Beyond the PDF: Accuris Taps ASTM Veterans for AI Standards Push

DENVER, CO – October 21, 2026 — The physical world that surrounds us—from the fiber-optic cables buried beneath our streets to the autonomous grids powering our cities—is held together by an invisible web of rules. These rules, known as engineering standards, dictate the safety, interoperability, and design of nearly every manufactured component on earth. Yet, for decades, this critical digital backbone has been trapped in a surprisingly antiquated format: the static PDF.

Now, a high-stakes race is underway to liberate this data, transforming it into machine-readable fuel for artificial intelligence and digital twins. In a move that underscores the urgency of this transition, engineering intelligence provider Accuris has announced the appointment of two seasoned veterans from ASTM International, a global leader in standards development.

Effective October 19, Steve Holiday assumes the role of Director of Standards Technology & Strategic Alliances, while Lesley West steps in as Director of Publisher Partnerships & Content Strategy. Both executives bring decades of insider experience to a company that is aggressively positioning itself as the indispensable middleware between traditional standards publishers and the modern, AI-driven engineering tech stack.

Poaching for the Platform Era

The recruitment of Holiday and West is a calculated maneuver in a broader industry chess match. Accuris, which spun out of S&P Global in 2023 following a $975 million acquisition by investment funds managed by KKR, operates at a massive scale. With over 800 employees, the Denver-based company integrates technical standards from more than 1,000 publishing and standards development organizations (SDOs), serving upwards of 900,000 engineers globally.

However, the sheer volume of data is no longer the primary competitive advantage; the utility of that data is. Bridging the gap between traditional standards bodies—which are fiercely protective of their intellectual property—and dynamic digital platforms requires delicate diplomacy.

West, who spent nearly 30 years at ASTM and most recently directed product management for platforms like ASTM Compass, understands this friction intimately. Her previous work focused heavily on developing tools to pinpoint critical components in normative standards, a precursor to the fully digital workflows Accuris envisions.

“Standards users need more structured, connected and actionable information, and standards publishers recognize this and are committing to working and publishing in new ways,” said West. “Passionate about this, I have spent much of my career helping advance that transition. I chose to join Accuris now, because its combination of authoritative content partnerships, multi-publisher breadth and workflow technology creates an extraordinary opportunity to work more closely with the publishers and make standards more valuable within the day-to-day work of engineers.”

The sentiment is echoed across the executive suite. As Claude Pumilia, CEO of Accuris, noted, “Engineering teams do not work with one publisher, one document type or one system. They need authoritative knowledge connected across the full context of their work - from requirements and design through supply chain, production and compliance. Steve and Lesley understand both the standards ecosystem and the people who depend on it.”

The High-Stakes Push for AI Training Data

The most pressing challenge facing the engineering intelligence sector is not technological, but legal. The industry is rapidly moving toward “Smart Standards”—a joint initiative by organizations like ISO and IEC to make standard content fully digital and usable by intelligent devices without manual human interpretation.

The ultimate goal is to structure standards content so that it is Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR). But as generative AI models become increasingly embedded in engineering workflows, a complex intellectual property dilemma emerges. How do software platforms ingest and train AI on copyrighted engineering standards without infringing on the revenue models of the publishers who create them?

This is where Holiday’s nearly 40 years of experience in standards solutions and enterprise implementation becomes critical. Prior to his decade-long tenure at ASTM, Holiday held senior product-development roles at IHS, Accuris’s predecessor, where he focused on bringing multi-source technical information into enterprise workflows.

“What attracted me to Accuris is its understanding that customers need more than another destination for finding documents,” said Holiday. “They need trusted information from across the standards ecosystem connected with their own systems, people and decisions. Accuris has the content relationships, technology and customer reach to deliver that connected experience at enterprise scale.”

To navigate the copyright minefield, companies like Accuris are investing heavily in structured content delivery—such as XML and JSON-LD formats—and developing approved AI capabilities that preserve attribution and integrity. This requires negotiating novel licensing models with SDOs that permit the use of structured data for AI applications while maintaining granular control over how that data is monetized. By hiring industry insiders who speak the language of SDOs, Accuris is signaling to publishers that it intends to be a partner in this transition, rather than a disruptive threat.

Consolidation and the Race for the Tech Stack

The dual appointments arrive at a moment of intense consolidation and modernization within the engineering software ecosystem. Accuris is not alone in its ambitions. Competitors like Techstreet (owned by ASME's for-profit subsidiary ISIE) and SAI Global (now part of Intertek Inform) are also vying for dominance in the compliance and standards data market.

Simultaneously, native Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) and Computer-Aided Design (CAD) vendors—such as Siemens, PTC, and IBM—are increasingly seeking to integrate standards data directly into their design environments to ensure real-time compliance during the manufacturing process.

The market is shifting toward comprehensive "software engineering intelligence platforms" (SEIPs) that provide deep visibility into team activities and value delivery. To remain relevant, data providers must evolve from being mere repositories to becoming active, intelligent participants in the digital thread that connects product design, supply chain logistics, and regulatory compliance.

“Steve and Lesley bring complementary expertise that will help us translate changes in technology, customer workflows and the standards ecosystem into meaningful product opportunities,” said Duane Newman, Head of Product at Accuris. “Together, they will help us incorporate more input from the publishers, deliver more value to customers, and expand the reach and application of authoritative standards content.”

As the infrastructure of the future grows increasingly autonomous and interconnected, the underlying codes governing its construction must follow suit. The transition of engineering standards from static pages to intelligent, AI-integrated data streams is no longer just a theoretical exercise; it is an operational necessity. With the strategic acquisition of top-tier talent from the very organizations that write these rules, platforms like Accuris are aggressively laying the digital groundwork required to keep the modern world moving safely forward.