Chartered Surveyor Pushes Ahead with AI Investment

National Chartered Surveying firm Bruton Knowles is pushing ahead of the curve, announcing it will continue to develop its £400,000 digital infrastructure investment with an increase in its adoption of AI.

According to a survey[1] of over 10,000 businesses by the Office for National Statistics, only a quarter of UK businesses with 100–249 employees used some form of Artificial Intelligence towards the end of 2024.

The investment move at Bruton Knowles reflects the company’s commitment to keeping up with the changing landscape of the sector early on, amid research[2] by SpenDesk which revealed that per-company spending on AI tools in the UK has risen 5.9 times – from £195 in 2022, to £1,151 in 2024 – with OpenAI emerging as the dominant provider, particularly for content creation.

Bruton Knowles is taking a broader approach and exploring a wider range of innovative AI programmes which service different purposes. Two of these have already begun making waves at the firm, by creating automated processes which assist National Teams across the business.

AI-driven data gathering and valuation report generation tool, Valos, has been a massive success story for the National Valuation Team so far, with 80% of loan security valuations at the business being completed with the support of the tool; halving the turnaround time from instruction to report publication for the firm’s valuers.

Microsoft Co-Pilot, an AI chatbot that aims to increase productivity and efficiency has also proved to provide day-to-day support, such as taking minutes, reviewing documents, generating emails and retrieving publicly available data from the internet.

In addition to these systems, the Bruton Knowles IT department has been using AI to generate programme code, which has proved to be effective after human review.

Although there has been investment in new technologies, Bruton Knowles is reviewing its use of AI continuously to ensure it is used correctly and has implemented regular meetings to assess new tools and potential risks associated with systems that are under consideration for further use.

The firm is ensuring it is staying ahead of the influx of AI into businesses around the UK, having recently released its AI Usage Policy to advise staff on several key procedures to follow, in order to ensure the safe handling of the systems, especially when it comes to the security of the firm’s clients.

Paul Martin, IT Director at Bruton Knowles, said: “Our commitment to investing in artificial intelligence has been driven by the promising results it has offered Bruton Knowles so far, particularly when automating various processes, which can be time consuming for each of our National Teams.

“We have acknowledged that AI is still in its early stages and requires a human overseeing its work, therefore we are approaching the future of AI at a steady pace so that we can adopt new technologies in a fast, flexible way but only when we are assured that it is cost effective and safe for our business and clients.

“Throughout 2025, we will continue working with various third parties to evaluate and trial new AI tools and keep abreast of the latest developments.”

The firm is currently at the end of their half year financial period, which has seen impactful investment across the business.

In 2024, Bruton Knowles announced £400,000 worth of investment into various digital infrastructure projects last year, outlining several industry-leading technologies to help support its National Teams across the UK, such as Solstice and GoReport.

[1] ONS Business insights and impact on the UK economy: 3 October 2024. https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/business/businessservices/bulletins/businessinsightsandimpactontheukeconomy/3october2024

[2] Spending on AI Tools by UK SMBs Grows Fivefold in Past Two Years, According to Spendesk Data: 13 December 2024. https://ffnews.com/newsarticle/fintech/spending-on-ai-tools-by-uk-smbs-grows-fivefold-in-past-two-years-according-to-spendesk-data/