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2PLM John Stark Associates |
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- 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 "PLM Inc." is from Menno Huijben of Technia. But first, a few words about the PLM Forum to be held in Oxford, England next month. * PLM Forum * In the August 4 issue we mentioned that some PLM users and vendors have asked us to help set up a neutral, non-profit PLM Interest Group in which all members of the PLM community can work together to support the development and use of PLM. There has been a lot of positive feedback highlighting the advantages for PLM of taking a collaborative approach involving all players. For example, "Great idea to make a PLM Interest Group. It should propose an industry-consensused one-day introductory seminar about the concept of PLM. We're just starting our PLM project and we're missing that overview. If we had it we could see where everyone's products and services fit. Each vendor gives us its own concept and then shows its products and services which fit 100% of course. Not useful at our low level of understanding." The Inaugural Meeting is scheduled for September 23 in Oxford, England. For other details about the meeting, mail Roger Tempest. * PLM Inc. * Introduction Attend a PDM/PLM conference and you may hear two kinds of presentations. There are the optimistic sales talks about PLM visions and the great things it will do for you. And there are the PLM project war-stories telling what went wrong, and which lessons were learned. I prefer the latter, but both are important to keep in mind when aiming for a successful PLM implementation. When a well-formulated PLM vision and a positive 'we can do' spirit is lacking, senior management will not approve the required investment. Without taking the lessons learned into account and without realistic project management, you may never get your return on investment. However, 'separating practice from promise' (which as I recall, was the lead theme of one such conference) is not easy. Implementing PLM does not happen overnight. It is not just a matter of selecting and deploying an IT system, but rather a program that must run over many years to ensure that the business benefits are fully delivered, and PLM is firmly anchored in the organization. A PLM program consists of many projects and tasks. Just to mention a few of them: generate fast ROI, manage the project team and the PLM vendors and suppliers, improve product data quality, integrate multiple ERP systems, manage organizational change in a global environment, and sell, sell, sell the PLM vision to senior management and the end-users. Balance all of these activities against the available budget, keep your time schedule and you have succeeded. Underestimate some factors, overemphasize others, or misjudge the maturity of the organization to bring PLM into use, and you are in for failure. PLM programs are very much about your capability to manage uncertainty. Implementing PLM is not a set of deterministic tasks. It is a learning process. PLM Inc. PLM programs can be of considerable size, but often the management structure does not reflect this. Consider a PLM program as managing a small company; found your own 'PLM Inc.' Your senior managers become the shareholders, your steering committee is the board, your end-users are the customers, and high quality product data, with lifelong-guarantee and low cost of ownership is your product. Using PLM Inc. as a metaphor and a checklist to manage your PLM program will help to avoid the most common pitfalls. For example, you need to take care of your project teams (PLM Inc.'s employees). Competence management and career development are regularly under-addressed in PLM projects, which may lead to key resources leaving unexpectedly. To stay in business (that is, to keep your PLM program alive) you have to use your resources effectively, pay attention to your shareholders (deliver the expected ROI), ensure customer satisfaction (nurture happy PLM users), and deliver your product on time (conduct good program management and provide a stable system). Of course, your PLM Inc. has a mission, a vision and a strategy, and quarterly progress reports, it pays dividends (early wins) to its shareholders, and its public relations department keeps its customers informed. Do start your PLM Inc. up properly. A lot of startup companies fail by focusing too much on product development, forgetting their customers and marketing and sales activities. The same happens with many PLM projects. Instead of writing a good, balanced business plan, a technology-biased evaluation is carried out to select a PLM system, forgetting the 'shareholders' and 'customers'. Continue the PLM Inc. metaphor and a whole set of well-established management tools, like the Balanced Score Card and Benchmarking, become available. PLM programs should follow the paved paths of established project management methods, good business practices, and focused organizational change management to avoid failure. For questions and comments, please contact me by mail or call +358 40 860 7221. In addition, we could meet at the PLM Forum in Oxford. Menno Huijben is a consultant at Technia, a leading supplier of PLM solutions in the Nordic countries. He has 13 years experience of using, consulting, developing, managing, and providing PDM/PLM solutions. |
