Agenda
Tuesday 3/2/2027
Wednesday 3/3/2027
Thursday 3/4/2027
Agenda & Presenters subject to change.
The integration of data across the design-to-sustainment lifecycle remains a significant hurdle in the manufacturing industry. To overcome this challenge, a collaborative effort between Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, and Georgia Tech and Purdue has yielded a standards-based framework that facilitates seamless data exchange. At the core of this framework is the utilization of Persistent IDs (PIDs), which serve as unique digital identifiers for part geometry and product manufacturing information (PMI). By leveraging open standards such as STEP AP242, MTConnect, and QIF, PIDs can establish a digital thread that bridges the gaps between design, manufacturing, inspection, and sustainment ecosystems.
Last Year’s 2026 Agenda
Monday 3/2/2026
- What are the best methods for authoring GD&T requirements for both human and machine consumption using MBD?
- Are all GD&T symbols machine readable?
- How can I leverage MBD to better define my GD&T requirements?
Join Action Engineering for a half-day session to learn the answers to these questions and more!
2:00 PM – 4:30 PM
Registration
1:00 PM – 4:00 PM
Sponsor Setup
Across industries, CAD systems contain the richest representation of a product, but most manufacturers still rely on manual processes to translate that data into production-ready instructions. This handoff between CAD and the factory floor introduces delay, inconsistency, and rework, thus turning engineering velocity into a manufacturing constraint. In this talk, Trevor Smith will explore how leading manufacturers are addressing this problem with AI-driven production orchestration, using CAD data as the foundation for execution. Rather than converting CAD into static documents, this approach maintains a dynamic, model-based representation of the product and the factory—where geometry, structure, assembly logic, sequencing, and constraints remain continuously connected through AI.
4:30 PM – 6:30 PM
CAD & Cocktails
Dirac
Tuesday 3/3/2026
8:00 AM
Registration & Breakfast
8:30 AM
Welcome & Opening Remarks
The integration of data across the design-to-sustainment lifecycle remains a significant hurdle in the manufacturing industry. To overcome this challenge, a collaborative effort between Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, and Georgia Tech and Purdue has yielded a standards-based framework that facilitates seamless data exchange. At the core of this framework is the utilization of Persistent IDs (PIDs), which serve as unique digital identifiers for part geometry and product manufacturing information (PMI). By leveraging open standards such as STEP AP242, MTConnect, and QIF, PIDs can establish a digital thread that bridges the gaps between design, manufacturing, inspection, and sustainment ecosystems.
This presentation will highlight the technical, process, and cultural hurdles that we face in the implementation of a robust 3D PMI workflow for powertrain manufacturing at Ford. The current PLM state requires the management of data using intermediate formats such as JT, STEP242 and QIF. The procedure for design changes requires robust validation and a knowledge of the distinctions of each system to avoid translation faults. In-process tolerances are separate from design tolerances and represent intermediate dimensional requirements relative to manufacturing datums. Design level PMI are allocated into manufacturing tolerances through a reverse stack-up procedure. Most CAD systems are designed for component level PMI authoring and manufacturing process-specific PMI is an emerging specialty that requires substantial workflow development. The PMI transition requires a fundamental shift in how we all think and work. Manufacturing engineers require significant training in software usage and best practices to become “PMI Authors”.
9:55 AM
Behind the LEGO Scenes
Duane Hess
10:00 AM
Networking & Coffee
This presentation identifies the 3D solid model as the engineering authority for an item and explains what that means. The model is the basis for the definition to control the item variation. This expands by the application of dimensional limits for the item. After the tolerancing has been applied, the interpretation must be semantic for both “machine and human” for a viable MBD. There are different types of tolerances that can be applied to the model, and this presentation dissects the tolerance types applied to the model and the different tolerance syntax. Some of these tolerances are viable and some are not. In the end, the annotated model is the engineering authority, providing the data for the item. The model is both Nominal and BASIC.
As an engineering checker, there are a plethora of things we look for and we do not all check for the same things, our priorities may differ, our understanding of certain concepts and conditions may differ. When reviewing all the different approaches I’ve seen through engineering checking, none are the same, and none are complete.
This presentation introduces how trust and traceability form the foundation of model‑based product definition. It begins with trust, showing how model‑based quality checking is used to validate MBD quality and standards compliance, ensuring the model can be confidently consumed downstream. It then moves to traceability, explaining how QIF and characteristic support enable product definition data to remain connected and interpretable across engineering, manufacturing, and quality domains. Together, these capabilities demonstrate how model‑based definition can instill trust and establish traceability of persistent and compliant product definition.
