ISO 19650 explained: the parts, the CDE, the EIR and the BEP

What ISO 19650 is

ISO 19650 covers the organisation and digitisation of information about buildings and civil engineering works, including BIM. It does not tell you which software to use or how to model a wall. It describes who asks for information, who produces it, how it is planned, checked, shared and stored, and how it is handed over for operation.

The series grew out of earlier UK specifications, in particular the PAS 1192 series, which it internationalised. Parts 1 and 2 came first, in 2018. Part 6, on health and safety information, followed in 2025 and replaces PAS 1192-6:2018, according to BSI.

The information requirements chain: OIR, AIR, PIR and EIR

ISO 19650 organises requirements in layers. Organizational information requirements (OIR) describe what an organisation needs to know to run its business. Asset information requirements (AIR) describe what it needs about each asset it owns or operates. Project information requirements (PIR) describe what it needs for a given project.

Exchange information requirements (EIR) are the most concrete layer: they state what a delivery team must hand over under a given appointment. On French projects, the BIM brief (cahier des charges BIM) plays a comparable role; our page on the French BIM charter, brief and protocol compares the two vocabularies.

Many EIR items concern what the models must contain: a property on a type of object, a classification, a naming rule. Those items can be written as IDS files and checked automatically, as explained on our page about BIM requirements and IDS.

The common data environment (CDE)

ISO 19650 calls the CDE the agreed source of information for a project or asset. It is not a particular product: it is the combination of a platform and the agreed process for using it.

As NBS explained in 2019, information in a CDE moves through four states: work in progress, shared, published and archived. Moving from one state to the next should go through an agreed approval and authorisation process. Each information container carries a unique identifier and metadata such as its status or suitability, its revision and its classification.

The BEP and the delivery plans

The BIM execution plan (BEP) is the delivery team's answer to the exchange information requirements. ISO 19650-2 distinguishes a pre-appointment BEP, which shows what the team can do, from a post-appointment BEP, which the team then works to.

Delivery is then planned in information delivery plans: a task information delivery plan (TIDP) for each task team, brought together in a master information delivery plan (MIDP) for the whole delivery team.

From the UK BIM Framework to the IMI Framework

In the UK, the UK BIM Framework was launched in October 2019 to support the adoption of ISO 19650. It was developed jointly by the UK BIM Alliance, BSI and the Centre for Digital Built Britain.

It has since been renamed the IMI Framework (Information Management Initiative) and remains a free online resource, according to nima, which has supported it alongside BSI since March 2022. Its guidance is a good place to start before buying the standards themselves.

Where SeveUp App fits

We do not claim that SeveUp App is ISO 19650 compliant, and using it does not make a project compliant. It helps with some of the checks the standard expects around information exchange.

SeveUp App checks each IFC model you upload against IDS files, so you can see whether a delivery carries the information the requirements ask for: see checking BIM requirements with IDS. It keeps every revision of a model, so you can compare what was delivered over time: see managing IFC models. It also lets you raise and follow BIM issues on the elements concerned.

If your client asks for asset data at handover, our page on COBie explains what that format contains.