Clarity on PLM

I had the chance to attend PTC’s “Project Lightning” announcement yesterday in Boston. PTC CEO Jim Heppelmann  announced “creo” as the “biggest innovation in the industry in years” and the future of PTC’s mechanical CAD (MCAD) offering. We showed up in a castle-like stone building with a prison cell in the room and guards all around. We sat in metal chairs at metal tables like a prison. In dramatic fashion, four men in orange jumpsuits labeled “Efficiency,” “Creativity,” “Value,” and one other which I think was “Innovation” were locked in the cell. The metaphor is clear – CAD has locked up the most important things you want from your engineers. Then – they are set free and the announcement begins. The meeting was dramatic and PTC got everybody’s attention right from the start. So what did the say and what does it mean?

What did they Say?

You can learn more and see the replay of the event for yourself at the creo blog site. I won’t spend too much time repeating what they said, instead I will give you a few facts and then share my impressions. Some key facts:

• The new suite of products is the future of PTC’s MCAD offering
• Pro/Engineer, CoCreate, and ProductView are now all “creo/elements” products
• Creo will be a suite of products built on an open, common database
• Creo will consist of smaller, lighter, simpler “apps” that are role and function-specific

What is Different?

One of the key differences PTC describes is a fundamental one. There will be one database at the core of creo that is acted on by a series of smaller, role-based applications. These “AnyRole” apps will be simpler to use and very focused on specific tasks. For those that want the power of parametrics and are willing to invest the design rigor in it, there will be an app for that. For those that want the flexibility of direct modeling, there will be an app for that. The “AnyMode” concept promises to deliver that on the same data model and make them interoperable. The demo showed a parametric model opened in the direct modeling app, modified, and then showed up in the parametric app with changes highlighted which were then applied to the parametric model. Pretty amazing stuff. Of course the devil will be in the details. I am not a CAD expert, but I understand this is a big challenge. But PTC appears confident they have it solved.

So if I keep saying “there is an app for that” someone will eventually ask “will there be an app store for that?” We asked that too. What we heard is that PTC is developing creo as an open system, and that it can be a platform on which 3rd parties can develop their own applications. Is that an app store? My guess is probably yes, but whether you buy them in one place is less important in my opinion than the willingness for PTC to open up the infrastructure for others to develop on. The infrastructure is there and it is available for others to leverage, including a creo application template.

Implications for Customers
There is more to the announcement, and over time we will all learn more. So what do customers do? The good news is that they have time to decide. As the picture below shows, the roadmap for creo shows the first release in Summer of next year followed by another in Fall.

The customers that I spoke with at the event seemed positive. But there is definitely a “wait and see” mentality. The phrases that seemed to preface most comments was “If PTC can execute on this…” or “If PTC can pull this off…” But that skepticism is healthy, PTC is promising a lot and they know they need to deliver. And in the meantime they aren’t planning to take away the tools that people are already using and getting value from. I was pleased with the way the execs answered questions about customer transition. PTC promises to protect the relationship and the investments of their customers. If you have a license to a capability today (like direct modeling with CoCreate) then you will get a license to the creo that app that delivers that functionality.

I think the benefits will vary by customer. Some will be able to take advantage of another aspect of the announcement, such as the “anyBOM” capabilities to drive configurations from Windchill PLM down to the design environment. Very cool, and very needed for companies with multiple product variations based on specifications, features, and options. But the part that seemed to excite the customer more frequently than anything else seemed to be the “anyData” portion. Each of the participants on the customer panel mentioned that in one form or another. The promise for open and interoperable solutions is compelling. But I am not sure that PTC promised as much as the customers thought they heard. But they did promise to bring in CAD models from other leading CAD suppliers and be able to adopt them in creo as if they were native creo models. The other aspect that excited the customers was getting the CAD data out to more people though purpose-built apps for roles outside of Engineering. The customers seemed to relate to the idea that their CAD data is locked up, and are looking to creo to help them solve that problem.

So that’s what I hear from PTC, I hope you found it useful. What do you think? What else should I have asked them? Clearly PTC has a lot of work in front of them, it will be exciting to watch this as it unfolds.

I had the chance to participate in a discussion by Bob Deragisch of Parker Hannifin at COFES last week. His topic, Living with Heterogeneous Systems, is a top of mind issue for many large manufacturers I speak with. So has Parker found the key to managing disparate engineering and enterprise systems? In a word, no. Sorry, there was no silver bullet answer uncovered by Parker or any of the other participants. But the steps Parker has taken and the ongoing challenge are worth discussing.

The Parker Scenario

Here are some of the key thinkgs that I took away from Bob’s discussion and description of the Parker Hannifin systems ecosystem:

• Parker Hannifin is now 135 divisions
• They have acquired 120 companies of all sizes
• Just in aersospace (Bob’s area), they have 8 divisions … and 6 ERP systems!
• They have even more engineering tools than ERP systems - 185 engineering tools

Does that sound scarey? It should. How can those systems possibly be integrated into a consistent, repeatable workflow? How can data be shared effectively across so many tools? How can engineering data be reused? How can employees be shared between divisions (or from program to program) to meet capacity needs? This is the challenge that Parker faced. This is not that different than a lot of big companies, particularly those that have grown through acquisition.

Parker’s Response

So given the challenges, what has Parker done? The first thing Bob made sure to say was that he wasn’t at COFES to present the answer, he was there looking for answers. He described what Parker has done to date. He explained that the first step was to try to homogenize. Parker developed corporate standards for their engineering tools. They have developed a systems design process that narrows tools down to 20 tools. For some, 20 might sound like a lot of engineering tools. For many, that number sounds like an unachievable dream. For Parker, it is a set of standards they are trying to move towards. They have one standard MCAD (mechanical CAD) tool and other singular standards for tools such as ECAD (electronics CAD), requirements management, and others.

So how has this worked? Trying to standardize on a single MCAD tool, for example, is “like herding cats.” There has been a lot of resistance by engineers that feel they are more productive in their tool of choice. Externally, Parker faces challenges in consolidating tools because they supply components and subsystems to other manufacturers. These customers ”expect designs to come in their format.” And Bob says they have given up on CAD interoperability.” Bob did add, however, that they expect interpoerability from PLM.

So is there help? PLM systems help manage the data and processes from all of these systems, and is a key part of the answer. New architectures make integration easier (see The Evolving Roles of ERP and PLM in Manufacturing). But this will be an issue for some time to come. If you have the answer, let us all know (and I will pass it on to Bob).

So that’s what I hear from Bob Deragisch at Parker, I hope you found it useful. I found his discussion relavent, open, and honest. Parker, as much progress as they have made, is still looking for answers. What do you think?