BOM and CAD-PDM-PLM-ERP Integration Challenges

November 3, 2011

I want to talk about Bill of Material and integration today. The reason why I’m coming to this topic is largely because I have a feeling "integration" will play a significant role in the future of product lifecycle management and enterprise systems in general. Two days ago, I’ve been writing about two approaches "unification" and "integration" in PLM. One of the main reasons why, I think, CAD/PLM companies decided to focus on "unification" is a struggle with integration. Time ago it started from integration between CAD and PDM. Since then, multiple other topics were added to the story of integration between multiple systems. So, one of the objectives companies put in front of them investing into unification was to simplify deployment of integrated systems.

BOM and Integrations

What I learned from multiple integration projects I’ve been involved for the last 10 years? Bill of Materials is the central piece of every integration story. The majority of integration topics are around how to handle BOM during all scenarios. The processes and implementation practices related to Bill of Materials are impacting in a significant way how a company will operate multiple systems (CAD, PDM, PLM, ERP).

Interesting enough, Bill of Material is also a centerpiece of all battles around how manage product data in various forms in multiple systems. It comes in a form of BOM synchronization between systems, definition of multiple BOM views, Product representations and many others. After thinking about possible integration scenarios, I’d like to come with three main challenges that exist in most of the integration projects (in most of the cases regardless on what systems are involved) – BOM Transfer, Item Data Synchronization and Single Bill of Material representation.

Integration Challenges

Challenge 1: BOM Transfer

This is a very complicated topic. Bill of Materials are everywhere. Drawings, CAD Systems, Engineering databases, ERP and Manufacturing systems. Even sales configurations requires a certain representation of BOM. The top waste, people want to eliminate is a need to entering information manually from one system to another system. Therefore, to automate the transfer is No.1 priority for many integration projects. However, it requires mapping of data and a lot of "hand-wiring".

Challenge 2: How to keep Item Data in Sync

Item information (or how ERP-related people saying Item Master) is a second important topic for the integration. In most of the companies, it is originated and maintained by ERP/MRP systems. However, when company is moving more towards cross-functional processes, the need to have item master information replicated and, sometime originated outside of ERP system, is growing.

Challenge 3: Where is my single BOM?

This is of the most challenging topic. Lots of companies are spending tons of time trying to decide how to maintain different flavors of BOMs in multiple systems, how to synchronize it and how to define what is the "ultimate single BOM". Some of the companies are taking a different approach and starting to manage so called "multiple BOM". Time ago, I spent some time discussing these topics. Read the following two blog post I published before: Is it a time for synchronized BOM? and Non-linear BOM perspective. Companies are spending lots of resources trying to find what is the right BOM management strategy. Lots of tools (including customized tools) are focusing on how to maintain bill of materials handling across multiple representations (aka systems).

What is my conclusion? BOM is a centerpiece of everything. You may lose control of 3D drawings’ versions and do everything in 2D. You can maintain change tracking manually. You may decide not to manage requirements. However, in my view, you cannot lose the control of items and bill of materials. As the number of systems involved into this process is growing, the complexity of keeping BOM under control becomes and more complicated. Many companies are avoiding management of Bill of Materials in multiple systems just because of this reason. As, one of my readers mentioned earlier this week – "you rarely can satisfy all your needs with a single system". So, I’m expecting more "integration challenges" in coming years from implementing CAD, PDM, PLM, ERP in various flavors and combinations. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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PLM Think Tank October Top 5

November 2, 2011

The last week snow in Boston was kind of an event. I think, many of New England residents are still sitting without power and the internet. Which made me think about how dependent we are on the internet supply and how few choices we actually have when it comes to the service interruption. Talking about it, I really want to come to the topic which caused lots of discussion among readers of my blog and also CAD/PLM blogosphere – cloud. Navigate to the following link and read about my discussion with Ralf Grabowski about the future of Cloud. Now, let’s move to my traditional top 5 for October.