12:00 PM
Lunch
Our organisation exists in an exciting digital time of change and aerospace is at the forefront of this transformation. Having a method that connects data across the product life cycle is key to unlocking the efficiency potential that can come with the digital thread. Yet organisations do not exist in isolation, they are built upon ever evolving technical systems and reliant on integrated global supply chains of varying levels of digital capability. Behind all of this are systems and processes that are managed and driven by human operators.
Moog is on an ambitious journey to modernize how products are developed and manufactured by embracing model‑based processes and introducing new digital factories around the world. In this presentation, Max will share Moog’s experiences moving toward Model‑Based Definition (MBD) and explain why it plays a critical role in the company’s broader digital engineering strategy. He’ll walk through the scope and goals for the initial rollout and present Moog’s design modeling approach to hardware components.
2:25 PM
Networking & Cookies
Model-Based Definition (MBD) examples are everywhere, but truly useful ones are not, especially when interoperability and downstream use are part of the equation. This session tells the story of an open, standards-driven MBD reference project that started with a simple goal and quickly ran into the messy realities of real-world implementation across tools, roles, and workflows.
After a focused walkthrough of the project context and constraints, participants will break into discussion groups to review the models and derivatives through the lens of interoperability, job roles, and standards applicability.
MBD Ready is more than adopting 3D models, it’s the ability to publish, consume, and validate machine-readable engineering intent across the supply chain without introducing translation errors, ambiguity, or rework. In this session, we break down what MBD readiness looks like from both sides of the digital thread: OEMs, who must generate and distribute validated MBD data, and suppliers, who must reliably consume that data and produce inspection-ready, traceable results.
4:30 PM – 6:30 PM
A Very Colorado CAD & Cocktails
Capvidia
Wednesday 3/4/2026
8:00 AM
Breakfast
8:30 AM
Welcome & 10-Year Awards
Geometric deviations between as-designed and as-manufactured parts significantly impact cost, quality, and delivery timelines across aerospace, automotive, medical device, and industrial manufacturing sectors. The digital quantification and modeling of these deviations in an interoperable, scalable, and repeatable manner remains a critical barrier to achieving robust Digital Thread capabilities.
Honeywell Aerospace was facing a familiar challenge within the CAD model based design community: it had the tools and knowledge to create annotated solid models, but its supplier base was struggling to consume them, particularly in the Quality function. As the team evaluated different approaches and new industry software offerings available to consume its models downstream of Design, it found a solution in an unexpected piece of software it already had: DISCUS. Although for many years it was only used internally to balloon 2D PDF drawings, in recent years DISCUS has invested in and made significant progress towards developing its 3D model and PMI processing capabilities. This presentation will showcase how Honeywell Aerospace grew its model based capabilities downstream of Design and solved critical supplier adoption challenges by incorporating the latest model based capabilities offered by DISCUS 3D.
9:55 AM
Networking & Coffee
This presentation will illustrate the process on how HII-Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS) has approached applying Model-Based Definition (MBD); the process of defining product & engineering data within a 3D CAD model which creates a single source of truth that is used in downstream manufacturing, inspection, and assembly processes, on a digitally designed shipbuilding program.
Achieving true digital continuity across the product realization lifecycle remains one of the industry’s most persistent challenges. Design, engineering, manufacturing, procurement, quality, and service organizations often manage product-related information in disconnected silos, limiting collaboration and creating barriers to efficiency. The xBOX Framework introduces a structured strategy to unify digital information through two complementary dimensions. In this model, the lowercase “x” represents product lifecycle views—such as engineering, manufacturing, procurement, quality, or service—while the uppercase “X” represents information types, including materials, characteristics, processes, resources, and information items. By explicitly linking these views and types, the framework creates a systematic “x-view of a Bill of X” model that maps, manages, and connects product information across the product realization lifecycle.
Founded in 1983, International TechneGroup, Inc. (ITI) embarked on a mission to empower manufacturers to accelerateinnovation and reduce time to market through cutting-edge computer-aided product development solutions. Over the decades,as the adoption of advanced product development software and engineering systems proliferated, manufacturers encounteredincreasingly intricate integration and interoperability challenges. ITI emerged as the go-to expert, adept at navigating andresolving these complexities.
12:00 PM
Lunch
The shift from drawing-centric workflows to model-based definition (MBD) is not just a change in format, it represents a fundamental transformation in how product definition is created, communicated, and consumed across the enterprise. MBD offers the promise of persistent, machine-readable engineering requirements seamlessly connected across the digital thread. However, achieving this vision is not without challenges. While standards organizations such as ASME, ISO, DMSC, and PDES continue to evolve to support MBD and the broader model-based enterprise (MBE), critical gaps remain that impact interoperability, trust in data, and the ability to automate downstream processes.
