The disclosure generally describes methods, software, and systems, including a method for using an object definition from which object documents are instantiated defining real-world variants of a physical object and including a meta-model identifying nodes, fields, and associations with other object definitions. The object definition includes, at instantiation of a given object document marking an existence of the physical object, an object identifier node, including an object identifier, and at least one variant type node, including a variant type identifier identifying the real-world variant of the physical object and including variant extension nodes and fields extending the object definition to a variant object definition. For each variant type node, process variant configuration information is received that models real-world processes for the real-world variant of the physical object, including process and data interactions between the real-world variant of the physical object and the other physical objects.