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News |
Agile Software Corporation announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Eigner, for consideration comprised of stock and cash. Details Agile Software Corporation announced it has completed the acquisition of Eigner. Agile issued 1,795,000 shares of common stock and paid $2,850,000 in cash for all outstanding shares of Eigner. Details * Financial * Moldflow Corporation announced the results for its fourth fiscal quarter and year ended June 30, 2003. Fourth quarter revenues of $9.9 million increased 20% from the corresponding quarter of fiscal 2002. Revenues of $36.6 million for the full 2003 fiscal year increased 4% over fiscal 2002. Details PROSTEP AG announced it increased revenue by 15% in the first half of 2003, to approximately 6.2 million euros, compared with the same period last year. Details 3D Systems Corp. announced revenues for the quarter ended June 27, 2003 were $26.9 million compared with revenues of $28.5 in the second quarter a year ago, a decrease of 5.9%. Details * People * Pilgrim Software announced that Dr. Cameron Durrant has been appointed to Pilgrim's Executive Board of Advisors. Details Synergis Technologies, Inc. announced the appointment of Kristen Tomasic as vice president of its Autodesk Commercial Solutions Division. Details  think3 announced that Alain Massabo, vice president of advanced research and development, now also oversees industrial design engineering to maximize synergies between the teams. Chad Kammeraad and Brad Redmond joined think3 to drive the company's industrial design sales and marketing strategies. Details 3D Systems Corp. announced that Brian K. Service has decided to resign from his positions as officer and director immediately. Details * Implementation * Arena Solutions, Inc. announced that Topspin Communications has employed Arena PLM in support of its business operations. Details Autodesk, Inc. announced that Hydrakraft AS of Norway credits Autodesk manufacturing technology for its improved product development processes that reduced cycle time by as much as 50 percent in just one year. Details Cadence Design Systems, Inc. announced that Aspex Technology selected Cadence solutions to help it meet the market demand for scalable, fully software-programmable processors that deliver high performance with low power consumption. Details Intergraph Corporation announced the sale of SmartPlant Foundation engineering lifecycle information and workflow management software and related services to the Murray and Roberts group, South Africa. Details MatrixOne, Inc. announced that Nokia has decided to use MatrixOne's PLM Solution as a Nokia-wide Product Data Management (PDM) platform to fulfill product development and manufacturing requirements. Details MSC.Software Corp. announced that MTU Friedrichshafen, a manufacturer of large diesel engines and complete drive systems and a division of DaimlerChrysler AG, has invested in the MSC.ADAMS product line including ADAMS/Engine powered by FEV. Details SolidWorks announced UCLA engineering students are using SolidWorks and COSMOSWorks software to learn 3D mechanical design skills by creating products ranging from satellites to stereo turntables. Details SolidWorks announced cable assembly company ISC Engineering LLC has simplified and reduced its customers' purchasing decision times from days to minutes with SolidWorks 3D PartStream.NET service. Details Synchronicity and Royal Philips Electronics announced the successful implementation of a new semiconductor Intellectual Property (IP) delivery, management and support system built with the Synchronicity Publisher Suite. Details * Developments * Actify announced new enhancements to its SpinFire CAD Visualization Solution. Details CoCreate Software, Inc. announced the launch of OneSpace.net software. Details Digital Paper Corporation announced availability of DigitalPaper XE 3.1. Details Documentum announced its support for BEA WebLogic Platform 8.1. Details Engineering Intent announced the availability of the Intent Product Family (Intent) 6.0. Details FileNet Corporation announced its support of the newest version of BEA's WebLogic Enterprise Platform. Details Gibbs and Associates announced that the GibbsCAM Solid Exchange Built on Granite has been updated to Parametric Technology Corporation's