Formas.AI Co-Founders on Closing the Gap Between Sketch and Build, on Practice Disrupted

Formas.AI co-founders Yiping Goh and Carlos Bañón joined German Aparicio of Trimble Ventures on a bonus episode of Practice Disrupted, hosted by Evelyn Lee. The conversation, published 2 July 2026, explored what it took to close the gap between sketch and build — and what happened when AI-native tools were designed to amplify human intent rather than replace the architect.

Inside the Trimble 0-60 Program

German walked listeners through the Trimble 0-60 accelerator, a 12-week, equity-free program recently named Built World's Accelerator Program of the Year. The program invited early-stage AECO startups to build on Trimble platforms like SketchUp, with participants showcasing live integrations at Trimble Dimensions in Las Vegas that November.

German described Trimble's role as a system of record, looking for partners that could build systems of action and intelligence across three pillars: connected data, connected design, and the connected field. "Early stage," in the program's terms, meant companies founded within the last five years, making under $2 million ARR, with a couple of early customers ready to scale. Formas.AI was part of the current cohort, operating in the connected design space.

From Sketch to Buildable Model in Hours

Yiping and Carlos explained how Formas.AI's AI-native design workspace bridged the gap between an initial sketch, reference image, or floor plan and a buildable 3D model — compressing a process that traditionally took months into hours. Carlos, an architect and professor who has taught design in Singapore for 13 years, shared that the tool grew out of his own frustration with fragmented interfaces and broken workflows that pulled designers away from the joy of creating.

An Industry Overdue for Digitization

Yiping brought an entrepreneurial lens to the conversation, noting that the AEC industry represents 13% of global GDP yet remains one of the least digitized sectors — still reliant on legacy software and constrained by the slow timeline of physical construction.

Trust as the Real Barrier

The group tackled the core challenge of technology adoption: trust, more than capability, was the real barrier for practitioners who had invested years in traditional tools. Rather than replacing human designers, Yiping and Carlos argued for a democratization of design built on guardrails that preserved creative authorship and intent.

"We are believing in the future of design being more human led, less or not even about human replaced. That the winners of AI are the ones that really can give people more creative power, not less." — Yiping Goh, Co-Founder & CEO, Formas.AI

Building Toward Trimble Dimensions

As Formas.AI moved through its 12-week acceleration, the goal was to use Trimble's ecosystem to deliver a validated, highly precise design experience — one that brought excitement and joy back to the craft.

Listen to the full conversation: here

Frequently Asked Question

What is the Trimble 0-60 accelerator?

Trimble 0-60 is a 12-week, equity-free accelerator run by Trimble Ventures for early-stage AECO (architecture, engineering, construction, and owner) startups building on Trimble platforms like SketchUp. It was named Built World's Accelerator Program of the Year.

What did Yiping Goh and Carlos Bañón discuss on Practice Disrupted?

They discussed how Formas.AI's AI-native design workspace takes a design from an initial sketch to a buildable 3D model in hours, the AEC industry's slow pace of digitization, and why trust — not capability — is the biggest barrier to AI adoption among architects.

About FORMAS.AI

FORMAS.AI is an AI-native design and marketing workspace for architects, interior and product designers. It orchestrates 60+ specialist AI models in one platform, turning sketches, images, and 3D models into client-ready renders, video, and editable 3D.

Used by designers and studios worldwide, FORMAS.AI is also reaching the next generation of architects through students and studios at institutions including MIT, Columbia, Cornell, and SUTD. The company raised an oversubscribed US$3.9M pre-seed round led by Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia & India and won first place at SuperAI Genesis 2026.