This article outlines on-going activities at the RWTH Aachen University aiming at a standardized, modular, extendable and open simulation platform for materials processing. This platform on the one hand facilitates the information exchange between different simulation tools and thus strongly reduces the effort to design/re-design production processes. On the other hand, tracking of simulation results along the entire production chain provides new insights into mechanisms, which cannot be explained on the basis of individual simulations. Respective simulation chains provide e.g. the basis for the determination of materials and component properties, like e.g. distortions, for an improved product quality, for more efficient and more reliable production processes and many further aspects. After a short introduction to the platform concept, actual examples for different test case scenarios will be presented and discussed