Granite 2.0 interoperability kernel. Details Informative Graphics Corporation announced the release of Net-It Central 6.1, which now includes server-based Flash and PDF document publishing capabilities. Details MAPICS, Inc. announced the general availability of its new, integrated Field Service and Support solution. Details Oracle Corp. announced the availability of Oracle Advanced Product Catalog, expanding the collaboration tools available with Oracle's Product Lifecycle Management applications. Details Prodika announced the immediate availability of a new program aimed at helping Food and Beverage companies accelerate their product design, re-formulation, and nutrition labeling efforts to comply with emerging labeling and nutrition standards. Details Rasterex Software announced the new release of RxAutoImage R6.5 for AutoCAD 2004/AutoCAD LT 2004. Details SofTech, Inc. announced the availability of ProductDashboard, a user-configurable PDM (product data management) Web portal, now available for SofTech's ProductCenter collaborative PDM solution. Details STEP Tools, Inc. announced the introduction of ST-MachineTM v1.0, a CAM plug-in software used to generate STEP-NC machine independent CNC control data. Details * Relationships * Algor announced ALGOR's InCAD products for Solid Edge were among the first named by EDS PLM Solutions as Solid Edge Version 14 Certified Select applications. Details Domain Systems, Inc. announced the launch of their new Affiliate Program. Details IDEAL.com announced it has partnered with Avatech Solutions to bring its entire line of scanning solutions to Avatech's government, education and commercial customers. Details Realization Technologies announced that it has appointed Thru-Put India as country manager for its Indian operations. Details VX Corporation announced that it has further expanded its global reseller organization. Details * Other * Autodesk, Inc. announced the Autodesk Inventor Certified Hardware Program. Details Avatech Solutions, Inc. announced several strategic vendor partnerships that enable it to launch a total infrastructure and facilities management practice. Details CADKEY Corporation announced that it is shipping a free driver for use with the SpaceMouse motion controller from 3Dconnexion on its CADKEY Version 21 Product Line CD. Details COSMOS Advanced Analysis Group announced that COSMOSDesignSTAR has been awarded Certified Select status for Solid Edge Version 14. Details Documentum announced the availability of new Language Packs, which substantially simplify and accelerate concurrent implementation of localized Documentum products in many languages. Details EDS announced availability of its NX portfolio of CAD/CAM/CAE solutions on Itanium 2-based HP workstations. Details EDS announced three of the top four overall finishers in this year's American Solar Car Challenge (ASC) -- the world's longest solar car race -- were EDS Academic Partner institutions using EDS product lifecycle management (PLM) software to design, test, build and support their vehicles. Details Firepond, Inc., announced it celebrates its twentieth year in business. Details LMS International announced the re-certification of its software development quality system to the new ISO 9001:2000 standard. Details ProSTEP announced iViP Science Days 2003 on October 8 and 9, 2003 in Dresden. Details Prodika, Inc. announced that it has received Microsoft's.NET Connected Logo - indicating that Prodika Supplier Portal (a component of Prodika Supply Chain Relationship Management) fully supports XML web services capabilities. Details SAP AG announced its support for the first release of the WS-I Basic Profile 1.0 (BP 1.0), a set of implementation guidelines for companies to utilize a set of core Web services specifications to develop interoperable Web services. Details SGI and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore announced the opening of the NTU Reality Theater, a virtual reality center for institutions of higher learning. Details Solass announced it hosted a Solutions Forum. In addition to presentations by technology partners, there were also two sessions from companies directly involved in deploying applications, BAE SYSTEMS and Airbus. Details SolidWork announced that students at the Albert-Ludwig University of Freiburg in Germany are learning how to design microscopic transistors, fluid controls, and other micro-systems using SolidWorks 3D mechanical design software. Details SolidWorks Corporation announced it donated more than $70,000 worth of SolidWorks 3D mechanical design software to more than 350 contestants in the SkillsUSA Championships. Details Verity Inc. announced the availability of Verity's Arabic Morphological Analyzer (VAMA) to provide advanced Arab language support for its Verity K2 Enterprise (K2E) software. Details |
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