Enable Your CM Processes for Mission Critical Process Management

Next week I will join the BOM summit 2009 which will occur at Chicago, Illinois, hosted by Razorleaf. We will discuss the business process coverage from Bidding to Service. The industry-specific needs and methodologies

Razorleaf will host a multi-day event for companies interested in understanding the methodologies and capabilities behind the ENOVIA SmarTeam BOM module and Engineering Express package. Product managers from Dassault and solution architects from Razorleaf will present the software’s capabilities, demonstrate detailed methodologies, and facilitate discussions among a uniquely focused peer group. Attendees will present and share their industry-specific BOM needs, further enriching the event.

The event is a follow-up to last year’s successful BOM Summit. One attendee had this to say about BOM Summit 2008:

“I think it [the event] was invaluable, frankly. I would highly recommend that anybody come. I think that the format was extremely appropriate and had a lot of value. The information that you could focus on here without having other interruptions… I would definitely come again.”
- Maureen Murphy
Engineering Services manager at AS&E

http://www.razorleaf.com/events/bom-summit-09/

Item-Centric product data management

Lately I see more and more usage of the term ‘Item-Centric’ PDM / PLM. Is every PDM application that can support BOM (Bill of Material) also can say it is ‘Item-Centric’ ?

What do you say, ‘Item-Centric’ = BOM ?

Is it that simple ?

Item-Centric product data management – What is it really?

I will try to specify few elements that are MUST for a real Item-Centric PDM / PLM. After that you can judge yourself which application really provides Item-Centric PDM / PLM, and which just knows to have a simple BOM from the design.

 

The 1st element that is critical to understand will be the fact that when talking about Item-Centric PDM / PLM, we are talking about managing the development process from Concept to Manufacturing, and not just design to BOM. The reason I am saying that is an Item-Centric PDM / PLM means bringing a Top-Down Engineering approach which means I am starting with Item (from Concept), reusing items structures, planning top-down up to the module level and only then going to design bottom-up. any solution that starts bottom-up from the design is not Item-Centric.

Next important element will be Item Maturity Management. When working Item-Centric, the Item maturity represent the development business process maturity and unlike a design maturity (that usually will be based on Check-in/Check-out/Release/Obsolete of the design) the item maturity really represent the development maturity (e.g. In Work, Approved by Engineering, Limited Released for purchasing only (LLI support), Released to manufacturing, Delivered, In Service…). also the movement (Promote/Demote) within this maturity process need to be performed based on the company development process rules and not just sequential.

But, the most important and critical is the ability to automatically apply the company business rules needed for getting into a new maturity state, e.g.:

• Does specifications needs to be released and frozen?
• Do I allow InActive/Obsolete children?
• Do I need all children to be in minimum state (e.g. Released, Approved by Engineering)
• When I demote an Item, how can I be sure I am not breaking maturity of a parent?

Usually, this part will be where you will need to invest a lot of customization (in applications that do not support real Item-Centric).

When implementing an Item-Centric PDM / PLM you need to be able to support different configuration views (e.g. Conceptual BOM, Engineering BOM, Manufacturing BOM, Serialized BOM…) the minimum will be E-BOM (Engineering BOM) and M-BOM (Manufacturing BOM). Is this enough? when working Item-Centric I need the capability to synchronize between those different configuration views, synchronize with embedded business logic (what needs to be synched and what is not), Item-Centric means I’m managing mechatronics (Multi-disciplinary product development integrating mechanical, electrical/electronic and software components – Unified BOM including Hardware (mechanical, electrical / electronic) & Software. This means I need to be able to automatically synch the unified BOM from multiple sources concurrently (Mechanical, Electronics, Software, Standard components, Outsourcing, Excel…) = Concurrent Engineering.

Also, do not forget different configuration views needs to be frozen based on different maturity states (E-BOM needs to be frozen when ‘Approved’ by engineering, but M-BOM is still open for modifications by production engineering.

 

So, to summarized – if one is selling you an Item-Centric PDM / PLM ask him:

1. Do you support Top-Down Engineering?
2. Do you support Item Maturity?
3. Can I model my development process into the Item Maturity?
4. Does the Item Maturity support Out-Of-The-Box business rules?
5. Do you support Configuration views (E-BOM, M-BOM)?
6. Can I automatically synchronize between the Configuration views?
7. Can I manage Mechatronics? unified BOM including Hardware (mechanical, electrical / electronic) & Software?
8. Can I Freeze Configuration views based on Item Maturity?

If the answers are YES to all those questions, you’ve got a real Item-Centric PDM / PLM in hand, if NOT…