Across the globe, public agencies are feeling the pressure: Citizens want answers faster. Developers expect clarity and predictability. Communities demand that development happens more quickly and request transparency in the process. And at the same time, technology keeps changing at breakneck speed.
Plan review is now a strategic pillar in every agency’s digital stack. Without a robust, future-ready solution, teams will face tomorrow’s housing demand, workplace shifts, regulatory complexity, and rapid technology change with tools built for yesterday. When the solution fails to scale, growth stalls.
As the leader in electronic plan review, Avolve has always been at the forefront of innovation. For almost two decades, we’ve been creating solutions that empower governments to build thriving communities through streamlined, efficient approval processes.
Yet this year marks a pivotal moment in our journey, as we introduce four transformative innovations that will revolutionize how plan review is conducted. These advancements aren't just incremental improvements but rather represent a fundamental shift in how agencies approach the entire permit lifecycle — from submission to approval and beyond.
Why Innovation Matters Now
Community development departments continue to face intensifying challenges. Budget constraints and staffing shortages collide with increasing demand for faster permit approvals and greater transparency. Meanwhile, citizen expectations continue to rise as digital experiences in their personal lives shape what they expect from government services. Today, these citizen expectations have a significant effect on investment decisions across City Hall — seventy-four percent of respondents to KPMG’s 2024 survey as part of the report Unlocking Government Technology’s Future said that citizen feedback influences their investment in government technology.
In this environment, innovation isn’t a luxury; It’s a necessity. The most forward-thinking agencies recognize that technology, properly applied, can simultaneously boost efficiency, strengthen compliance, and enhance the citizen experience. Data shows that the majority of agencies are already planning for, or considering investments in, emerging technologies, meaning those who don’t may get left behind.
Two-thirds of government leaders who responded to KPMG’s survey said they are planning to invest in AI in the coming twelve months. Eighty-five percent of government and public sector respondents say they prioritize embracing emerging technologies over maintaining legacy ones.
Our Innovation Philosophy
At Avolve, innovation is guided by four core principles:
Our Four Pillars of Innovation
Our 2025 innovation roadmap centers around four transformative capabilities that will reshape plan review:
1. Bringing Spatial Intelligence to Plan Review
Spatial intelligence is nothing new, but it is increasingly considered a competitive advantage. Deloitte named spatial computing as one of the top five GovTech trends for 2025, noting, “Being able to interact with information in a spatial context creates many possible opportunities for governments, from urban planning to emergency response to environment monitoring and much more.”
This spatial awareness accelerates reviews by preventing oversights, reduces errors by confirming location-based compliance issues, and ultimately leads to faster, more accurate permit approvals. Agencies can leverage their existing Esri investments while providing reviewers with critical geographic context at the exact moment they need it.
2. AI-Powered Submission Intelligence
Trivial errors in plan submissions create major bottlenecks in the review process. Our Avolve AI Submit acts as an intelligent “front gate,” automatically validating submission standards before plans ever reach a reviewer’s desk. By catching common mistakes — missing sheet references, incorrect scales, mislabeled files — AI ensures only complete, ready-for-review packages move forward.
The result? Staff get to focus their expertise on meaningful compliance oversight instead of administrative corrections. Agencies maintain complete control, configuring which checks to enforce and how strictly to apply them. This flexible approach eliminates submission errors without disrupting existing workflows, laying the groundwork for even deeper AI-assisted compliance reviews in the future.
3. Mobile-First Field Inspections
This mobile-first approach eliminates reliance on printed plans, reduces manual paperwork, and ensures field observations are immediately captured and synchronized with the main system. The result is faster inspections, improved accuracy, and a seamless bridge between field verification and office-based review.
4. Analytics That Drive Decisions
Data-driven decision making has long been the standard in the public sector, but wrangling data from disparate sources hasn’t historically made it easy. In 2025 and beyond, analytics will only grow in importance — American City & County named enhanced data analytics a top tech trend for 2025 — but more important than ever is the credibility of data, ease of report generation, and the quality of insights delivered.
The final piece of our innovation roadmap transforms how agencies understand and optimize their operations. Our enhanced analytics capabilities deliver structured, permit-focused insights that track processing times, workforce oversight, and compliance factors across departments. By putting reporting tools in the hands of our users with a nimble and easy-to-use solution, users can easily generate reports and create dashboards as needed. These council-ready reports provide unprecedented visibility into approval efficiency and operational performance.
Unlike generic reporting tools, our purpose-built analytics integrate directly with permit workflows to eliminate data silos and the need for manual report generation. Agencies gain the insights they need to make informed decisions about resource allocation, process improvements, and regulatory compliance.
The Future of Plan Review
These innovations represent more than new features — they signal a fundamental transformation in electronic plan review. By bringing together spatial intelligence, AI validation, mobile accessibility, and actionable analytics, we’re creating an ecosystem where plan reviewers can work smarter, applicants receive faster approvals, and communities thrive.
The most successful agencies recognize that innovation isn’t about technology for technology’s sake, but empowering people to do their best work. Our solutions are designed to enhance human expertise, simplify complex workflows, and ultimately help communities grow and prosper.
As the leading provider of electronic plan review solutions, we’re proud to continue pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in electronic plan review. The innovations we’re introducing this year are just the beginning of a new chapter in community development where technology and human expertise combine to build better, more resilient communities.
Ready to see our latest innovations in action? Book a demo.