Common Data Environment (CDE) for Engineering Organizations

A Common Data Environment (CDE) is the single, agreed source of information for a project or an asset — the place where drawings, models, documents, and structured data are collected, controlled, and shared across everyone who works on them. Instead of information living on individual desktops, email threads, and disconnected drives, a CDE gives every discipline one place to find the current, approved version of anything, with a full record of how it got there.

The concept was formalised for the built environment in ISO 19650, which defines how information moves through controlled states — work in progress, shared, published, and archived — with clear ownership, status, and approval at each step. The same principles apply well beyond construction. Any engineering organisation that produces controlled data across teams, suppliers, and clients benefits from the same discipline around version control, access, and traceability.

No single product is “the CDE” for every organisation. The right foundation depends on the data you manage, the workflows you run, and the systems you already own. Neilsoft builds CDEs on established data management platforms — Autodesk Vault, Autodesk Fusion Manage, Autodesk Forma, and the CONTACT Elements platform — and, where requirements go beyond what a product offers, from the ground up.

Neilsoft's capabilities

Neilsoft designs and builds CDEs around how an organisation actually works, choosing the foundation to match the requirement rather than forcing the requirement onto a product.

Architecture and platform selection

Assessing your data, workflows, and existing systems to choose the right foundation — a configured product, a combination, or a custom build — and designing the information structure, states, and access model around ISO 19650-style control.

CDEs on Vault and Fusion Manage

Controlled engineering data management on Autodesk Vault (PDM) and Fusion Manage (cloud PLM), with revision control, change and approval workflows, and Vault Gateway linking PDM and PLM.

CDEs on Autodesk Forma

Configuring Forma Data Management (formerly Autodesk Docs), coordination, and review workflows as the common data environment for AEC and plant project delivery.

CDEs on CONTACT Elements

Building collaboration and lifecycle solutions on CONTACT's open, low-code platform behind CIM Database PLM and Project Office — delivered by Neilsoft's dedicated CONTACT Software team.

Ground-up custom CDEs

When no product fits, building from proven components — databases, document and object stores, workflow and rules engines, viewers, and web front ends — with authentication, audit, and APIs designed in from the start.

Integration and migration

Connecting the CDE to CAD, BIM, ERP, and downstream systems, and migrating legacy documents and metadata in with clean mapping, deduplication, and validated relationships.