1 – PLM Definition and ERP Implementation Patterns

Manufacturing clearly wants to optimize product development processes across the enterprise. The single point of truth is leveraging the simplicity of SQL-database experience for the last 20 years. At the same time, centralization and replication of data are complicated and expensive processes. Managing phased implementation creates a set of new problems related to the ability to maintain the data transformation and synchronization within the time.

2 – Aras, SolidWorks and Disruptive PLM Strategies

Aras is clearly playing a role of a disrupter on PLM market. Back in 2007, Aras disrupted PLM first time by introducing Open Source PLM. It looks like Aras is on the way to make a second disruption among large companies using SolidWorks and taking a role of Enovia V6 in a bundle EPDM / EPLM. Enovia clearly has a technological advantage of having unified development forces in their new Dassault facilities in Waltham, MA to develop “best in class” Enovia V6 / SolidWorks EPDM integration. The speed of customer adoption will be a key factor for Aras.

3 – Cloud and Next Generation of BOM

I think, cloud and other web-based solution can introduce many advantages. One of them is to streamline BOM access by members of the team. Think about BOM as a Google spreadsheet and you probably can get excited by how it may change the way you work. However, cloud technologies introduce new challenges (especially in the field of integration) that need to be solved.

4 – CAD, PLM and Visual Reporting

I think, slowly, but surely, CAD and PLM vendors are starting to understand the value of the ability to present data reports and visualize them nicely. It recognized by many vendors (and just brought examples of Siemens PLM, Dassault Systems and Autodesk). In my view, we are going to see more examples of how reporting capabilities can increase the value of products and make it more usable.

5- PDM Cartoons, Marketing and Unsolved Problems

Few weeks ago, I’ve been interviewed during Autodesk Forum in Moscow. The conversation was about social networks and the question I’ve been asked was – What is next after “Like”? For the sake of the story, my answer was “+”. However, let me shift gears a bit. Thinking about PDM Cartoons I came to the question – “What is next after PLM?”. I found many things marketed as “PLM” functionality presented in these PDM cartoons. Does it mean “PDM” will be the next step after “PLM”. Who knows… The only thing is clear to me – lots of problems in manufacturing organizations cannot be solved by application of yet another “power point deck”. It is time to think what software can do so. The complexity is not in favor these days. Companies are trying to find a different way to solve existing problems.

Best, Oleg

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ERP vs. PLM: More Competition in The Future?

August 11, 2011

Finally, my vacation over and Beyond PLM is back to normal. While screening materials, the following title caught my attention: ERP vs. PLM: What’s the difference? WhichPLM? is sharing a free copy of BMS whitepaper with this catching topic. A relatively short publication (7 pages including the cover and contact page) will take you to the explanation about what is ERP and what is PLM with examples about roles of these systems. Navigate to the following link, download the document. The whitepaper was available at the time I visited it without any registration. Have a read and make your opinion. In the beginning, the white paper quote Tom Shoemaker (PTC VP Marketing) by saying:

PLM is to your intellectual property, what ERP is to your physical property. In other words, PLM focuses on the planning before you commit to making a product, and ERP take over from there. Both systems, however, often require customization and their functions could overlap from one company to the next. For instance, some PLM platforms have been expanded both upstream and downstream, thus taking overlap. Some functions formerly thought to be the domain of ERP.

However, the following passage is the most remarkable, in my view:

The type and brand of data management software that you use will determine how PLM and ERP function. Some will allow for extensive integration between the two, other systems may be able to perform all necessary functions on their own without integration. Some systems are customizable and scalable, others are “out of the box.” How Your company implements these systems also determines, to a large degree, how they will operate.

The discussion about differences between PLM and ERP in this white paper reminded me one of my old posts from the last year – PLM vs. ER: Weird or Different? Even so, I discussed few very specific differentiations, in my view, it becomes less relevant in a business word. Companies are making their choices on what system will dominate (PLM or ERP) based on the multiple set of criteria. The choice of the implementer as well as broad IT platform becomes more and more important. At the same time, implementation of both ERP and PLM system can skyrocket the overall investment in the implementation.

