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PDM Issues

Prioritisation

If we are to formalise some of the main aspects of PDM it will need detailed work, practical examples, and probably one or more workshops to bring together the right experience and expertise.

To generate this kind of involvement we have to focus on the most important issues - those that have the biggest impact on a company's costs and product development performance.

Possible Issues

Some of the main issues in PDM in 2010 are:-

  • Product Configuration
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 		A "product" is not just a product: it breaks down into a configuration of parts, variants, alternatives, systems, project work and associated services that must be defined precisely enough for serial numbers to be placed on them.
  • Multiple Configurations
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 		There is not just one configuration: there are structures for 'As-Designed', 'As-Manufactured', 'As-Built (or Delivered)', 'As-Supported' and 'As-Maintained', and in most companies these
are all different.
  • Bill of Materials
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 		Managing the different unstructured and structured versions used by Engineering and Manufacturing, and 'precise' and 'imprecise' BOMs.
  • Revision Management
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 		Rules for raising the revision of parent parts or assemblies when a sub-part or component has been modified.
  • Data Integrity
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 		How to maintain clean data, and accurate data, as users take shortcuts or make mistakes.
  • Mergers and Acquisitions
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 		Rationalising and maintaining PDM control when the PDM systems and naming conventions from several different companies are combined.
  • PDM Pitfalls
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 		Recursive structures; manual copying to cope with integration interrupts; hierarchical vs. indexed methods.
  • Distributed Systems
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 		Not all of the "truth", or full set of data about the company's products, is contained within the PDM system itself: some of the information is in other systems.
  • PDM Tool
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 		Shortcomings, or improvement "wish lists", for the main PDM application on which the company relies.
  • Corporate Structure
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 		Budgets; directives from Head Office; geographical differences in systems and cultures; departmental focus; "Why should I do this if I don't get the benefit?"
  • IT Platform Management
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 		Managing software versions, interfaces and upgrades for the many different applications (MCAD, ECAD, ECM, ERP, Office, and PDM itself) that form the data management platform; as well as coping with the upgrade patterns of the customer and supplier systems you exchange data with.
  • User Issues
-

 		Resistance; difficulties faced by occasional users; procedures;
"I prefer my system"; training and education.


Send In Your Comments

Let us know your views about the main PDM issues, and your comments about the best approach to resolving them, via .


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