Planning processes in the automotive industry and in the building industry have developed separately over the span of decades, leading to a big difference in terms of software, workflows and degree of digitalization nowadays. These differences make a cross-industry collaboration difficult. However, this collaboration is necessary when planning production sites for the automotive industry, since knowledge about the buildings is required to adapt the production lines to the existing built environment. In the building industry, the digitalization is tied to Building Information Modeling (BIM) and the use of the ISO-certified standard Industry Foundation Classes (IFC). While IFC is essential for the data exchange in the building industry, its domain-specific design limits the collaboration with other industries. Data exchange approaches that require either industry to change its workflow are unlikely to succeed on a large scale, as both industries are deeply entrenched in their established practices. To close the existing gap between the two industries, the process “Ifc2CoLab” was developed as part of the research project “Collaboration for Digital Twin”. This process prepares IFC files for use in the automotive industry by organizing and transforming the model data to ensure compatibility and facilitate seamless integration into existing workflows. The proposed process, which was validated with multiple IFC models, enables the integration of diverse digital 3D models and thereby establishes a foundation for cross-industry collaboration.