The integration of cyber-physical systems and the advent of concepts like the Digital Thread and Digital Twin (DT) are reshaping how organizations approach design, production, and lifecycle management. While DT shows promise in enabling real-time monitoring, performance evaluation, and decision support, its adoption is hindered by challenges in quantifying the return on investment and implementation time. Specifically, small to medium-sized enterprises face barriers to adopting the Model-Based Enterprise while facing increasing pressure to connect their physical operations with a virtual synchronized representation of their operations.
2:25 PM
Side Quests
Ball Valve Discussion: One More Cycle
Query the Presenter
Campus Walk
2:45 PM
Networking & Cookies
This presentation explores how treating product characteristics as structured business objects can serve as the semantic backbone of the digital thread, closing the persistent gap between product engineering and manufacturing and quality operations. Despite advanced point technologies, organizations still face a “valley of death” marked by manual data handling, inconsistent interpretation of characteristics, and static documentation. Building on DMSC’s Model-Based Characteristics (MBC) framework, this presentation demonstrates how characteristics can move beyond simple balloon identifiers to include product requirement associations, criticality classifications, and verification plan requirements, enabling traceability from systems requirements through design, inspection, and production. QIF can provide the standards-based infrastructure to link characteristics semantically to functional features rather than raw CAD geometry, ensuring consistent interpretation across coordinate metrology, smart CNC, virtual assembly, and connected MES workflows. By elevating characteristics to governed, interoperable enterprise objects, organizations can unlock automation, improve process repeatability, and achieve end-to-end visibility and control across the product lifecycle.
The Quality Information Framework (QIF) is often positioned as an interoperability standard connecting semantic product specification data (via PMI) with downstream quality processes. However, its greatest opportunity lies in bridging the gap between design intent and measurement execution. Current implementations focus on standardization of GD&T and data exchange (i.e. using MBCs), but the real challenge is converting functional tolerances into executable, optimized measurement instructions. In the quality domain in any business, the selection of accurate and cost-effective measurement strategies for verification is vital. The MBE workflow for quality provides the required data traceability to enable a rule-based approach to measurement planning. At the same time, many new measurement technologies have recently been introduced, yet they lack international standards for data traceability and calibration, while existing standards often address only specific domains, such as contact-based standard only covers touch-trigger systems. Without a unifying approach, this fragmentation leads to gaps in trust, repeatability, and adoption. QIF offers the opportunity to close this gap by providing a consistent framework to integrate diverse technologies into traceable, rule-based planning.
Kubotek Kosmos supports suppliers who rely on MBD data across inspection, CNC machining, and process‑planning/tool‑design teams—each transforming CAD models in different ways. Our vantage point, serving manufacturing shops directly, reveals how these downstream edits complicate digital‑thread continuity. This brief session highlights real translation‑validation challenges and opportunities we see every day, and how both end‑user tools and embeddable geometry components can strengthen MBD adoption across the supply chain.
4:30 PM – 6:30 PM
CAD & Cocktails
Kubotek Kosmos
8:30 PM
Karaoke at Ace Hi Tavern
First hour of beer, wine, soda will be covered by karaoke sponsors.
Past Topics
Reducing the Digital Threat in Smart Manufacturing
Product Design as a Downstream Process: Leveraging Model-Based Enterprise
How the Government Uses Your Delivered Data
The Agile Organization that Enables Digital Transformation
Organizational Challenges During the Air Force PLM Journey
How to Lose Friends, Miss Product Delivery Dates, and Throw Away Money
Taking Down Thanos: A Smaller Company Conquering MBE
Who Do You Trust: Single Source of Truth
Creating the Connected, Accessible, and Realistic Digital Manufacturing Process of the Future
Digital Journey Using QIF + 3D Scanning
Are We Ready? Findings from the MBD Supplier Readiness Study
Accurate Data Transfer for Telescopes and Amusement Rides
How to Author PMI for Really Big Boats
Empowering People with the Right Tool Set to Drive Enterprise Accountability for MBE
Comfy Paper Pillows are Smothering MBD
Journey to MBE: Using MBD in the Plant and Supplier Quality Environments
Product Structure and Meta-Modeling: The Final Frontier
Animation is Worth a Million Bucks
Leveraging MBD with Cost Modeling
MIL-STD-31000 Technical Data Packages in Acquisition
One Hundred and One Dimensions
Trust the Digital Force: A QIF Story
It’s All Fun and Games Until the Other People Show Up: User Experience Analysis for MBD Success
Creating an Optimized Culture for Enterprise Accountability: Applying the Five Laws of Human Motivational Dynamics
Developing Contractual Language for Model-Based Standards