Modern Systems Engineering, Without the Overhead
We believe systems engineering should connect intent, design, and verification — without the chaos of documents and spreadsheets, and without the weight of enterprise MBSE.
From Idea to Reality: The Lifecycle Every Product Follows
Take something simple — a garden swing. The same flow applies to a medical device, a robot, or a control system.
It gets specified
Someone writes down what the swing must do: hold up to 100 kg, fit in a 2 m space, be safe for kids, last outdoors for years. Requirements.
It gets designed
Structure, materials, dimensions: the frame, the seat, the ropes or chains, the fixings. How the parts connect and what they rely on. Architecture and design.
It gets built
Manufacturing, assembly, integration. The thing takes shape.
It gets verified
Tests and checks: does it hold 100 kg? Is it safe? Does it match the spec? Verification ties back to the original requirements.
That flow — specify → design → build → verify — is systems engineering. The trouble starts when requirements live in one document, design in another, and test results somewhere else. Change a requirement and nobody knows which design elements or tests are affected. The links are in people’s heads, or in a spreadsheet that nobody keeps up to date. We want that lifecycle connected — so intent, design, and verification stay traceable and in sync.
What Drives Us
Elan8 aims to be the infrastructure layer for modern systems engineering — connecting intent, design, and verification across disciplines.
We see too many teams stuck between Office-based workflows that don’t scale and enterprise tools that are too heavy. We’re building for the middle: teams that take systems engineering seriously and want traceability, clarity, and control — without the overhead.
Why This Matters
Mid-sized engineering teams face a gap: they need more than spreadsheets and slides, but full-blown MBSE is out of reach. That’s the problem we’re here to address.
Fragmented lifecycle
Requirements in one place, architecture in another, test cases somewhere else. No single source of truth connecting intent, design, and verification.
Manual traceability
Trace matrices maintained by hand. No reliable impact analysis when requirements or design change. Who’s affected? You find out the hard way.
Audit stress
Compliance evidence collected retroactively. High overhead for CE, ISO, IEC and similar processes. Documentation and reality drift apart.
Heavy MBSE barrier
Enterprise tools are expensive, complex to implement, and need dedicated administrators. Too much for many mid-sized teams.
We’re building to close that gap: lightweight enough for mid-sized teams, powerful enough for compliance.
What We’re Building
We’re building SEP — a Systems Engineering Platform that connects requirements, architecture, and verification in one place. Plain text, Git-native, no lock-in. For the details on how it works, see our product page.
See our productsWant to Learn More?
Use the contact form to get in touch. We’re happy to answer questions about what we’re building or how we can help your team.