What is my conclusion? I think we are going to face an increased competition between ERP and PLM vendors in a near future. The overlap between these two domains becomes more and more obvious. With the increased business objectives, PLM companies and stepping into the ERP territory in the spaces related to business aspects of PLM. At the same time, ERP companies are increasing their ability to handle and maintain engineering and product design data, which will put under a big question mark the potential implementation of PLM. Just my thoughts… What is your take on this? I’m interested in your opinion.

Best, Oleg

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PDM vs. PLM: Implementation Gaps

July 6, 2011

One of the topics that people often ask is what is the difference between PDM and PLM. The question is almost rhetoric, since the number of explanation is +1 from the number of people involved into the discussion. I stumble on the following article in the FISHER/UNITEC blog – PDM or PLM: Top Down or Bottom Up. There are two important point that caught my attention. First point was about the gap between the product design (CAD) and the layer of managing financials, material requirements and manufacturing planning (ERP). Here is my favorite passage, which clearly position the problem:

Most will agree that the gap between CAD and ERP is too great to ignore the value proposition of the two “middle layers”. However, which should be selected and in what order: PDM or PLM? Additionally, can a typical manufacturer select just one or the other?

CAD Data Management

Wide adoption of CAD system created a crappy problem – what to do with all CAD files and other information CAD systems produce? People are not good in the organization of their data, in general. Engineers are interesting in how to create product design, but not much interesting in how to organize and manage the results. So, CAD Data Management was born. It called TDM, EDM and lately PDM (Product Data Management). As mentioned in Fisher/Unitech blog, many years of CAD data management implementation made it almost perfect:

The PDM solutions marketed today offer near-perfect CAD integrations, because they are typically developed by the CAD vendors themselves and come with a guarantee that new releases of CAD will be supported by them. Additionally, the many complex features of a 3D parametric CAD system are supported by the PDM system available from the same developer. As an example, SolidWorks Enterprise PDM offers simply the very best CAD integration to SolidWorks available on the market.

However, as soon as functional requirements are going beyond simple CAD file management or going beyond support of a single CAD system / environment, the implementation becomes crappy. PDM is a crappy solution for a crappy problem created by CAD.

Product Development and PLM Implementation Gap

Despite well defined, development of systems that support product development from various standpoints wasn’t so straightforward. For many years, ERP was the only system that was visible on the organizational level to manage processes, materials and production. Engineering was considered as a "black box" that needs to be self managed. Engineering supposed to through the results of their work over the wall to manufacturing and execution. The efficiency of this organization was sufficient probably 15 years ago. However, nowadays it is not so anymore. Global development, competition, cost management and many other factors raised need to create more transparency in product development management.

So, the value proposition of PLM became obvious. Now, PLM implementation became the issue. The PLM implementations are complicated, requires lots of service work and corporate involvement. In the real world, only very big companies can handle it. In order to take PLM implementation to mainstream, software vendors created so called "best practices" or "out of the box solutions". It was good for marketing. The reality check didn’t show as a success, in my view. Most of the "out of the box" PLM implementations are not going beyond CAD file management.

Another problem of PLM implementation is CAD file management. In most of the organization, PLM implementation has to deal with multiple CAD (and sometime PDM) systems. Quoting the same blog:

Conversely, PLM systems today provide application support for managing product data and it’s metadata. Applications like engineering BOM management, configuration management, portfolio management, quality management, project management and supply chain management are available and native functions of a PLM solution today. However, because of the many 3D parametric CAD brands on the market, the PLM software developers and resulting systems do not normally have robust CAD data management capabilities that are always in step with current releases and design features, as noted above.

What is my conclusion? I can clearly see the gap between an organizational need to have a robust and scalable system to support product development (let’s call it PLM to be consistent with industry terminology) and maturing of PLM and PDM implementation. For me, bottom up approach makes more sense. People are trying to stay away from complexity these days. The next generation of PDM/PLM will need to take it as an axiom for a future success. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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Design To Manufacturing Process: Bumpy Road?

