COExperience 2025 Recap: Extending the 3DEXPERIENCE Digital Thread

Reno, Nevada – April 2025

This week, Anark returned to COExperience with a clear message and a powerful showing: simplifying technical data exchange and collaboration for the 3DEXPERIENCE (3DX) platform is not only possible — it’s happening now.

From the moment the expo hall opened, the excitement around Anark’s updated solutions for 3DX, 3D PDF, and web-based Technical Data Packages (TDPs) was palpable. Attendees from companies like Sierra Nevada Corporation, Textron, Bell Helicopter, Lucid, and Beta were all there to understand the latest ways to generate rich 3D PDFs directly from CATPart - CATProduct data output from 3DX. For many, it was exciting to see there is a practical, elegant answer to a problem that has long plagued engineering teams trying to share 3D data outside of their native tools.

That pain point was a recurring theme throughout the event. Even seasoned system integrators couldn’t hide their frustration over how difficult this challenge has become. The verdict from the community was loud and clear: Dassault’s platform is a powerful product lifecycle management (PLM) platform, but making engineering technical data available for exchange and collaboration with others is still a serious barrier. One of our customers recently commented, "We've talked to quite a few software vendors over the last 2 years, and they all say they can produce a complete TDP from 3DX, but when you start digging into the use cases, you quickly realize that's not the case. It's all a work in progress."

Attendees at COExperience 2025 were thrilled to find out that Anark, through work with Dassault Spatial, is providing the solution they’ve been waiting for to produce complete and accurate technical data packages (TDP) from 3DEXPERIENCE and CATIA.  As of the beginning of this year, Anark can translate and render 3DEXPERIENCE CATIA CAD models, including composites data, into a TDP that meets all the requirements, format wise and function wise, of a variety of use cases, including FAA type certification, external technical data exchange and supplier collaboration.  

Another highlight? Strong interest from attendees in leveraging model-based definition (MBD) to create visual Electronic Work Instructions (EWI). Companies were exploring how our platform can streamline shop floor processes and close the loop from engineering to manufacturing — quickly and without friction. 

One particularly eye-opening moment came during a 3DEXPERIENCE workshop titled "Collaboration with Business Experience." The Dassault team touted an impressive 300 partner applications focused on collaboration, most of which focused on workflow automation, system integration, and data flows. One attendee asked a pointed question about MBD (Model-Based Definition) support for technical data exchange and collaboration. The response was that nothing currently exists in their ecosystem to address this critical gap.

This tracks with what we have heard from many of our customers about The Digital Thread Myth. Most digital thread solutions focus on system-to-system or machine-to-machine connections, but leave out the critical technical data exchange and collaboration use cases. That’s where Anark extends the value of 3DEXPERIENCE and CATIA to help companies go faster!

This year also marked the first time that the MBSE Cyber Systems Symposium was co-located with COE — and the connection between systems engineering, digital thread, and downstream realization became more evident than ever. Conversations highlighted the industry-wide struggle to trace requirements across MBSE, engineering, and manufacturing disciplines — a challenge Anark is addressing head-on through our work with :em Engineering Methods AG and the Digital Data Package (DDP) Working Group to deliver digital data package (DDP) solutions that offer value well beyond traditional mechanical engineering data exchange and collaboration use cases. 

Many attendees were unaware of this developing standard that bridges the MBSE and TDP domains. When we showed how Anark Collaborate can simplify and connect product planning to realization across the digital thread, it resonated deeply.

Bottom line:
Anark has built a unique and powerful set of solutions for the Community of Experts of Dassault Systemes solutions. While other players talk about future roadmaps and theoretical integrations, Anark is enabling real, accessible collaboration across the entire product lifecycle.

We’re not just integrating with 3DEXPERIENCE. We’re unlocking it.