How AFRY’s early adoption of open standards transformed collaboration

When most of the infrastructure world was still locked into proprietary formats, AFRY made a different choice. Long before IFC 4.3 became a standard, they decided to commit to an open, vendor‑neutral, future-proof way of working: one that would allow engineers, designers, and other stakeholders to collaborate seamlessly across tools and disciplines. 

It was a forward‑looking move born out of necessity. Considering the complexity, scale, and multi-disciplinary nature of the projects in their portfolio, the cost of fragmentation was simply too high. 

Today, as open standards become the norm, AFRY’s early vision has proven that a standardized way of working is the smartest way to stay flexible and scalable in their industry. 

Background 

AFRY provides engineering, project management, and advisory services that enable energy and industrial transition, helping build a stronger society. With 18,000 experts worldwide across more than 100 countries, they combine global reach with local insight to make a real impact. Supporting clients from over 300 local offices, AFRY’s teams deliver projects that range from energy systems and transportation infrastructure to industrial facilities. 

The nature of these projects made the need for a standardized, interoperable way of working even more pressing. With infrastructure projects often spanning over 30 km and involving multiple disciplines and partners, fragmented tools and workflows threatened both efficiency and data integrity. The push for open standards was about enabling global collaboration in a practical way while laying the foundation for future‑proof project delivery. 

The challenge 

In 2018, AFRY’s teams were coordinating teams and projects across many disciplines, each group using a vast collection of tools. Proprietary formats created hard stops between authoring environments: a model exported from one tool couldn’t be trusted or even opened in another. Selecting a single vendor was tempting from an IT perspective, but there simply wasn’t one solution that worked for everyone without imposing severe limitations. 

The decision: An IFC‑first, tool‑agnostic approach 

AFRY’s BIM leadership made a clear call: “Don’t bet on one horse.” Any team could choose its toolset, as long as it could import and export in IFC-format. That put an open schema at the heart of the strategy and shifted efforts toward creating clear, agreed-upon internal standards and processes to help realize this vision.  

“As long as you deliver IFC, you can work the way you want to. The tool shouldn’t decide how we collaborate.”
— Paul-Christian Max, Digital Transformation Manager, AFRY 

From harmonization to transformation 

To make an IFC-first workflow operational, AFRY built a new digital foundation. They created project-adaptable templates, common modeling guidelines, and shared coordinate systems that would allow any discipline to ensure their models were correctly aligned from the start. Regular training sessions, Q&As, and one-to-one onboarding helped normalize open BIM practices across offices and partners. This structured approach to creating clear internal processes was crucial to the success of their transformation. The rollout was pragmatic: start small, learn quickly, then standardize and scale. 

This foundation made BIMcollab a natural fit. BIMcollab Zoom proved uniquely capable of handling infrastructure-scale models, sometimes spanning 30 kilometers and comprising over 600 IFC files, without performance loss. “Other tools would just crash”, says Paul-Christian. BIMcollab Zoom became the dependable window into massive datasets, performing predictably and building user trust in the process. 

Meanwhile, BIMcollab’s platform gave teams a single source of truth for coordination. All design communication, from clash discussions to formal decisions, was captured in the platform, creating a living record of accountability. With global agreement and transparent administration, AFRY could easily onboard new users, keeping project costs predictable and on-budget. “BIMcollab’s pricing is really transparent,” says Paul-Christian. “Perhaps a small detail, but it makes a big difference to us: it gives us the confidence to add new users as needed without worrying that pricing will catch us by surprise and put us over budget for the project in question.” 

Together, harmonized standards and BIMcollab’s open infrastructure turned what could have been a patchwork of tools into one connected ecosystem. Even less technical users in non-BIM roles became confident using BIMcollab, a testament to the simplicity of the platform and the strength of AFRY’s process. 

Clarity, consistency, and cultural change 

The impact was tangible. On one project, a contractor on site questioned a design detail. Instead of starting a lengthy email chain, Paul-Christian referred to the model in BIMcollab’s WebViewer, and walked the contractor through the issue visually. The confusion was quickly overcome, and the matter settled. No drawings were redone, no mistakes were made on site, and frustration between stakeholders was easily avoided.  

In another instance, a client questioned a decision made by AFRY’s team. Without hesitation, the team was able to refer to a clear, dated message trail, each contextualized within the platform. The client’s concerns were quickly put to rest, without lengthy debate.  

These moments captured the essence of AFRY’s transformation: clarity replacing complexity, and confidence replacing doubt. Across projects, the same pattern emerged: smoother onboarding through reusable templates, reduced need for bespoke configurations across different authoring tools, and improved understanding for contractors and clients who could finally see (and trust) what they were building in 3D. 

Clean, consistent IFC data also became the launchpad for automation. With reliable, structured information, teams could build workflows for quality checking, 5D cost estimation, and visualization: steps that used to require a significant amount of time and effort on data wrangling. The investment in open standards paid off not just in efficiency, but in confidence. 

Results at a glance 

Conclusion  

AFRY’s experience offers a powerful message for an industry still transitioning to open BIM: an open approach is the best way forward for longevity. IFC ensures data remains usable decades from now, long after today’s software changes. And crucially, strong, clear standards must precede speed. Without clean templates and consistent processes, automation won’t scale. And above all, communication beats documentation: regular dialogue, not dense manuals, is what turns standards into practice, and helps companies like AFRY streamline and improve their processes over time. 

“BIMcollab handled our largest infrastructure models without flinching, and it connected the disparate tools we used, helping us find a common language and central place to bring all BIM-related work together. Its reliability made open BIM workable for everyone.” — Davide Barbero, Team Manager BIM & Digital Engineering, AFRY 

Looking back, AFRY’s IFC-first approach wasn’t simply about technology; it was about shaping a culture of openness and accountability. It empowered teams to choose the tools that fit them best, while aligning everyone around a shared digital language. Years later, as open standards become the rule rather than the exception, AFRY’s early decision stands as proof that standardization doesn’t have to slow you down. Rather, it can serve as a powerful foundation for scale and flexibility.