June 12, 2011

Integration between design and manufacturing is one of the topics that normally hits a lot of discussion in the product development and PLM space. To support this process becomes more and more important in a modern enterprise manufacturing organization. You can ask me why? Let me put is simple – this is one of the most important processes that can drive cost optimization in the companies. Everything a company is making need to be first designed and later manufacturing. If it breaks – nothing can help.

Design to Manufacturing Connection

One of the numbers that always amazed me is what percentage of product cost is defined actually early in the design process. Do you want to guess this number? Well, it is around 70%. I think, this is an amazing number. At the same time, the initial cost planning is something that poorly can be done without getting information about manufacturing, supply and other related elements. Efficient transferring of the information between a design system (CAD, PLM) and manufacturing system (MRP/ERP) is an important element of streamlining of manufacturing processes.

Integration Challenges

Despite the high importance of the integration between design and manufacturing, the reality of many companies shows that few of them can show successfully implemented integrations. There are several reasons for that. The top three, in my view, are as following: 1/ high diversity of engineering and manufacturing processes; 2/dependencies on CAD, PLM, ERP and other home grown systems; and 3/ significant cost of implementation and changes. Each vendor develops his own strategies and relies on multiple technologies and partners to deliver that.

Design to Manufacturing Integration Examples

To illustrate the need and the level of complexity, I decided to pull together few videos that present some elements of integration solutions. The first one is the integration solution between Autodesk Inventor and SAP. The solution developed by Autodesk partner – CIDEON Software.

The next one is the solution developed by CORDYS, Holland based company, which focuses on the development of business process management middleware and tools. What is interesting in this solution is complete Independence of CORDYS from both software vendors manufacturing solution CORDYS integrates.

The following video presents TeamCenter 8 integration with Microsoft Dynamics AX developed by Microsoft’s partner To-Increase. This is another example of "a process like" integration between two packages – engineering and manufacturing.

The last examples show a different approach of integration. Dassault 3DLive solution is providing an interesting approach to access manufacturing information from ERP and other systems via the native 3DLive user interface.

What is my conclusion? The space of design to the manufacturing solution is complex and not covered well, in my view. The demand from customers is significant and the same time the requirements are complicated and solution in a most situation needs to be tailored for every customer. Most of the software vendors are talking about design to manufacturing processes and, at the same time, moving integration to partners, service providers and 3rd parties. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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Revisions in CAD/PLM/ERP: Old Problems or New Challenges?

June 7, 2011

I want to talk about the topic, which is actually is not very new – revisions. I was reading Autodesk Manufacturing Community blog – Vault 2012 Revision Block Integration. It made me think about the problem of revision in engineering software, how different software engineering and manufacturing disciplines solve it.

Revisions in CAD

The support of revisions in CAD has a long history. From the early beginning of CAD systems, engineers had a need to maintain revisions and changes in drawings and later in 3D CAD models. Because of CAD reliance on the file system, revisions where originally considered as something that “file system” can do. As a result of CAD files’ complexity, it wasn’t as simple as managing of Word file revisions. Companies were developed multiple strategies how to manage CAD file revisions. At the same time, revision must be part of every released drawing. Because of this need, CAD systems started to provide the support for automatic reflecting of revisions (and revision history) inside of CAD files and drawings. You can take a look on the How to make a Custom Revision Table? blog article to get an example of advanced revision reflection in SolidWorks. Other CAD systems can do a similar job from the conceptual standpoint. However, revisions are complicated. To handle them right manually is not a simple job. You can see the following SolidSmack Blog – How To Kill All Previous Revisions on a SolidWorks Drawing? as a good example of problems customers are facing on a daily basis. The last (and not only) led companies to develop advanced tools to manage revisions. It was the beginning of PDM.

Revisions in PDM / PLM

At the time PDM system started it was about a “vault” and “revisions”. The idea of documents (CAD) control was dominant. To put CAD files into the electronic vault (so called EDM, TDM or PDM) was a simple task, in my view. However, it raised few problems very fast – 1/not everybody in an organization can/want to use these DM technologies; 2/the output drawings (2D and printed in many cases even today) need to contain the information about revisions. Even if industry of PDM systems passed last 20 years of evolution, it is still about to solve revision/drawing update problem. You can take a look on two videos from Autodesk and SolidWorks presenting the same challenges and scenarios.

