1) VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, P. O. Box 1000, FI‐02044 VTT, Finland 2) Aalto University, School of Science and Technology, Department of Applied Physics, P.O. Box 4100, FI‐02015 TKK, Espoo, Finland 3) Department of Physics, P.O. Box 64, 000014 University of Helsinki, Finland 4) Department of Physics, Tampere University of Technology, P.O. Box 692, FI‐33101 Tampere, Finland 5) FPInnovations, Pointe‐Claire, 570 St‐Jean Blvd., H9R 3J9, Québec, Canada Cellulose nanofibers show a great potential in expanding the use of sustainable raw materials in forest products industry. They will allow paper and board products to be produced with much lower consumption of raw materials, water and energy. They can also be used to develop completely new fiber‐based products with characteristics that cannot be achieved with present‐day raw materials. Thus, the operation space for research and development will expand considerably. This will cause a big challenge for the traditional way of development work, which is based almost solely on laboratory experiments, pilot and full‐scale testing. Virtual product modeling offers a way to significantly speed up product development.