Back to the beginning of this year, I came with the post – Integrating PLM and PDM. Wrong question? My initial thoughts about integrating PDM and PLM was driven by growing interest to integrate existing software assets in the companies. However, thinking more I can see some additional aspects of PDM / PLM integration in a longer-term perspective. Few weeks ago, I posted From PDM to PLM: Unify vs. Integrate. I can see some examples of “integrate trend” happens now. I wanted to discuss two examples. Both Aras and Autodesk, in my view, are trying to integrate existing PDM systems with agile and flexible PLM environments.
Aras Enterprise PLM
If you haven’t had a chance to review it, Aras EPLM is a new packaged offering coming from Aras and expanding SolidWorks Enterprise PDM horizons by providing additional process oriented applications in Aras PLM. I recommend you to take a look on Aras EPLM on-demand webcast. Based on the information I found on the website, the functional scope of Aras EPLM related to Item and BOM Management, Product costing, Supply Chain processes, Project management and Change Management.
The clear strategy of Aras is to provide a complementary solution to SolidWorks and EPDM. I believe SolidWorks customers are looking for this solution as the opportunity to keep SolidWorks EPDM, to have an additional functionality and eliminate probably more expensive and unclear migration towards future Enovia V6 solutions DS is planning to deliver in the future.
Autodesk Nexus PLM
Another interesting example that just came last week – Autodesk made the announcement of Nexus PLM. Thre is little information and hands-on experience available about Autodesk PLM. You can navigate to my earlier posts about Autodesk Nexus PLM and Autodesk PLM strategies. At the same time, from the top slide presented by Steve Bodnar, Autodesk VP of PLM, we can learn that Autodesk is building their PLM strategy as a combination of two products – on-premise PDM (Autodesk Vault) and cloud based future product (Nexus PLM).
Looking on the scope of solutions Autodesk is promising to deliver as part of Nexus PLM, you can see some similarity with Aras EPLM Solution.
PDM / PLM Integration: pros and cons
If I think about possible advantages of combined solutions PDM+PLM, the one that stands clear to me is the interest to leverage existing software assets and re-use implementations cost already made by customers. When I think about the way Aras and Autodesk articulate what they do, I can see lots of similarities.
In that context, the cost of integration between PDM and PLM becomes one of the most important elements. Mindshare PLM vendors like Siemens PLM and Dassault are driving customers towards unified solution. They are trying to convince customers that unification will reduce the total cost of ownership and optimize the implementation. At the same time, if cost of integration is low, the type of solution proposed by Autodesk and Aras can have some grounds.
What is my conclusion? PDM / PLM integration looks like an interesting trend. We are going to see to see more examples, in my view. What is the fundamental reason behind it? I think many companies are having trouble to drive their IT infrastructure towards unification. It requires longer projects and expanded budgets. If PLM companies find an efficient way to integrate and access data between systems, it can definitely provide a competitive advantage on the market. Last one cannot be guaranteed, but it sounds as an interesting opportunity. Just my thoughts…
Mobile is very important nowadays. More and more people these days discovering opportunities to use “mobile version of something“. It is interesting to see how the market of devices is affecting the development of products. To leverage the power of the device becomes absolutely important. I was reading TNW blog yesterday – Google Just Used Search Application to Sneak the major part of Chrome onto the iPad. I made a try and find it useful – take a look.
Last week, during AU 2011, I’ve seen how significantly Autodesk is investing in the business of mobile applications. One of the applications caught my special attention – Autodesk ForceEffect. Having my engineering background, I almost forgot about how tough it was to deal with force diagrams and calculations 25 years ago. So, I found the following video specially enjoyable – you can capture diagrams, use photo and cameras.
What is my conclusion? Introducing tools that can use new devices is a very powerful trend. CAD/PLM software companies won’t be able to avoid it. These two great examples are just scratching the surface of the level of importance mobile devices will have in today’s business. You can ask me how it related to Product Lifecycle Management. Two aspects: 1/ the power of the device; and 2/ granularity. CAD /PLM companies have the opportunity to delivery applications, they want to end users via cool mobile devices. Granularity is another important aspect. PLM is going to be fragmented into a large set of applications used by many people in the organization. One size doesn’t fit all – you cannot deliver a single application for PLM. Just my thoughts…
I’d like to continue Autodesk PLM story I started in my previous post and share some of my thoughts based on hands-on experience with Nexus PLM. The demo was provided by Brian Roepke, Autodesk Product Director responsible for Nexus PLM.
