PLM, ERP and enterprise cloud race

May 22, 2012

I was reading GIGAOM article Amazon and SAP put All-in-One in the cloud few days ago. According to the article SAP will soon make an appearance on Amazon EC2 cloud. Interesting enough it is connected to the fact almost all software of SAP rival Oracle is already available from the cloud.

Another interesting point is related to the fact Amazon is working to support product customization on the public cloud. It will remove another big barrier for deployment and implementation of enterprise software. Here is a very interesting passage:

The conventional wisdom is that big companies are wary of running ERP and other enterprise applications in a public cloud — because they tend to be quite customized and tied into other applications, which makes them difficult to forklift into the cloud. But Amazon is working to change that perception.

PLM and ERP: cloud race

In the past, CAD / PLM vendors lost the competition of C-level and IT visibility in the organization. PLM was considered as Engineering tools, and it took many years and significant effort to improve this perception (still not accomplish in full, from my standpoint). These days a typical “PLM on the cloud” discussion usually runs in too many questions about cloud PLM viability and security. At the same time, we can see how ERP vendors run their products on Amazon cloud.

PLM and Cloud / IaaS

When Amazon is considered as a definite leader in IaaS race, Aras PLM is thinking differently. During the ACE 2012 conference earlier this month, Aras announced Aras Spectrum – soon to be available on Microsoft Windows Azure platform. You can take a look on my post-ACE conference blog post – Aras PLM, Microsoft Azure and Cloud competition.

Autodesk (new PLM vendor these days) is playing with lots of “cloud toys” in the portfolio. One of the toys is PLM 360 -recently announced “cloud PLM alternative”. It is not clear what IaaS platform is using for their cloud development and deployment, for the moment.

What is my conclusion? Amazon is pushing to the enterprise by supporting major ERP vendors. Autodesk is playing with new cloud offering and probably going to make their IaaS choice later. Microsoft is experimenting with Aras PLM to provide Aras Innovator up and running on Azure Cloud. Dassault, Siemens, PTC… Are you watching?

Best, Oleg

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ERP and “Visual PLM” Weapon

March 13, 2012

PLM space is hyping these days. There are many news floating around about what happens in PLM industries these days. I captured some of the trends in my article PLM Perfect Storm 2012 couple of weeks ago. The picture presented by Gartner, shows two major ERP players laying beyond PLM companies and the rest of providers.

SAP and Oracle are huge software behemoths. Nevertheless, their PLM agendas become more and more interesting these days. Few days ago, I stumbled on the following announcement made by CENIT – CENIT Hands-on SAP PLM 7.02 Workshop. The content is quite interesting. Among regular process management and change management topics, the one that drove my special attention — SAP Visual Enterprise solutions (formerly Right Hemisphere acquired by SAP). Watch the following video. Even if I found it a bit marketing, you can get yourself educated about what route SAP takes in visualization.

Now, what about Oracle? If you remember, few years ago Oracle acquired Cimmetry via the acquisition of Agile Software, which forms so-called AutoVue Enterprise Visualization Solution.

What is my conclusion? I think, ERP vendors are moving towards a more “visual world”. The emerging need is clear – to compete with “big three” PLM vendors that can leverage in full their belonging to CAD and visual world. Will PLM solution from ERP providers become more competitive in the future? With the absence of brand new accounts, ERP-PLM will be going to discover undiscovered industries or compete on existing accounts owned by PTC, Dassault and Siemens PLM. “Visual weapon” will make this fight more interesting. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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Future PLM platforms and SAP / Oracle technological wars

January 26, 2012

All existing PDM / PLM technologies were created 15-20 years ago. I hope I’ve got your attention :) . So, let me speak a bit more about technologies today. Past 10 years of web development for the consumer market created a significant technological foundation that cannot be ignored. Most of the enterprise software in production these days is running on the technologies created at least a decade ago.

Let’s talk first about major 4 PLM providers – Dassault Systems, PTC, Siemens PLM and the platform they use for their flagship PLM products. Enovia from Dassault technological foundation came from MatrixOne acquisition formerMatrixOne/Adra development 15-20 years ago. PTC is using Windchill coming back in 1998 from CV acquisition. Siemens PLM platform – TeamCenter is also coming from acquired and transformed product lines of Metaphase and IMAN.

Thinking about PLM platforms, you cannot avoid and not to speak about long time pure-PLM rivals coming from ERP software – SAP and Oracle. Oracle is leading the way towards full-fledged usage of Oracle Fusion platform. Despite multiple delays and re-orgs, it seems to me the way Oracle is thinking about business application platform for enterprise. Oracle is also leveraging their in-house innovation of database technologies.