In parallel, the evolution of PDM into PLM raised the new set of problems. Product Lifecycle Management introduces an additional set of information. In addition to Documents, you are management Parts and Part lifecycle almost in 100% of PLM implementations. The problem now becomes not only how to find a right revision of CAD assembly, but also to find relevant revisions of Parts/Items. At the same time, Parts lifecycle is completely different from Document revision management. Connection between them creates another set of challenges for every company- how to relate a right drawing version to the right Part Number and how to manage these relations.

Revisions in ERP

ERP systems have a different pattern of the data and revision modeling. ERP is not actually managing versions. The fundamental difference is that ERP is managing “effectivities”. Revision is not something that makes a lot difference to ERP, except one small elements – ERP system needs to have a reference to a relevant version of document/drawing with the right information inside of drawing. It creates another set of challenges. The following videos present examples of integration between CAD/PDM to the ERP.

What is my conclusion? In my view, after all years of CAD/PDM/PLM, the issue of “revision” is still unsolved. Why do I think so? It is because the simple question like “where is my last revision?” or the question like “Where is the up-to-date document, which belongs to the product X?” are still not answered in many companies. Each system in the whole engineering and manufacturing software world has sort of a revision / version notion. However, the new challenge is probably the interplay of revision in different systems. It doesn’t really happen and PLM systems don’t seem to have a reliable solution these days. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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PLM: Work-in-progress vs. System of Records?

June 6, 2011

Recently, I’ve been in a very interesting conversation with one of my industry buddies. It was about a role PDM and PLM systems are playing today manufacturing organizations. To summarize our discussion in few sentences, it was sounded like that: all data management systems (PDM, PLM, ERP) are used as a system of records. People keep in PDM/PLM/ERP information about released products. However, people never used these systems as Work-in-Progress systems. I read a AIIM blog post – Is it ever okay to copy "final" documents to a separate system? I learned that problem of system split is not unique in PLM world. Here is my favorite passage from there:

Both organizations have mature ECM implementations and in both cases have had their ECM programs in place for more than a decade. The original mandate of their programs was to manage all information through its entire lifecycle, following AIIM’s advice to capture, store, manage, deliver and preserve all unstructured content.

But a funny thing happened on the way to ECM nirvana. Both organizations decided to pursue a "parallel" strategy; one system for collaboration and work-in-progress documents and one for "official records" or final versions (often copies) of documents that have completed the collaboration cycle (and yes, the rise of SharePoint plays a part in this decision, but that’s a discussion for another day).

It made me think about relationships between work-in-progress and released documents a bit more.

Vaulting and System of Record

In the early beginning, PDM/PLM started as vaulting systems for CAD. The straightforward need was to "vault" all revisions of design (CAD files and others) and maintain their changes. The main objective was to manage traceability of design decisions. The original ideas, strated as CALS (Continues Acquisition and Lifecycle Support) and Configuration Management (MIL-973 and EIA-649) explored to what we know today about PLM. The notion of WIP (work-in-progress) vs. Formal Control was all the time there. In my view, it developed a notion of "system of records". In parallel, the role early PDM/PLM tools played in the organization and their relationships with ERP also favored ERP as a final system of record that disconnected from engineering and R&D in every manufacturing organization.

Design Collaboration

At the same time, CAD vendors continuously developed the tied connection of CAD and PLM tools. This connectivity helped to establish more efficient engineering work and helped engineers to collaborate online. This collaboration tool helped engineers, but becomes complicated and made designers and engineering life really complex. So, justification of the deployment of these tools created a stigma of complicated and expensive PLM environment. However, when established, these systems helped to make engineering information available across the organization and improved the way company worked with engineering and product information.

Downstream Problem – what is the right tehnology?

