The development of complex products, characterized by long lifecycles and deep supply chains, requires enhanced capabilities to assess, in an early design stage, the value of a solution not merely from a requirement fulfillment perspective. The paper proposes a conceptual scenario, described in terms of activities, inputs, outputs, actors and mechanisms, which details how aircraft components can be developed and assessed with a focus on their value contribution at system level. The scenario proposes a set of methodological and technological tools needed to enable value assessment in preliminary design, and has been created and preliminary validated together with major European aerospace manufacturers. The importance of being able to communicate the lifecycle value contribution of design solutions during the development work emerged clearly from the study. In this spirit, an approach to visualize such contribution directly in a 3D CAD model (across a set of value criteria, dimensions and drivers) has been proposed and it is currently under development.