The PlanSuite Story
PlanSuite was born from more than two decades of experience inside Victorian statutory planning. After years of answering the same types of enquiries, reviewing the same types of applications, and watching planners spend hours on work that should take minutes, James decided to build the tools he wished he'd had.
The result is PlanSuite — purpose-built AI-assisted planning tools that understand Victorian planning schemes the way a planner does, because they were built by one.
This isn't a generic tech product adapted for planning. It's a planning product that happens to use the best technology available.
Founder: James Bruscella
James is a practising Victorian town planner, local government innovator and founder of PlanSuite, with more than 20 years' experience across local government, planning compliance, private consulting and development.
Before founding PlanSuite, James helped lead the digital transformation of Brimbank City Council's statutory planning department. The work was recognised with an LGPro Award for Innovation and became the subject of industry presentations to organisations including LGPro and the Municipal Association of Victoria.
After years of seeing planners spend valuable time repeatedly researching controls, answering the same enquiries and preparing the same types of assessments, he started building the tools he wished he'd had as a council planner.
James is also an industry speaker on artificial intelligence, digital transformation and innovation in planning and local government, drawing on both his award-recognised work within local government and his experience building PlanSuite.
Experience
Local Government Statutory Planning
Over 20 years in town planning, including six years as a coordinator in the statutory planning department of a major Melbourne council. Deep experience across permit applications, compliance, and enforcement.
Private Consulting & Development
Experience across residential, commercial and mixed-use projects throughout Victoria.
Industry Leadership & Speaking
James has presented to planning, local government and technology audiences on innovation, digital transformation and the practical use of AI in planning.
Before founding PlanSuite, he helped lead the digital transformation of Brimbank City Council's statutory planning service. That work was recognised with an LGPro Award for Innovation, and James subsequently presented on the transformation to LGPro and the Municipal Association of Victoria (MAV).
More recently, James has presented on PlanSuite and the emerging role of AI in statutory planning to the Planning Enforcement Officers Association (PEOA) and the ALGIM AI, Web & Digital Community of Practice.
His perspective combines more than 20 years working as a planner inside the system, award-recognised experience implementing digital transformation within local government, and the experience of now building technology specifically designed to change how planning work is done.
Learn more about James' speaking and presentations →What Makes PlanSuite Different
Built by a planner. Not by a tech company guessing what planners need. Every feature exists because James needed it himself.
Reads the actual scheme. PlanSuite doesn't rely on training data or generic AI. It reads directly from your council's planning scheme ordinances — the same source your planners use.
Victorian-specific. This isn't a one-size-fits-all product adapted for planning. It's purpose-built for Victorian planning schemes and the 79 LGAs that use them.
Still practising. James is still an active planner. PlanSuite evolves with every legislative change, scheme amendment, and real-world edge case he encounters.
Planning + Technology
PlanSuite combines deep statutory planning experience with experienced software engineering and product development. Both sides of that sit in the business rather than being contracted out, which is why a change in the planning scheme, a new provision or a real-world edge case can be reflected in the product quickly.
Planning
Over 20 years of Victorian statutory planning, including coordinating a statutory planning team, assessing applications, handling referrals, compliance and enforcement, and maintaining council report templates.
Engineering
Professional software engineering and product development, covering the platform architecture, the spatial data pipeline that reads Victorian government sources, the AI assessment pipelines and the security controls councils review.
The platform is built on Australian cloud infrastructure, with application data hosted in AWS Sydney. Council content is used to support the requested service, not to train public AI models. Our Security and Essential Eight Compliance pages set out the detail an IT manager or procurement team will want, including how AI processing and data residency are handled.
AI-assisted outputs support professional judgement. Council officers and planning professionals remain responsible for reviewing and finalising every output and decision.
Get in Touch
Want to see how PlanSuite can work for your council? James is happy to walk you through it.