Mercedes-Benz is overhauling its engineering ecosystem with PLM.AI, a €500 million AI-native digital backbone designed to cut vehicle development time by up to 30 percent. By creating a seamless, intelligent thread that connects development, procurement, production, and sales, this new infrastructure is projected to boost efficiency in specific engineering processes by up to 50 percent.
This acceleration doesn’t come from cutting corners. Instead, it eliminates information silos, allowing teams to make better decisions earlier in the lifecycle. The result brings new technologies to market faster without compromising the safety, quality, and craftsmanship expected of the brand.
While Mercedes already uses AI for localized tasks like optimizing material costs, managing homologation, or debugging software, PLM.AI scales this intelligence across the entire company. It relies on standardized data models to connect disparate AI applications, giving engineering teams real-time visibility into complex trade-offs.
If a team wants to optimize a component’s weight, for example, specialized AI agents can simultaneously calculate the ripple effects on manufacturing costs, crash safety, and hardware integration. This holistic, data-driven approach allows for highly targeted physical testing, which the company expects to reduce by half over time. Crucially, while the AI analyzes the interdependencies, human teams retain complete authority over final product decisions.
To build this architecture, Mercedes-Benz is maintaining strict ownership of its data and proprietary AI models while collaborating with two strategic technology partners:
- CONTACT Software: Supplies the foundational, open PLM core layer (CONTACT Elements). This provides the modular, scalable infrastructure needed to integrate product data across workflows and easily incorporate future AI advancements.
- Siemens: Delivers the digital twin expertise. Their solutions power the AI-enabled automotive design, simulation, and digital validation that accelerate core engineering domains.
By driving the target vision and governance internally, Mercedes-Benz is positioning PLM.AI not just as an IT upgrade, but as the fully integrated, data-driven foundation for all future vehicle programs.
Leadership Comment
“With PLM.AI, we are creating the digital backbone for the future of product development at Mercedes-Benz and bringing new technologies to series maturity up to 30 percent faster. This will make us faster, more connected and more capable of learning. At the same time, we are creating a foundation that connects vehicle development, production and customer experience in a new dimension. Our high standards for quality and safety remain unchanged.”
Jörg Burzer, Member of the Board of Management of Mercedes-Benz Group AG, Chief Technology Officer, Development & Procurement
