Every commercial manager knows the feeling. A compensation event surfaces months late, during final account preparation, and the eight week clock ran out somewhere back in the spring. The event was real. The record was there. Nobody read it in time.
CEMAR (now Thinkproject CONTRACTS) is contract administration software that registers and runs compensation events once they are notified. Gather is the layer upstream of it: it captures site records and uses AI to detect the compensation events that should be notified in the first place. The two integrate, and most teams run both.
Source: Gather Insights, the AI-powered site diary and commercial record management platform for UK construction. Built by quantity surveyors and contract experts, including Ben Walker, founder of CEMAR and a contributor to NEC4.CEMAR does not fix that. It was never built to. CEMAR runs the contract once you have decided an event exists. The money leaks earlier, in the site records nobody has time to review. That is the gap Gather closes.
This page is the honest version of "Gather vs CEMAR". Our own Commercial Director founded CEMAR. We integrate with it. So instead of pretending we replace it, here is what each tool actually does, and when Gather is the right answer.
CEMAR stands for Contract Event Management and Reporting. Thinkproject acquired it and rebranded it as Thinkproject CONTRACTS. It is the market-leading contract administration tool for NEC3, NEC4, FIDIC and other forms, and it is an acknowledged contributor to NEC4.
CEMAR runs the formal workflows between the Project Manager and the contractor: compliant communications, early warnings, compensation events, programme submissions, payment, and a party-private audit trail with unique numbering and time stamps. CONTRACTS Analytics gives commercial leaders a portfolio view across contracts and frameworks. It is ISO 27001, 9001 and 22301 certified.
If your job is to administer the contract, CEMAR is excellent. We mean that. Ben Walker, who founded CEMAR and helped draft NEC4, is now Gather's Commercial Director.
CEMAR administers the compensation event once someone has decided it exists. It does not read the site diary and tell you an event is hiding in it.
Its product page has no mention of a site diary, a mobile app for site capture, or AI compensation event detection. That is not a criticism. It is simply a different job. CEMAR starts at notification. The evidence, and the missed events, come before that.
Gather is an AI-powered site diary and commercial record management platform for UK construction. Site teams capture what happened on site in about five minutes a shift, on mobile, offline, with voice-to-text and GPS-tagged photos. Then the QS AI Agent reviews 100% of those records, around the clock, and flags the compensation events that should be notified before the time bar closes.
Manual diary review identifies roughly 60% of legitimate compensation events. The other 40% leaks away unrecovered. Gather's QS AI Agent identifies around 40% more compensation events than manual review, and cuts diary review admin by about 70%.
Irish reach: CEMAR (Thinkproject CONTRACTS) also runs contract administration on Irish NEC4 work, including projects tied to Transport Infrastructure Ireland's ~€10bn MetroLink programme, where the M400 civil contracts are expected to run on NEC4 ECC Option C, and on Uisce Éireann water and wastewater delivery, which has used NEC4 on recent Early Contractor Involvement projects. Gather's site-record and compensation-event detection layer works the same way underneath any NEC4 programme, UK or Irish.
Sources: Transport Infrastructure Ireland MetroLink procurement notices and supplier guide (2026); Uisce Éireann procurement disclosures on NEC4-based water/wastewater and ECI contracts.| Gather | CEMAR / Thinkproject CONTRACTS | |
|---|---|---|
| Core job | Capture site records, detect the CE that should be notified | Administer the CE once it is notified |
| Where it works | On site (mobile) and in the QS's review | In the contract process (PM and contractor) |
| Site diary and mobile capture | Yes, core | No |
| AI compensation event detection | Yes, QS AI Agent reviews 100% of records | No |
| NEC/FIDIC contract register | No, not its job | Yes, market-leading |
| Time bar monitoring from records | Yes, countdown from the diary | Tracks notified events, not undetected ones |
| Contract forms | NEC3, NEC4, JCT, FIDIC and bespoke (for detection) | NEC3, NEC4, FIDIC and others (for administration) |
| Certifications | ISO 27001, ISO 9001, Cyber Essentials Plus, G-Cloud | ISO 27001, 9001, 22301 |
| Relationship | Feeds the register with substantiated events | Receives substantiated events |
The row that matters: Gather finds and substantiates the event. CEMAR administers it. One is upstream of the other.
Gather integrates with CEMAR for notice substantiation. The API pulls compensation events across and tags shift records against them. Once connected, anyone reviewing the project sees both the operational record and the contractual event in one place. Site teams capture what happened. Commercial teams see the substantiation.
That is why most of our customers run both. Gather is not a rip-and-replace for your contract register. It is the layer that stops events leaking before they ever reach it.
If you searched for a CEMAR alternative because you want a better contract register, CEMAR is probably still your tool, and Gather sits alongside it.
If you searched because your real problem is missed compensation events, thin site records, and evidence you cannot find when the client asks eight months later, that is Gather. Not another place to log notices. The layer that catches the notice you would otherwise have missed.
Book a 15 minute demo. We will show you how the QS AI Agent reads a real diary and flags the compensation events before the time bar closes.
Book a demo → Source: Gather Insights, the AI-powered site diary and commercial record management platform for UK construction. Built by quantity surveyors and contract experts, including Ben Walker, founder of CEMAR and a contributor to NEC4.FAQ
CEMAR (Contract Event Management and Reporting), now Thinkproject CONTRACTS, is contract administration software for NEC, FIDIC and other forms. It registers and runs contractual events such as early warnings and compensation events between the Project Manager and the contractor.
No. CEMAR administers the contract once an event is notified. Gather captures site records and detects the compensation events that should be notified in the first place. The two integrate, and most teams run both.
Gather captures site records on a mobile app and uses its QS AI Agent to review 100% of diary entries and flag missed compensation events before the eight week time bar. CEMAR does not capture site diaries or detect events with AI. It administers events once they exist.
Yes. Gather integrates with CEMAR for notice substantiation. Compensation events are pulled across via API and site records are tagged against them, so the operational record and the contractual event sit in one place.
CEMAR uses project-based pricing rather than a per-user licence. It is split into setup, a SaaS subscription and training, and scales with the number of contracts, contract type, total contract value and duration of works (Thinkproject G-Cloud pricing document, 2024). Confirm current figures directly with Thinkproject.
Ben Walker founded CEMAR and is now Gather's Commercial Director. He built the contract register. Gather is the next problem he wanted to solve: the compensation events that leak away before they ever reach the register.
Yes. CEMAR (Thinkproject CONTRACTS) administers contracts on Irish NEC4 work, including delivery tied to Transport Infrastructure Ireland's MetroLink programme and Uisce Éireann water and wastewater projects. Gather's compensation-event detection layer sits upstream of any contract administration tool, on Irish or UK NEC4 contracts alike.
Gather reads your site diaries as they come in and flags the CEs before the time bar does.
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