Nexus PLM Architecture
Not much been said about Nexus PLM architecture, except of saying it is on the cloud. I haven’t seen Nexus PLM architecture charts during AU. From the conversation with Autodesk people, I can drive the following conclusion about how Nexus PLM is built. Nexus cloud is running on Amazon (AWS). The storage is SQL-compliant database (I can guess it is MySQL or Oracle) via Amazon RDS. As it was explained Nexus separates databases per customers in the cloud, so customer data is separated. It indeed provides some advantages related to the perceptions of the security. However, in my view, it creates some disadvantages when it comes to cross company usage of data. The last one can be a very interesting use case of global collaboration organization.
Applications
Autodesk is planning to release lots of applications using Nexus PLM platform. Initial focus is on the following five applications: new-product development, Program and process management, Quality and compliance, Supplier and partner management, Maintenance and services. The total amount of applications available on Nexus now is about 140 (this number probably includes Buzzsaw apps).
User Experience
Below you can see few screenshots of Nexus PLM. You can see the main user dashboard appearance and how Nexus gives you the access to object information (i.e. project).
The following pictures will give you a glimpse of how Nexus Project and Program management app works. It includes also scheduling module as well as elements of reporting and navigation.
Customization
Autodesk claims Nexus PLM to be “insanely configurable”. What does it mean? According to the what I’ve heard everything can be customized. Well, this is probably too broad. From what I’ve seen user interface appearance, names and many other elements can be changed. During the demo, the flexibility of workflow was presented. It was related to the ability of flowchart and logic changes. It also includes the example of Java scripting.
Autodesk claims “everything can be customized” in Nexus PLM. The examlpes they presented related to workflow, rules and user interface appearance is great. However, I’d love to have a deeper look on these abilities when software will be available.
What is my conclusion? Nexus PLM has nice and slick web user experience. Without practicall hands-on it is hard to say something about ease of navigation and the estimate the number of clicks you need to do to perform an action (click-per-action). These two things normally drive crazy users in data-oriented web environment. I found very positive the fact Autodesk is thinking about “insane customization”. However, it will be interested to see and experiment with how the complexity of customization will co-exist with cloud-based multi-tenant deployment. It reminds me one of my old posts – Is PLM customization a Data Management Titanic? Another critical aspect that wasn’t covered is data import or integration with existing systems (i.e. Files, Archives, Content Management, PDM, PLM, ERP, etc.). The answer Autodesk provided pointed to some internal development with Autodesk Vault as well as a future work with partners. That would be very interesting to see in the future. Overall, Nexus has a potential to disrupt. I’m looking forward to seeing how Autodesk will realize this potential.
It finally happened. Autodesk enters PLM business. After talks, speculations, discussions and guesses, Autodesk presented their Autodesk Nexus PLM product earlier this week during AU2011. I had a chance to read initial press and blog reviews related to Autodesk Nexus PLM. Here are few examples. Navigate your browser to the following link to read the [...]
Reporting is a very important part of product lifecycle management. Actually, without reporting it is hard to imaging how you can make all information about a product and its lifecycle usable. At the same time, PLM vendors ditched reporting capabilities for a very long time. I was writing about it few times. Maybe you can [...]
PLM 2.0 is a new term that was born about 5 years ago. The term was introduced by Dassault Sysetemes as part of their V6 platform. At the same time, Dassault didn’t put “an equal” sign between V6 and PLM 2.0. The consideration about PLM 2.0 was mostly related as a vision and the next [...]
PLM User Experience… Yes, I know. This is a painful point. Everybody wants it simpler, intuitive and easy. My best quotes about how to design a good user interface belongs to Steve Krug – “Don’t Make Me Think”. One of the most painful elements of user experience in data-management systems like PDM and PLM is [...]
I’m still cleaning my post-vacation backlog of feeds and messages. One of the articles by UK Eureca Magazine caught my attention, since it was named exactly as my blog – Beyond PLM. This article is an interview with managing director PLM Software, Robin Hancock about the company’s vision for the future of PLM. One of [...]
The topic of openness in PLM software isn’t new. In the past decade, I’ve been hearing lots of good and bad things about PLM and openness. Last year, I shared my thoughts with regards to PLM and openness in my post - Closed Thoughts About PLM Openness. Few days ago, I had a chance to read [...]
Well, time is running fast, and I counted my first week of G+ experience. It is still too early to share any specific experience, but probably a good time to share some of my initial thoughts. For the moment, I can see Google+ as a real geekdom. Most of the people there are mostly experimenting, [...]
Back to the beginning of this year, I came with the post – Integrating PLM and PDM. Wrong question? My initial thoughts about integrating PDM and PLM was driven by growing interest to integrate existing software assets in the companies. However, thinking more I can see some additional aspects of PDM / PLM integration in a longer-term perspective. Few weeks ago, I posted From PDM to PLM: Unify vs. Integrate. I can see some examples of “integrate trend” happens now. I wanted to discuss two examples. Both Aras and Autodesk, in my view, are trying to integrate existing PDM systems with agile and flexible PLM environments.
