In large organisations, procurement processes are usually built for projects with a scope that’s known upfront — plant digitalisation, by definition, doesn’t fit that assumption. It’s this mismatched procurement procedure — not a lack of conviction about the value of the technology — that most often delays or blocks digitalisation projects in large organisations.
The Problem: Digitalisation Doesn’t Fit a Classic, Waterfall Procurement Model
In a waterfall approach, you first define the full scope, then prepare a budget, then sign a single all-encompassing contract, and only evaluate the outcome at the end. This works well for projects with predictable results like building a warehouse, installing a production line with a known specification.
Ordering a complete, target-state digital twin right from the start, on the other hand, means making a major budget decision based on data that doesn’t exist yet.
That data doesn’t exist until the team starts working with the first, limited stage of implementation. It must be assumed whether employees will use the model regularly, which processes benefit most from access to up-to-date documentation, and how much it really costs to maintain sensor integration within your IT infrastructure.
This is exactly where the procedural rigidity of large organisations becomes an obstacle: it’s easier to get board approval for a large, one-time purchase with a full specification, than for a smaller, flexible budget spread across stages, even when the latter approach is cheaper and less risky.
The Solution: Small Steps That Justify Themselves
An agile approach to digitalisation doesn’t mean chaos or a lack of planning. It means that each stage of implementation is a standalone product that the plant can use immediately, regardless of whether it decides to go further in the future.
We covered this in more detail in our piece on the difference between visualisation and a digital twin: the path from 3D scanning, through sharing data across the whole organisation (WebPano Visual Plant), through a simple-solids 3D model (Digital Shadow), all the way to a full, feedback-connected digital twin. This isn’t one decision, but a series of smaller ones, each of which makes sense on its own.
The practical consequence: instead of ordering the target system right away, a plant can start with a single area — one hall, one line — see the real value, and only then decide whether and how to expand the scope. The budget grows alongside confirmed value, rather than getting ahead of it.
It’s Also a Question of Learning, Not Just Budget
Staged implementation has another reason behind it, independent of financial risk: the organisation itself has to learn how to use the new data before it can precisely define what it expects from it. A single conversation at the start of the project and a written set of requirements aren’t enough — it’s only hands-on use of the model or platform in day-to-day work that reveals which departments and processes genuinely benefit from it, and how.
For an implementation to succeed, the outcome of digitalisation needs to be used broadly, across many processes and departments, and that requires time for the client to learn and refine their own needs. That’s why this kind of project works best when tried first at a smaller scale, as a pilot, before scaling to the whole plant. A small pilot creates the space in which the client learns what it actually needs and can evaluate the results of our work on a concrete, verifiable example before deciding on the scale of the full rollout.
How to Reconcile This With Large-Organisation Procedures
You don’t have to give up a single partner or a coherent project vision in order to implement it in stages. In practice, this means:
- One framework agreement, several execution orders — instead of a single contract covering the whole scope, the agreement sets out the collaboration and standards, while subsequent stages are ordered and billed separately as the project progresses.
- A pilot in a limited area — before a decision is made to scale across the whole plant, a single object or installation makes it possible to verify assumptions without committing the full budget.
- Clear criteria for moving to the next stage — IT, maintenance, and management know upfront what will show it’s worth going further (e.g., time saved on site visits, number of users active on the platform).
This approach isn’t at odds with the need for predictability that large organisations have but simply moves the point at which the big budget decision gets made from the start of the project to the point where data is available to make an informed decision.
How We Determine the Scope of an Implementation: A Digital Maturity Audit
Staged implementation doesn’t have to mean starting with a small fragment of the plant. Some clients choose to roll out a digital twin across the entire facility right away, if the scale of the project and internal resources allow for it. A limited pilot is one of the available options, particularly useful when an organisation wants to first verify its assumptions at a smaller scale before committing the full budget. At 3Deling, this option has its own name — the WebPano Mini Pilot Program.
Regardless of whether a project starts at full scale right away or with a pilot, we precede the scope decision with an audit conversation, in which we look at, among other things: the current state and format of the plant’s technical documentation; how access to hazardous zones and onboarding of new personnel around the installation currently works; where designers and contractors get their data from when planning renovations and investments; whether the plant already has any experience with 3D scanning and established data-format standards; how technical knowledge is managed (including the risk of losing it when employees leave); and how ready the IT infrastructure is to support a new platform.
Only on that basis do we jointly determine the real scope of the project with the client — whether that’s a pilot in a selected area or a full-scale rollout from the start — along with success criteria that will guide the next steps, instead of guessing at the required scope based on general declarations.
If you are wondering how to start digitalising your plant without making a big budget decision upfront, check out our WebPano Mini Pilot Program — a scaled-down version of the full service, focused on a selected part of your facility, with results visible in a short time.
