Construction Software Built From Your Own Spreadsheets
Estimating, bidding, job tracking, and change order software built by LlamaPress from the spreadsheets your construction company already uses. See how Leonardo turns them into real apps.
Back to all articlesYour company runs on spreadsheets that were never built for this
The estimator opens the bid spreadsheet, copies last month's tab, and starts adjusting line items. Unit prices, supplier quotes, labor rates, and the notes from three phone calls all live in different columns, and one wrong paste wipes a week of work. When the bid goes out, nobody is fully sure the numbers add up. The spreadsheet says they do, until the job is won and the real costs start coming in.
Once the job starts, tracking moves to another spreadsheet. Change orders get logged in a third. The project manager updates his copy, the office runs hers, and the owner asks for a status update that requires three people to reconcile before anyone answers. Subcontractor documents, inspection records, and daily logs live in email threads and glove boxes.
This is not a people problem. Your team is skilled and working hard. The tools force them to be the database. The estimate, the bid, the job, and the invoice are all the same job of work, but the spreadsheet keeps each one in its own fragile world, glued together by someone's memory.
The fix is software shaped to your actual process, built from the files you already use. Not a platform that takes a year to implement. Not a tool that forces your workflow into someone else's template.
Real apps for the work your company actually does
LlamaPress builds custom software for construction and contracting teams, usually starting from the spreadsheet that already runs the process. Here is what that looks like in practice.
Estimating
Your line items, unit prices, and labor rates become structured data with a history. No more copy-paste tabs. Changes to a price update everywhere that price is used, and the math is checked by the system, not by a tired estimator at midnight.
Bid & Tender Management
Every bid becomes a record with a status, a due date, and attached documents. The team sees which bids are out, which are waiting on a supplier quote, and which won. "Where is the bid?" stops being a question anyone has to ask.
Job Tracking
One record per job with budget, progress, documents, and key dates. The project manager updates it on site, the office sees it instantly, and the owner gets a real status instead of a reconciliation project.
Change Orders
Change requests logged with their scope, cost impact, and approval status. No more hunting through email for the version that got signed. The trail is attached to the job, and the budget updates the moment a change is approved.
Subs & Suppliers
Subcontractor and supplier records with certificates of insurance, licenses, and expiring documents tracked. The system reminds you before a certificate lapses, instead of finding out during an inspection.
Project Reporting
Estimates vs. actuals, job profitability, and bid win rates reported from the same data your team enters daily. The monthly owner's report that took a day of spreadsheet surgery now takes minutes.
From spreadsheet to construction software, with Leonardo
Leonardo is LlamaPress's AI builder. It reads the spreadsheet the way a developer would read a spec, then builds the software around it. You can start for free and see the first working version in your first session.
Upload the spreadsheet you use today
Head to Excel to App and upload your estimate, bid tracker, or job log exactly as it is. Tabs, formulas, color coding, notes in cells. Leonardo reads the columns, the logic, and the statuses you apply by hand.
Leonardo builds the first working version
Your spreadsheet becomes an application: a job record for each project, guided statuses, document attachments, and the reports your office actually runs. It runs on a real database from day one, so nothing lives in someone's head or inbox anymore.
Refine it in plain English
"Subcontractors need a COI expiry field." "Add a change order approval step." "Only the owner sees profitability." You describe the change, Leonardo makes it. The process logic lands exactly as your best estimator or PM would explain it.
Go live with your team
Invite your estimators, project managers, and office staff, and retire the spreadsheet. The app keeps evolving as your process does, because changing it is a conversation rather than a development contract.
Why not just buy an existing system?
Most contractors have already looked at the big platforms and the generic tools. Both miss the point in different ways.
Enterprise construction platforms
Powerful, and priced for large contractors with an IT team and months of implementation. A mid-sized company ends up paying for modules it will never switch on, then waits for a change to a workflow it already has working.
Generic project trackers
A shared to-do list with a nicer interface than your spreadsheet. It still has no idea that a change order affects the budget or that a bid needs three supplier quotes before it goes out. Your process logic stays in someone's head.
Better spreadsheets
Conditional formatting and locked cells can go only so far. The moment two people update the same file, or a document needs to attach to a job, the spreadsheet stops being the tool and starts being the bottleneck.
LlamaPress builds the option that fits: software shaped to your company's process, at a price shaped to your size. See pricing for what that costs.
Questions construction teams ask us
How long does it take to go from spreadsheet to a live system?
The first working version is built by Leonardo in your first session, usually within the hour. Most teams spend a few days refining estimates, statuses, and reports, then run one real job through it before switching over fully. Weeks, not a quarter.
Will my estimating formulas carry over?
Yes. The math in your spreadsheet becomes real logic in the app, and it is applied consistently instead of relying on someone copying a formula correctly. Totals, markups, and unit conversions are calculated by the system from your actual line items.
Can our project managers work from the field?
Yes. The app runs in any browser, so a project manager on site with a phone or tablet can update job status, log documents, and attach photos. The office sees the update the moment it is saved.
We handle confidential bid and pricing data. How is that protected?
Your application runs on its own dedicated instance with its own database, so your pricing and bids are never pooled with other companies' data. Access is controlled per role and every access is logged.
Who owns the software and the data?
You do. The application is yours, the database is yours, and your data is exportable at any time. Paid plans include access to the source code, so you are never locked into us to keep the system you built.
Your spreadsheet is the spec. Upload it.
The estimate or job tracker you maintain by hand already describes your ideal software. Leonardo will build the real version, with structured jobs, guided statuses, and reports that run themselves.