Cobotx Brings Order to Rapid Automation Growth

Netherlands-based Cobotx started the way many engineering-driven firms do: small, hands-on, and focused on solving real problems for manufacturers facing labor shortages and increasingly complex production demands. Cobots (collaborative robots) offered a way forward only if they could be deployed quickly with nearly immediate customer return on investment.

As Cobotx grew, its agility became harder to sustain. Projects expanded from individual cobot cells to entire production lines. The company began with just two people working out of a small office, handling every task from start to finish. Interns were later hired and eventually became full-time engineering employees, followed by more experienced staff. As the team grew, the company moved into its own building, which quickly proved too small. Within a few years, the parking lot was completely full. That growth led to a move into a nearby building four times larger.

What once worked through informal processes and cloud storage began to strain under the pressure of fast growth with increasing need for bespoke solutions. The stage was set for a deeper reconsideration of how Cobotx managed its designs, data, and downstream processes.

According to Boudewijn Crooijmans, co-founder and CTO of Cobotx, “Cobotx was founded in response to the growing need among manufacturing companies for solutions to personnel shortages.” Early on, the Cobotx team did everything themselves, from design through installation, and growth quickly followed.

With that growth came new realities. More engineers meant higher expectations around internal systems. Drawings were often created manually while designs became more complex. Data lived in multiple locations. Engineers could not always be certain they were working from the correct version or even know the current status of a project.

Julian Van Egmond, Senior Mechanical Engineer at Cobotx, described the situation plainly: “Previously, we did a lot of manual actions, so we had to create drawings manually. We had [file] locations all over the place where things were stored, so you were never sure if you had the right version or the status of a project.”

Cobotx also implemented ERP to support its growth. Without structured design data, connecting engineering to ERP and ultimately to the shop floor would have remained tenuous. To continue scaling, Cobotx needed a way to bring order, consistency, and transparency to its product development process.

Structuring Design Data from the Start

Cobotx had already relied on SOLIDWORKS Design for years, but its growth exposed the limits of loosely managed data. As the company expanded, the need for formal product data management became unavoidable. “We had been using SOLIDWORKS for years and saved our designs in the cloud, but as we grew, we noticed we needed a PDM solution more and more,” Crooijmans explained.

By implementing the 3DEXPERIENCE platform for built-in data management alongside SOLIDWORKS Design, Cobotx centralized CAD models and related documents in a controlled environment where version control, access rights, and workflows were enforced automatically. Instead of scattered files and manual tracking, engineering data lived in a single location with clear project status and revision history.

The change was not purely technical. Cobotx made the deliberate decision to restructure its designs to fully benefit from structured data management. That structure extended beyond CAD.

Correct part numbers, bills of materials, and consistent naming conventions were defined at the start and carried through to ERP and onto the shop floor. “Now, we enter the designs correctly right from the start with the correct bills of materials, Crooijmans emphasized. That consistency flows through to the ERP system and onto the shop floor.

For Van Egmond, the impact was immediate. “Now all those things like revision management and such are automated, which means there is only one possibility. This is the status of the project. This is where we are. That way, everyone knows exactly where things stand.”

The most immediate benefit for Cobotx was certainty. Engineers no longer questioned whether they had the correct files or the latest revisions. The 3DEXPERIENCE platform provided a single source of truth, eliminating ambiguity and reducing the risk of rework caused by outdated files.

The benefits extended well beyond engineering. Structured data flowed into ERP and onto the shop floor, enabling tickets and processes that followed the same logic from design through manufacturing. “We now work with tickets that follow the same structure, so throughout the entire process from start to finish,” Crooijmans explained.

Fewer Errors, Better Builds, Faster Throughput

This consistency reduced mistakes and accelerated work across departments. “3DEXPERIENCE doesn't just stop at our department; it extends throughout the entire company,” Van Egmond said.

For a company with a keen on continued growth, these gains were strategic. Without sacrificing control or quality, Cobotx added a development foundation capable of supporting expansion into new technologies and new markets across Europe. As Crooijmans summarized, “We are truly committed to ongoing development.”

In an industry where automation is meant to bring order to complexity, Cobotx applied the same principle to its own product development and brought structure to innovation to move faster and more efficiently and confidently.