PLM Interest Group : PLM User Forum - Dealing with Complexity

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PLM User Forum

Dealing with PLM Complexity

You have seen the "PLM Benefits" spreadsheets. Simply plug in your estimated benefit or return from each of the attributes of the software application, and the spreadsheet will automatically produce an ROI for implementing the package across your whole organisation.

The trouble is that your enterprise is a multi-national corporation that will not fit into any two-dimensional spreadsheet. It operates in trucks, buses, construction equipment, nautical and aerospace, and in one of those industries it operates as three different companies. The markets themselves are sub-divided into areas such as powertrain, parts and logistics. Combined sales are over $30bn, and there is a growing presence in Asia. Your enterprise is active in 5 continents, and employs over 5000 people.

Within this scenario the product information for these many products needs to be generated, owned, shared and used by Design, Manufacturing, Project Management, Purchasing, Sales, Field Support - and also with Suppliers and Customers. The environment too is constantly changing, as technology develops and PLM and PDM advance with time.

Your PLM team must establish an extremely complex process and technical architecture simply in order to make PLM work, and is then required to troubleshoot problems, quantify the implementation benefits, measure progress and show best practice. As every implementation has its strengths and weaknesses, a natural step would be to compare methods and material with teams from other companies, but this has become very difficult to do.

A recent PLMIG survey of PLM-related user groups revealed that 39% had become defunct and fewer than 10% of the remainder had any activities planned. This suggests that only around 6% of potential user cooperation is actually taking place.

This represents a major lost opportunity for PLM implementors, and the PLM Interest Group aims to redress it. The PLM User Forum meetings in November will provide a proven 2-day format for PLM managers and directors to work on the real PLM issues in all their complexity.

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