You are currently browsing the category archive for the ‘PLM’ category.
This week I visited a company, which was very successful in what they were doing with their products – actually everyone is running to keep up the demand from their customers. I have seen this typical situation all around the world. People are too busy to implement new and more efficient ways of working (introducing PLM in the cases where I am involved) and hanging to their old ways of working. Companies went through their first (and second) ERP implementation and this became the dominant system where everyone has to connect to, trying to avoid another maybe painful implementation.
Implementing PLM requires a different vision; it is not just connecting the CAD documents through a PDM system with ERP. It means that you need to start to think about company-wide processes, not optimization of a department. The biggest discussion often is around who owns the creation of an item number and its status. Companies have invested in the past in all kind of complex numbering systems to identify items by its number (as there was no IT system to support that). Then the ERP system became the source for item definition although the initial creation was done by engineers.
It is clear there is a change needed in the way companies connect their engineering environment with their production environment. Doing it the old way still requires many flExcels (as Excel is the most flexible tool to pass information) and people chasing, modifying and checking Excels before entering them in the ERP system.
ERP vendors tried to avoid this change by extending their systems with PLM functionality. As PLM and ERP are two complete different disciplines, would you go to a construction company to have your new house designed or would you hire an architect first.
Of course, ERP systems can become familiar with PLM, but if it is not your key activity, you will never get the 100 % feeling for it. For example, the company I visited tried to implement BlueStar, as this was a direct linked PLM system on top of Axapta. The reason the implementation failed was not a technical issue although there were some performance issues. Nevertheless, it is not hard to write the data in the right table even with some delay, but aligning the world of PLM and ERP together was the problem. Engineering works with revisions (major / minor) they work with statuses, which are not known in the ERP world.
Conclusion:
Let PLM systems do what they are design for and implement them through PLM specialists. Next, connect the PLM and ERP system for a streamlined company wide process. Look for the basics at the ENIAC SmarTeam Engineering Express.
In one of my next posts, I will address PLM-ERP integration best practices, but now I am going to pack my suitcase in order to be in Munich for an exciting ENOVIA Customer Conference
The connection between PLM systems and ERP systems has kept many companies busy for many years. As both systems manage items in their system, all kind of battles are fought on ownership, redundancy of data and more. Last week I was involved in four different cases, which demonstrates this topic is very actual, and as most of the companies involved were in the mid-market, it shows also these companies are no in the phase of implementing and extending PLM within the organization.
In the first case, which I will comment here, it was a big enterprise using ENOVIA SmarTeam and SAP. As SAP has their own PLM module, the initial push was of course to use SAP all over, however the company considered the SAP PLM module not powerful and flexible enough for their engineering environment. For that reason the battle around the items and mainly the BOM for Manufacturing started.
The manufacturing BOM is usually the start point for production and the source for the ERP system to start production (and planning). For that reason, ERP systems claim ownership for this BOM, although the definition of the BOM is all based on engineering information within the PLM system. As ERP systems are already established for many years, companies are familiar with defining the manufacturing BOM in their system, often a labor-intensive job as data needs to be collected from the engineering department, often in the form of spreadsheets.
PLM systems are designed to manage the manufacturing BOM , connecting all information within the system. This requires however, a change in the way people and a company is working. Engineers have more responsibility to enter complete data – there is no one to review and complete the data afterwards and combined with the lack of flexibility that people had before with Excel this lead to a cultural refusal from the floor.
If the management realizes that managing the manufacturing BOM in the PLM system will lead to less errors, a shorter time to production and less labor cost, they will push this approach top-down. This happened in many big PLM centric enterprises. In smaller companies, this value is not visible for the management as often users, the IT department or the ERP team will pinpoint that the PLM system does not suit their needs, as it requires a change in working (their best practices).
Culture change will only come in the mid-market when PLM concepts become a commodity for companies too. The change will come, driven by ENOVIA SmarTeam with their mid market solutions. But we all know changes take time.
I will talk in my next posts in more details on PLM-ERP issues. FYI the customer mentioned in the beginning decided to keep the manufacturing BOM definition in SAP as this is what they understood and people decided not to take the risk with PLM.
Culture change takes time ….
Virtual Dutchman
Why Virtual ? This is my first post and in the future, I will update you about my experiences in the world of PLM. Those of you not familiar with PLM I suggest searching for the definition on the web and you will find many almost similar definitions – a neutral one you can find on Wikipedia. The main goal behind PLM is that by managing all steps of the product lifecycle from concept through development until even destruction, the company will be able to optimize and integrate all steps and information. This combined with best practices on how to develop, release and benefit from customer feedback will lead to higher revenues and a more competitive position for such a company.
Most of the PLM software companies provide their solutions around a 3D CAD system, as the 3D CAD model is the understandable representation of a product. Here we see the virtual products and with analysis and simulation software we can test these products even before they are produced. Mobile phones undergo virtual crash tests; cars crash virtually and as I learned, even diapers are tested virtually.
Some PLM companies like Dassault Systèmes and Siemens UGS go even beyond the 3D CAD and integrate the whole manufacturing process initially through software to provide a virtual production process. This allows companies to fix (virtual) errors in the production process and the prototype even before a single product is manufactured in the real world. The time and costs savings of this virtualization allow companies to respond faster and better than their competitors. This change to define a complete virtual product and production process is costly and only affordable by the big enterprise but for sure this trend will continue.
With the introduction of PLM 2.0 Dassault Systèmes even introduced another extension to PLM, the involvement of the customer, experiencing the virtual product before it even exists. The 2.0 version is a reference to WEB 2.0 bringing WEB content to be influenced by the consumer. In the same analogy PLM 2.0 brings the world of product design to be influenced immediately by the customer, wherein the past customers only could review and select from existing products.
Look at the See What You Mean movie.
A virtual world seems to be a future trend, with possible virtual consumers. Currently the trend to virtualization can be compared with teenage sex; they all talk about but …….
As a Dutchman working in the real world, I am targeting to become a virtual Dutchman. This allows me to experience things I have never done and dared before. But before reaching this goal I will entertain you with my observations around PLM and look forward to real discussions.
Jos Voskuil's Weblog 
[…] (The following post from PLM Green Global Alliance cofounder Jos Voskuil first appeared in his European PLM-focused blog HERE.) […]
[…] recent discussions in the PLM ecosystem, including PSC Transition Technologies (EcoPLM), CIMPA PLM services (LCA), and the Design for…
Jos, all interesting and relevant. There are additional elements to be mentioned and Ontologies seem to be one of the…
Jos, as usual, you've provided a buffet of "food for thought". Where do you see AI being trained by a…
Hi Jos. Thanks for getting back to posting! Is is an interesting and ongoing struggle, federation vs one vendor approach.…