Systems engineering white paper
Model-Based System Engineering (MBSE) is increasingly adopted, but implementations remain local and fragmented. Agile methods, well known in software development, are more and more applied to systems engineering. In 2016, interviewees identified several major challenges: • Project scale and distribution: Teams now exceed 100 members and are often globally distributed. The sheer scale of software systems demands virtual validation to ensure sufficient test coverage. • Accelerated project timelines: Development cycles are getting shorter, increasing pressure on teams and processes. • Innovation increases uncertainty: Emerging technologies have unpredictable impacts. Functions often span across multiple vehicle domains—including IT and cloud infrastructure—yet organizations remain siloed, limiting the reach of system engineering. • Tooling limitations: Existing tools often lack interoperability, are not ready to handle new technologies, and impose constraints on efficient collaboration. • Cultural and skill barriers: Engineers are accustomed to working with document-based processes. Under pressure from ongoing projects, teams resist change, and MBSE skills are in short supply. • ROI pressure and R&D underfunding: Organizations are highly project-oriented. Management expects rapid returns on investment, making it difficult to justify and secure R&D budgets for method and tool development. Improvement initiatives are typically local, aimed at adopting best practices and addressing specific tooling, technology, or process needs. The pain points identified in 2016 led some companies to define strategic plans at the corporate level, with an increasing interest in standardization as a lever for harmonization and scalability.
CIL4Sys Vision: Towards a Living Digital Twin To meet the challenges, CIL4Sys has proposed in 2016 a bold and structured path forward: • Use an executable system behavior model as the backbone for all design deliverables—specifications, test cases, and simulations. • Deploy the Agile SCRUM method within system engineering to bring adaptability and iterative progress to complex developments. In a world where products are increasingly software-driven, traditional industries must evolve. It is time to bring a functional digital mockup to life: the system’s digital behavior must not be a static placeholder but a faithful representation of the actual system design.
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