One of the most complicated problems in manufacturing organization related to engineering, and product development is the availability of information downstream. It initially defined as 3D information availability, this problem is much broader and related to many other aspects of engineering information. Recently, CAD/PLM vendors recognized the problem. Examples of investment in this space are Dassault acquisition of Seemage and 3DVIA Composer product, Autodesk Inventor Publisher release earlier this year. You may be also interested to watch what Lattice Technology is doing in this space. They pioneered the idea of lightweight 3D format’s proliferation. At the same time, the problem is unsolved and lots of engineering information is still not available and not connected downstream in manufacturing organization.

What is my conclusion? In my view, the time when you can split the problem into the two independent problem is over. Last 10 years we split work-in-progress problems with the system of record problems. Engineering was throwing released engineering information to manufacturing and were fighting tons of ECOs. It is still happening. To develop a new way to work is probably the next challenge. What is your take? Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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PLM+ERP: Outside of Equations?

November 23, 2010

I’ve been watching a recorded webinar with a fascinating name: PLM+ERP = Manufacturing Success. The tweet about this webinar caught my attention. Navigate your browser to the following link to get an access to the recording. You need to register. I registered my blog as a media company. In addition, I failed to run webinar videoe in both Safari and Chrome on my MacBook. FireFox was okay. Later, I’ve seen that video streaming is using SilverLight plug-ins, which made me think about Silverlight portability and future Microsoft strategy with HTML5.

PTC+Microsoft: Webinar

This webinar is organized by PTC and Microsoft and help of IBIS, Microsoft partner. You will have an intensive and deep set of information about what PTC, Microsoft Dynamics and IBIS. There is a mix of sale, marketing and user. The most valuable, in my view, is the last part where you can see a demo of scenario with involvement of both systems – Windchill and AX. I put few slides below that did catch my attention.

PLM+ERP

I remember this formula for the last 10 years. The combination of PLM and ERP systems working together was a permanent challenge for mid-size and bigger companies that were thinking about how to streamline processes in the organization. If you will follow slides and webinar video, you will see all logical steps by organizing processes and data flow between PLM and ERP systems. The complication of organizing the process is high. It would be interesting to understand the effort needed to organize such integration. This is a key question, in my view.

Wrong Equation?

The webinar and demo made me think about how to streamline processes in the organization. The traditional and very often used way to solve the PLM+ERP equation is to make data flow between systems. It requires a significant amount of work in organizing these processes. Hard-wiring of data, connecting events, sending messages, screening exchange logs. Systems are working according to its own rules. Push/Pull of data is complicated. The overall system is very sensitive to changes and requires baby-sitting. The system can function. However, significant resources need to be spent to keep it up-and-running.

What is my conclusion? One of the fundamental principles behind PLM+ERP equation is an event driven process push. Many manufacturing companies and software vendors got into this for the last 10-15 years. It was an obvious way to solve PLM+ERP equation. It makes systems dependent and costly to manage. One of the fundamental ideas that may improve it is to get out of this equation. The name of the idea is "Pull". Pull can make systems independent and much easy managed. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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Will ERP Take a Lead in PLM Redefinition?

September 14, 2010

I had a chance to read an article by Michael Fauscette “Workday takes the Gloves Off?“. I’m tracking Workday for last 3-4 years. The trajectory is very interesting. For those of you who don’t know, Workday is the outfit created with a significant influence of ex-PeopleSoft people lead by Dave Duffield, the founder of PeopleSoft. Take the time and have a look on Michael’s article as well as interview with Dave Duffield about why he founded Workday. My favorite passage is the following:

Q: What’s missing in the marketplace?
Dave: Before the software-as-a-service model started gaining momentum, I felt like the industry had lost a passion for innovation and a focus on the customer. We’re focusing on both to help breathe new life into this business.

