Technical article: Why MBSE often fails to reach its potential

Model-Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) promises more structure and fewer errors. In practice, however, the benefits often fall short of expectations. Thomas Lachtrup, founder and managing director of digithings, explains why in the trade magazine Embedded Software Engineering.

Key points on MBSE

• Domain expertise resides with experienced developers, not with MBSE experts.

• Models and software diverge as they evolve at different paces.

• Tools often do not integrate, requiring data to be transferred manually.

• Many developers see MBSE as a detour because models can rarely be tested in advance.

• MBSE specialists are expensive and quickly become scarce on large projects.

The Hella case study shows what development-accompanied testing looks like in practice.