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2PLM John Stark Associates |
Number 20 |
- Welcome Page 2 - Update Page 3 - News Page 4 - Brief lines | Welcome to this issue of 2PLM, an e-zine distributed every two weeks on a free subscription basis. This week's article "Changing an individualistic culture to a collaborative culture" is from Peter Foster, CEO of i-nova.cpds. First though, a few words about the ICP-35K proposal. * Update on ICP-35K * Now and again over the last year we have mentioned a project we are proposing for the Sixth Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration. The project's title is Implementing Collaborative Product Development and Product Lifecycle Management for 35,000 European Manufacturing Companies, and its acronym is ICP-35K. We first mentioned the proposal in the May 20, 2002 issue. The Expression of Interest is on the European Commission's CORDIS web site at http://eoi.cordis.lu/dsp_details.cfm?ID=34920. During the last year we've had a lot of feedback about the proposal. This has included comments such as :
The way it has been PLM vendors run projects to develop new technologies that they then, in competition with similar technologies from other vendors, try to sell to users. In this dog-eats-dog environment, there's a lot of waste because competing vendors develop almost identical technology. Each user company tries to gain a competitive advantage by implementing new technologies faster than other user companies. Implementing a new technology is a difficult, thankless task that rarely meets its targets. Sometimes it's because the vendor oversold the capabilities of the technology. And sometimes the management of the user company withholds the financial resources and prevents the organizational changes that would be needed to make implementation a success. Effort is wasted as companies make almost identical implementation mistakes. Government-funded national and international R&D projects could propose solutions to overcome the waste, but they have tended to mimic the behavior (and problems) of the vendors and the user companies : HADES (Here's Another Data Exchange Standard), MYOPIA (Make Yet One more Productive Island of Automation). Often these projects can only have a small impact, don't have benefits that are easy to measure, don't communicate results to the PLM community and have a bias towards developing incremental CAX functionality. (If you don't agree, please send us your list of national or international CPD and PLM projects that have had a major impact on industry.) These projects don't seem to be aimed at offering, in a commercially useful timescale, the results that companies are looking for to help them compete in today's globalized industrial environment:
The way it could be ICP-35K proposes to help 35,000 organizations implement CPD and PLM by creating a new PLM infrastructure based on a new paradigm. Does that sound like a useful project to you? Answers please, such as :
Questions about possible participation in ICP-35K to Roger Tempest. * Changing an individualistic culture to a collaborative culture - by Peter Foster * We thank the many readers who participated in the survey in the December 16, 2002 issue. For that survey we made a list of the main areas of CPD interest and asked people to indicate the Top 5 priorities for their company. As shown in the table this revealed an interesting result : the top concern in Collaborative Product Development is not to do with Process, nor Methodologies, nor Information Technology, but Culture. What is culture? I was about to write, "Culture can be defined as ..", but it is not so easy to define - even if we restrict it to culture within industrial companies. It is probably not important anyway. Company culture is most visibly expressed by the decisions, actions and attitudes of its Managers and the way they recognize, reward or sanction :
Why do we have predominantly individualistic cultures? The roots of our individualistic cultures are deep : 1. Our society is based on promoting individuals 2. Our education systems are still based on individual scores in examinations although some enlightened establishments provide for contributions from team work. 3. The way we organize and manage our companies reflects and reinforces the individualistic culture :
Do we need a collaborative culture? Yes, for strategic reasons and for operational reasons. The strategic reason is linked to the changing way of doing business. The success of the globalization of sales, development, manufacturing and supply is directly related to the ability to share information accurately and quickly. The virtual enterprise is based on building relationships rapidly and making disparate business processes and information systems and people work together with a common objective. The straight forward operational reason is that we need to avoid some of the almighty cock ups that occur because we're not managing well the interfaces between our individual engineering groups. A solution was proposed in the platform or the project team. Some were weak and some were strong but neither has been able to resolve satisfactorily the problem of having individuals willingly cooperating and contributing their know how and information. Complex processes and methodologies have been developed to trap the problems which arise because we don't share enough information, but in truth they also add to the communication burden. How many of you have really done a thorough and effective Design Review program? To