I was reading an interesting article by ArnoldIT – SAP: Lemons from Lemonade for Search vendors. The article referencing technology coming from SAP called HANA. According to SAP blog:

HANA is the foundation and the core of all that we do now and going forward for existing products, new products and entirely new frontiers. We are transforming enterprise software with HANA, and we are transforming our entire product portfolio,” Sikka said in a statement earlier this week announcing that SAP HANA is now generally available worldwide. “But HANA is more than a product,” Sikka continued. “It is a new paradigm, an entirely new way to build applications. It is the basis for our own intellectual renewal internally at SAP—where we rethink how we design, build, deploy, service and sell products—and the basis for our customers’ and partners’ intellectual renewal—where we help customers rethink existing business problems and help them solve entirely new challenges using design-thinking.” (Source: The Top 10 Reasons SAP HANA Is Disrupting Larry Ellison’s Grand Plans]

Take a look on a very interesting video about HANA evolution.

Few screenshots I captured from this video (below) clearly shows the technological problem PLM vendors are trying to solve already for many years- creating a scalable business application platform capable of handling the complexity of data needed for product development and manufacturers.

Typical problem of enterprise applications.

The complexity of platforms and solutions today.

HANA way to solve the problem.

What is my conclusion? The complexity of enterprise PLM software is skyrocketing. PLM products are running on proven, but outdated platforms. My hunch – all major PLM vendors having some future technology platform projects on their back-burner. I don’t know if it comes as Enovia V7, TeamCenter Future or Creo Enterprise. What is clear to me is that PLM companies need to come with the next technological platforms to leverage last 10 years development of web and consumer space. Otherwise, they will be dismissed by newcomers. ERP vendors such as Oracle and SAP also keep stakes in this enterprise software game and need to be watched carefully by PLM players. Just my thoughts..

Best, Oleg

Freebie. SAP didn’t pay me to write this post.

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PLM and Future of Gamification

September 19, 2011

It is already more than 2 years I first asked on my blog if there is a border between games and PLM software. For some of the people back that days it was funny. However, things are moving more and more to game-like environments.

The following Forbes article The Gamification of SAP by Tim Clark caught my attention few days ago. For many years, I know SAP is a company that paying less attention to user experience (sorry SAP folks, but it is true). Things are going to change, actually. SAP is looking for people playing games when accomplishing business tasks. Funny. Huh? Reading Forbes, I found the following passage inspiring:

“If I look at how my kids are consuming software, if it’s not desirable immediately, they throw it away. Can you imagine what happens to your IT landscape when these people come into business? I don’t know how you want to keep your IT strategy going so we’d better make our software delightful as well.”

When it comes together with mobile, it becomes even more exciting. Take a look on iPad game SAP offers. Actually, users are playing games to achieve their business tasks.

What happens on PLM side? I didn’t find any evidence of PLM games in the portfolio of PLM vendors. However, I found Dassault System innovative in this space playing a lot with 3D and avatars.

What is my conclusion? I think enterprise software needs to re-thing "gaming" concept. The boarder is blurring these days. I can see many situations where game user experience can be very appropriate. Interesting to know your opinion. Speak your mind. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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PLM and Location Based Intelligence

September 13, 2011

I learn about SAP and Google Maps collaboration from LBZone few days ago. Navigate your browser to the the following link – Intuitive Overlay of Enterprise Data onto Maps to Fuel Better Business Decisions. SAP is traditionally investing in business analytic software via SAP Business Object product. The following passage explains how Google consumer oriented services can be used together with enterprise tools.

SAP and Google are working together to pair enterprise applications with the kinds of consumer tools that enrich millions of people’s lives every day, such as Google Maps and Google Earth™. With location-based intelligence capabilities, SAP envisions bringing corporate information to life via Google’s dynamic, interactive map, satellite and even street-level views. As a result, customers could analyze their businesses in a geospatial context to effectively understand the "where" of their information, as well as global, regional and local trends and how they are impacted by different scenarios — helping to increase efficiency and profitability, among other benefits.

I can see few interesting scenarios related to product development that require location-based tools such as: maintenance and service operation, supply chain and some other. Visualization of location information can simplify user interface and help to find data trends that hardly can be recognized using location-based visualizations. It will be interesting to see if latest PTC acquisition of 4CS for service lifecycle can find advantages of location-based software.

What is my take? There is a clear trend to merge consumer web tools with enterprise software. So called "IT consumerization" is definitely needed to be watched by PLM vendors. Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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PTC Social Link and SharePoint: What the Future Holds?

