nesseler group
A new colleague is productive in 30 minutes, because the data is open.
How the nesseler group delivered a five-story laboratory building for University Hospital Cologne on Open BIM, and built the in-house team to make it stick.
The project in one panel.
The facts a peer in your shoes scans first: who they are, what they build, and which parts of Catenda they put to work.
- Company
- nesseler group
- Sector
- General contractor / full lifecycle
- Region
- Aachen, Germany (nationwide)
- Size
- ~500 employees across 5 locations
- Project
- Five-story laboratory building, University Hospital Cologne
- Products used
Before Catenda, only Open BIM was ever on the table.
The nesseler group covers the entire lifecycle of a property, development, planning, construction and operation, so there has always been a strategic interest in project information flowing through every process in a fully integrated way. That meant the choice of platform came down to data sovereignty, not convenience.
For Daniel Simons, head of the new BIM Services department, being able to access planning information without restriction, even ten years on, was non-negotiable, and the laborious conversion of files that comes with proprietary, closed software was never an option. Open data formats were the only choice.
“We rely on data sovereignty. That's why anything other than Open BIM was unimaginable for us.”
What they did with Catenda.
The BIM Services department thoroughly evaluated numerous CDEs, looking for a platform that consistently provides the foundation for clear, comprehensive project communication. Before daily work began, the team built a company-wide standard, a sample project, and a full authorization structure with roles for planners, project managers and clients.
On the Cologne laboratory building, nesseler handled architectural execution planning, complex technical building equipment (TGA) planning, and turnkey shell construction, prefabrication and interior fit-out, with a highly detailed 3D model plus an As-Built model for operation and maintenance.
What changed once the project had one source of truth.
With the standard and authorization structure in place, the platform pays off in everyday work: the whole team can view, section and immediately understand what was changed, helped by topic-related communication that keeps the conversation organized.
Because everything sits on open formats, nesseler keeps full data sovereignty with no proprietary lock-in, and the same Open BIM approach now stretches from planning through to building operation with Catenda Duo. The five-story laboratory building for University Hospital Cologne was delivered on exactly this footing.
Once this basic structure is in place, it is particularly easy to onboard new employees into the system. Depending on their area of activity, new colleagues are often proficient after only about 30 minutes of training and can start their work immediately. The Catenda platform definitely pays off.
Daniel SimonsHead of BIM Services, nesseler group · General contractor, Germany
~30 min
to onboard a new colleague into the system
Open BIM
full data sovereignty, no proprietary lock-in
1
company-wide standard + authorization structure
5-story
laboratory building delivered, University Hospital Cologne
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