make it more complicated, we compress time scales and distribute the people who need to communicate freely in different places, sometimes 300 meters may be the same as 300 Km or 3000 Km in its effect. The word "Collaboration" entered the English language about 1860, with the meaning "To cooperate in literary, artistic or scientific work". It's that word COOPERATE that is the key. Today's complete complex design work can't be done by an individual all-knowing, all-seeing Renaissance engineer. Instead we have to cooperate with our colleagues. Otherwise our contribution is close to worthless. Engineering is a "holistic" affair. A good part doesn't necessarily make a good system. Now we have some pointers as to why we need a Collaborative Culture, let's discuss how to achieve it. But before that, just one thought. In research at Emory University, women, when they are cooperating on a subject, were found to experience brain activity as if they were being stimulated by "rewards" such as food, money or drugs. I wonder if anyone has tried to develop a car with an all female platform ? How do we get there? Having spent the last 18 months deeply involved with this issue, the survey results were particularly interesting for us. I will not offer up a prescription for a change medicine but here are some pointers for you to think about :
For more information Peter Foster works with teams developing new products and believes that collaborative culture is the foundation for successful implementation of new processes and technology. Contact through peter.foster@i-novastar.com. |
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News |
Cadence Design Systems, Inc. announced it has acquired K2 Technologies, Inc. Details RAND Worldwide announced the completion of a Letter of Intent to sell one of its wholly-owned, non-PLM German subsidiaries to the established management group. The subsidiary, RAND Technologies GmbH, has its head office and is registered in Ellwangen, Germany, and currently employs 183 people. Details * Financial * Ariba, Inc. announced results for the quarter ended March 31, 2003. Total revenue for the second quarter of fiscal 2003 was $59.3 million, representing an increase of 3 percent as compared to $57.4 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2002. Details EDS announced financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2003. Total revenue was $5.37 billion, up 2 percent from the year-ago quarter. PLM Solutions revenues decreased 11 percent at constant currency from a year ago to $201 million. Details Tecnomatix Technologies Ltd. announced its financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2003. Revenues for the first quarter of 2003 were $20.6 million, compared to $20.4 million for the first quarter of 2002. Details Other link : Ralph Grabowski's comments about Dassault Systemes' financial results in upFront.eZine. * People * Ariba, Inc. announced that Richard A. Kashnow has been appointed to Ariba's Board of Directors. Details Cadence Design Systems, Inc. announced it has appointed Leslie J. Rechan as senior vice president and general manager of Worldwide Field Operations for North America. Details  Covisint announced that Harold Kutner, 62, will retire on April 30 as Chairman and CEO from the company he helped found in 2000 while at General Motors. Details * Implementation * Access Commerce announced that Turbonetics Inc. has successfully implemented the Cameleon Advanced Product Configurator integrated with MAPICS iSeries ERP system. Details Documentum announced that BG Group plc has chosen the Documentum ECM platform to manage content for one of its gas plants in Tunisia. Details EDS announced H B Fuller has selected Teamcenter as its knowledge management solution - marking the initial chemical industry sector client for EDS in product lifecycle management (PLM). Details Gibbs and Associates announced that the 50th post processor for the GibbsCAM MTM (Multi-Task Machining) option was recently delivered to a customer. Details ITI TranscenData announced that Motorola Inc. has selected CADIQ to help improve product development speed and efficiency. Details MatrixOne, Inc. announced that Calypso Medical Technologies, Inc., an early stage life sciences company, has deployed MatrixOne PLM solutions. Details Realization Technologies announced that Orbitform has selected its Concerto software to manage projects. Details Realization Technologies announced that the Robert Bosch GmbH Packaging Technology Division in Germany has selected Realization's Concerto software to manage projects in their blister packaging business. Details SolidWorks announced that Denmark's Aalborg University has purchased 300 seats of SolidWorks three dimensional mechanical design software. Details SolidWorks announced that USUN Technology Co., Ltd. has purchased 50 seats of SolidWorks 3D CAD software. Details SolidWorks announced the Northern Ireland Department of Education has made SolidWorks 3D mechanical design software available to 300 of the country's secondary schools for as many as 9,000 students. Details Tecnomatix Technologies Ltd. announced that long-time customer Fiat Auto S.p.A. will implement eMPower products to maintain high levels of quality assurance and improve their process validation. Details think3, Inc. announced Buell Motorcycle, a Harley-Davidson Company, has entered into a long-term partnership with think3. Details VX Corp. announced CONCORD Kinderautositze GmbH will introduce a 3D CAD system from VX Corp. to replace the