June 17, 2011

One of the products I had a chance to review more closely earlier this week was PTC Social Link. I had a chance to post about social technologies before. Navigate your browser to the following links to read my earlier blog articles. Social PLM, Collaboration and Structured Discussion; PLM and Social Technologies Dating? Social Enterprise Discussion and Next Collaboration Buzz.

The following video provides a quick round trip for what PTC Social Link can do. Watch it and make your conclusion. I found it educational. According to the information PTC provided earlier this week, they are using Social Link internally to improve product development processes.

Activities

I found "an activity" concept interesting. Watch the following screen shot. As an engineer or a person in the organization you are interesting about what activities are running around a particular CAD model, drawing or similar piece of data. Social link gives you a summary view of activities placed alongside to this data.

Social Link, Technology and Web Parts

PTC is using SharePoint to implement Social Link. I can see some advantages in taking a leverage of Microsoft technological stack. SharePoint provides a good platform and Social Link leverage existing user experience, infrastructure and customization capabilities. To give you a glimpse of what is possible, navigate to the following link and read SharePoint 2007 Automatically updated web parts post. Web Parts is one of the fundamental elements of SharePoint technologies and Social Link uses it as well. However, if you don’t have in your team people familiar with SharePoint, this advantage can become a problem. It is your choice, of course.

What is my conclusion? PTC is thinking about social technologies. Social Link follows social hype, and you can find similarities with products like Salesforce.com Chatter, SAP StreamWork, Vuuch and some others. The question I’m asking myself is what should be the preference of users in a company if they will have a choice between SAP, PTC and other "social technology" applications. My intuitive hunch is that integration with product content (i.e. CAD files, BOM, etc.) can be important. Just my thoughts.

Best, Oleg

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PLM and End-To-End Business Process Myth

March 31, 2010

I was reading Arcweb SAP Insider 2010 related to the manufacturing, sustainability and product lifecycle management domains. The tag line “End-to-End Business Process Management” came to my attention, so I decided to go inside and try to understand what SAP is up to in their new PLM deliveries.

The overall document is heavy loaded with general statements about SAP and their investment into PLM program, important customer needs and problems that can be solved by SAP PLM. In the area of new product development, I found three pieces of new release achievements: 1- SAP new user interface; 2- New Project and Portfolio Management; 3- Integrated Development Environment. The last one was related to the information about end-to-end business processes I was looking for.

SAP PLM’s offerings for the Integrated Development environment.  Following the theme of end-to-end business processes, SAP PLM has focused on the need for a comprehensive product development and innovation approach.  This would involve multiple components of their PLM solution portfolio including robust CAD integration, project and portfolio management, single repository for product and process data, and a collaborative development platform that manages role-based IP protection. One of the more interesting offerings in this area is an Integrated Product Development platform for discrete industries and a companion IPD for the process industries.  IPD for the process industries included specific solutions for area like recipe management, material and task sourcing, compliance, and document management.  This follows the trend among PLM providers today to focus on specific industries with tailored solutions sets.

I think, I succeeded to get an idea of End-to-End business processes SAP is talking about. If I will translate to simple words it will contain a single repository for product and process data as well as set of tools and application to work on this data such as Project and Portfolio Management and some others. I still have few important, but not answered questions with regards to End-To-End business processes:

1. How to capture existing business processes?
2. What is the process of “solution tailoring”?
3. How IPD will be integrated with non-SAP modules and tools?

End-to-end business process management is a nice marketing slogan. In the end, there is nothing more than pieces of product and process data that need to stick together. SAP Wizards assumes that they know how to put them together to get an organizational job done by providing a specific tailored solution. Maybe they are right. However, the process to do so will contain lots of small steps related to existing business processes analyzes, integration and customization. I turned me back to one of my previous posts: PLM Best Practices Torpedo. End-To-End Business Processes are set of best practices on top of the single product and process data repository.

What is my conclusion after all? End-to-End processes sound very profound and attractive. However, it seems to me SAP was focused last three years on how to gather all definitions and implementation practices to introduce the comprehensive product portfolio making best practices for customers. The implementation of such can be bumpy and requires lots of energy, skills and the most important – time. The last becomes the most critical for manufacturers today. I’d like to quote another pace from the same write-up: “… that the number one goal for manufacturing companies was to reduce “time-to-profit” for new or changed products...”. With long PLM End-To-End business processes implementation cycles this goal will not be achievable and can easily become Dead-End.

Just my thoughts…
Best, Oleg

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PLM Prompt: SAP on premise vs. Business by Design

May 20, 2009

Interesting thoughts by Stephen Arnold related to On-Premise vs. SaaS software based on SAP case.  Also link on Understanding SAP’s Business by Design SaaS strategy.  

SAP Business By Design

Do you think the same analyses can be applied to PLM business?

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