Similar message is coming from Michael write-up:

Workday’s vision is to redefine ERP software not only from a business / delivery model prospective (SaaS / cloud) but also from the focus on usability and modern design. Business is becoming people-centric (people as the platform) and workday is approaching its software from that basic design premise, a very powerful concept. Software and technology, in particular ERP have gone through a few phases; the mainframe, then the shift to client server, the emergence of the Internet and the subsequent advance of the social web, the rise of mobile computing and global hyper-connectivity. Many of the enterprise systems in use today are still based on designs and technology from a previous phase, and the user experience is quite dated. Workday claims to be the only modern ERP system in the last decade, and while it’s a little more marketing than actual fact, it does make one think.

Another interesting information came out of the following slide presenting ERP technological evolution. Take a look on the picture below. You can see a clear simplification on the side of the system stack. A “business logic” and separate RDBMS storage for years were a strong part in every enterprise architecture diagram. Now it replaced by data+logic and persistent storage.

It made me think about some interesting parallels with PLM world:

User Interface Simplification

Complexity of user interface is one of the most problematic points in PDM/PLM software. Over the past few years I’ve seen some movements towards new concepts of UI experience. PLM vendors are trying to move to 3D-like visual interfaces and create a simple UI paradigm. Another option is definitely presented by software like SharePoint and it drives another user interface simplification. It still not clear what will be the winning combination for PLM

Internet Architecture Allignment

The overall influence of internet software architecture becomes significant. In my view, we are going to see more examples of usage different elements of internet architecture in enterprise applications. Such things like noSQL and other will drive future innovation in this space.

Openness

Enterprise software will have to make a significant shift towards openness. Usage of open standards, open source, meta-data driven development will shift systems to become more open and will reduce a barrier of system integrations.

What is my conclusion? It is interesting to see how ERP becomes a pace where innovation happens again. ERP was often used by PLM vendors as a reference for a very complex place. It seems to me ERP learning the lesson. PLM vendors need to learn it too. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg
Freebie. Workday didn’t pay me to write this post.

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The Ugly Truth About PLM-ERP Monkey Volleyball

March 5, 2010

I had the chance to read Jim Brown’s post about SAP achievements in PLM. As usual, when PLM and ERP words come to the interplay, a very good discussion can be generated. And this is what I’ve seen this morning. I enjoyed discussion and very interesting comments. Take a look, first and read that. The discussion became hot and separate post was done by Vuuch Voice this morning -PLM Is The Monkey In The Middle.

These posts made me think about what is the fundamental nature of the discussion about PLM and ERP. I see this discussion as a natural part of the overall system development in the organization. Since early beginning of MRP and MRP-II, systems started to accumulate product data in the electronic form. So, data moved from spreadsheets to databases and Excel  spreadsheets. In parallel, design data started to move from paper to CAD and other design systems. Since then, all engineering and manufacturing systems are managing the very interesting interplay on where is data located and how you move this data from one place to another. Now what means this movement? This is something everybody present as a ‘ business process’. Yes, processes are the blood movement in the organizational body. However, the blood cells are actually pieces of data that processes moves around.

The ugly truth is that everybody wants to own the piece of cheesy product data! ERP, PLM, PDM, CAD… Everybody pretends on the part of the product data, but mostly interested how to control it. Everybody in this volleyball game is trying to catch the ball and steer it to their side. ERP is saying Item Master belongs to me! Every time you want to do something, ask me. CAD and CAD-based PLM pretends to be the best in managing product design, configuration and revisions. ERP vendors are trying to steer Bill of Materials by managing overall ECO process. Social software is trying to steer the ball, by saying let’s organize Facebook of design files. Before that time PDM was trying to organize dashboards of data. In parallel, social product development is trying to put data inside of SharePoint… There is an endless number of examples I can bring…

So, what is my conclusion today? There is nothing new in this enterprise data life, but attempt to control data and accumulate data-tolls from enterprise processes’ toll-road. If you are good in organizing this toll-road, the ride won’t be bumpy and data arrives easy and customers will love it. Some of the tolls are mandatory. Try not to pay for CAD system or accounting, for example… It seems to me PLM road is a bit more bumpy in comparison to the ERP one.

Just my thoughts…
Best, Oleg

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