existing 2D system in their design department. Details * Developments * EDS announced plans to launch a new eSourcing software solution. The "Lifecycle Sourcing" solution integrates the new 5.0i version of the eBreviate eSourcing suite of technologies from the A.T. Kearney Procurement Solutions unit into Teamcenter. Details Framework Technologies announced the release of three new modules - ActiveCharter, ActiveResource and Portfolio Planning. Details IBM and Dassault Systemes announced the release of Version 5 Release 11 (V5R11) of their product lifecycle management (PLM) portfolio, comprised of CATIA for collaborative product development, and ENOVIA and SMARTEAM for lifecycle management, collaboration and decision support. Details Informative Graphics Corporation announced it has released DrawBridge ReproCentral 6.0, the latest version of its online planroom software for reprographers. Details Informative Graphics Corporation announced it has released Net-It Central 6.0, the latest version of its Web-publishing automation software. Details InnovMetric Software announced Version 8 of its point cloud processing software PolyWorks will feature a new rapid surfacing option for PolyWorks/Modeler. Details Intergraph Corporation and DNV Software jointly announced integrated lifecycle software for concurrent engineering, design, modeling, analysis, construction and operation of offshore oil and gas production facilities. Details Intergraph Corporation announced SmartPlant Offshore, software for the engineering, design and construction of marine oil and gas facilities. Details LightWork Design announced the launch of a new product designed specifically to meet the demands of the AEC market place. Details LightWork Design announced the release of industry standard RAL color libraries. Details LMS International announced the introduction of Revision 4 of LMS Test.Lab. Details Mentor Graphics Corporation announced that Silicon Graphics, Inc. has engaged with Mentor as the first customer of Mentor's new high-performance verification solution package. Details MSC.Software Corp. announced new software and services packages targeted at the biomedical market and medical device manufacturers. Details MSC.Software Corp. announced that MSC.ADAMS/Car Ride has been released to selected customers. Details Oce announced the release of Oce Engineering Exec 3.2 software. Details Pilgrim Software, Inc. announced the release of its SmartAudit software to select customers in FDA-regulated industries. Details PTC announced that Windchill 7.0 will encompass Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE) standards for product lifecycle management (PLM) solutions. Details QUMAS announced the introduction of e-DocCompliance for the Oracle platform. Details STEP Tools, Inc. announced it has released Version 1.0 of its STEP Index Library (STIX), a C++ library of functions for creating and modifying applications using STEP-NC (AP-238) machining data. Details Stratasys announced that it has released PPSF plastic for its FDM Titan system. Details think3, Inc. introduced MyTraining, an innovative, powerful and comprehensive e-learning solution for the design engineering community. Details * Relationships * Actify, Inc. announced that it has signed an agreement with Spatial, a Dassault Systemes S.A. company to enable Actify's SpinFire family of products to support CATIA V5. Details EDS and OHIO-DA announced EDS has incorporated InterComm, the ECAD visualization and collaboration solution from OHIO Design Automation, Inc., into its flagship product lifecycle management (PLM) portfolio, Teamcenter. Details Geometric Software Solutions Co. Ltd. announced an agreement whereby IntegWare has become Geometric Software Solutions' PLM sales partner for North America. Details LMS International announced that LMS Pimento is now available from Larson Davis Inc. Details Mathsoft and Intergraph Corporation jointly announced they have renewed and expanded a licensing and distribution agreement for Intergraph SmartSketch, the parametric 2D precision design, production drafting and diagramming software. Details Polyplan Technologies Inc. and Siemens AG IT PS announced they will exhibit together. Details * Other * Alibre Inc. has raised the prize amount for the Alibre Challenge from $500 to $1,000, and recognized the achievement of Ron Routledge who produced the only qualifying entry thus far. Details Avatech Solutions announced it has met Autodesk annual sales objectives and taken top honors in several award categories. Details Commerce One announced that it has posted an Open Source, royalty free Web services and SOAP XML Development Kit as part of its ongoing drive to foster the adoption of Web services technology for business. Details COSMOS announced COSMOS analysis software increased productivity for 100 percent of the customers responding to a recent return on investment (ROI) study by a Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management researcher. Details Endeca announced that Gartner, Inc. has positioned Endeca in the Visionary Quadrant of its 2003 Magic Quadrant report on enterprise search. Details Synergis Technologies announced that it has achieved Autodesk Platinum Club status for exceeding its sales objectives for Autodesk's fiscal year 2003. Details 3D Systems Corp. announced that the Audit Committee has completed its internal investigation of accounting issues, primarily relating to the timing of revenue recognition. Details |
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