their procedures, services and final products regarding the client’s needs, as an end user, with respect to time, cos t and quality. The V.E. process has evolved from previous methods based on the concept of value and functional approach. These methods were pioneered by Lawrence D. Miles, in the 1940's and 50's, who developed the technique of Value Analysis (V.A.) as a method to improve value in existing products. The concept of V.E. / Value Engineering (V.E.) has been developed through the years and numerous standards and manuals have been created.The wider construction market (U.S.A., U.K., etc.) has identified V.E. value and has used the practice extensively. The present study aims to clarify the concept of value management in construction industry, via literature review, and references and books the use of V.E. in global level and to present a short description of the worldwide know-how. That will be achieved by a historical review of V.E. and by the illustration of the most common definitions and a thorough terminology review. In addition, we will present three different markets applying V.E. worldwide, the U.S.A., the E.U. and the Japan Standards for V.E.