Table of ContentsReducing Program Risk with Earned Value Management explores the business value of Earned Value Management (EVM) processes and tools and how they can streamline program execution and drive down risk. The eBook shares a brief overview of EVM in business terms and shares how EVM helps companies gain control of programs, monitor and correct program health, boost visibility…
- Leverage PLM as the backbone for the EVMS, connecting EVM with programs and program deliverables.
- Look for solutions that already incorporate the right data model, processes, and algorithms. There is no need to create this from scratch.
- Look for a solution that offers flexibility to extend reporting and processes to accommodate additional customer or management needs.
Tech-Clarity's new eBook, An Action Plan to Improve Your Product Portfolio, helps companies start down the path to better product profitability through PPM. The research shares insights on how to recognize the need for PPM, prepare your organization for the PPM journey,determine the potential ROI, and select a software vendor partner. It's a comprehensive look at how your company can start down the path to better portfolios (and profits).
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free of charge, no registration required).
For the full report, please visit our sponsor Planview (free of charge, registration required).
Overview
Product Portfolio Management improvements drive top line growth, expand margins, improve corporate agility, and reduce overhead costs. Given the value, is it any wonder that more manufacturers are turning to PPM? Product Portfolio Management (PPM) has become mission critical for today’s product development companies. It helps companies drive strategic value by filling the pipeline with the right ideas, selecting the right projects and products, applying the right resources, and providing the right level of visibility to manage and make good decisions. Benchmarks show PPM processes and technology offer powerful business improvements, including double-digit percentage improvements in:
- Efficiency
- Project cycle times
- Innovation capacity
This guide is intended to help you get started. Tech-Clarity Buyer’s Guides help lead companies through vendor selection for their critical enterprise applications. For the most part, our guides focus on software, service, and vendor requirements. But several things make acquiring PPM different:
- Many organizations are implementing PPM for the first time (at least on an enterprise scale or with enterprise class business solutions)
- PPM requires a greater degree of domain expertise to implement and adopt
- PPM disciplines, tools, and value are not as well know in most companies (although some might be able to leverage lessons learned from IT Portfolio Management)
- Identifying the need for PPM
- Preparing for the PPM journey (and making the business case)
- Selecting a solution and vendor partner
Material Trends for Engineering and Production
How are new materials impacting your design and production processes?
Please share your experience. What are your plans for new materials? What challenges should you be aware of when using new materials? What are so of the best practices when using new materials such as composites?
- If you already completed the survey –> please share with a colleague or on social media using the “Share/Save” options above.
- If you haven’t taken the survey –> please:
CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE SURVEY NOW!
In addition, 20 respondents will receive a $20 Amazon gift card. See rules and eligibility requirements below.
The survey should take about 10-15 minutes to complete. Individual responses will be kept confidential.
Thank you for your help and support!
Interested in CAD Research?
If you have interests in CAD, you may also be interested in our CAD survey. We are researching top considerations on making a change in CAD tools. For more information on the study go here or feel free to access the 10 minute survey here.Rules
To be eligible for this offer, you must complete the survey and be a professional with job responsibilities related to or supporting the development, release, or manufacture of products. Vendors and consultants who sell software, solutions, or services to support product development are not eligible. Students without relevant professional work experience are also not eligible. A valid work email is required to receive the gift card. To verify eligibility, your work email must include the domain of your place of employment. Email addresses will be kept confidential and will not be used for any direct sales or marketing purposes. Duplicate responses will be disqualified. Winners will be notified when the survey is closed.
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Have you gone through a change in CAD tools? Are you considering a change?
Please share your experience. How did the process go? What drove the change? What should companies expect when making a change?
- If you already completed the survey –> please share with a colleague or on social media using the “Share/Save” options above.
- If you haven’t taken the survey –> please:
CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE SURVEY NOW!
In addition, 20 respondents will receive a $20 Amazon gift card. See rules and eligibility requirements below.
The survey should take about 10 minutes to complete. Individual responses will be kept confidential.
Rules
To be eligible for this offer, you must complete the survey and be a professional with job responsibilities related to or supporting the development, release, or manufacture of products. Vendors and consultants who sell software, solutions, or services to support product development are not eligible. Students without relevant professional work experience are also not eligible. A valid work email is required to receive the gift card. To verify eligibility, your work email must include the domain of your place of employment. Email addresses will be kept confidential and will not be used for any direct sales or marketing purposes. Duplicate responses will be disqualified. Winners will be notified when the survey is closed.
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Michelle Boucher will join Kenneth Wong, Senior Editor from Desktop Engineering and Simon Floyd, Director of Innovation and Product Lifecycle Management Solutions from Microsoft for a very interesting webcast on Thursday, June 25, 2015 at 2:00 pm EDT.
The webinar will examine some of the latest advancements in product development technologies, specifically the combination of topology optimization software and 3D printers, and how they can be used to solve some of today's key design challenges. Topology optimization software allows you to achieve material savings and lower weight by placing material only where it is needed. However, the unique shapes proposed by the software are not always manufacturable with traditional manufacturing techniques. 3D Printing creates exciting new opportunities to produce these optimized shapes.
Register here!
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[post_content] => PDM/PLM Satisfaction Survey - Status Quo is Satisfactory but Needs are Changing 
shares the results of a survey of over 500 PLM users exploring their satisfaction with their Product Data Management (PDM) and/or Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems. The report conveys the perspectives of a large number of PLM users ranging in seniority, position, and industry. The study includes statistics based on survey responses and analysis of open-ended questions and concludes that PLM users are generally satisfied with current PLM systems but have low expectations, and that those expectations will likely grow as they become more accustomed to today's consumer-oriented applications.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report or title to download the full PDF (free of charge, no registration required).
For more information on PLM, please visit our sponsor Aras.
Table of Contents
- Executive Overview
- Overall PLM Satisfaction
- Does PLM Help People with Their Jobs?
- Executives Like PLM
- Design Engineers are Less Happy
- Familiarity Expands Satisfaction
- What Would Users Change?
- Conclusion
- Recommendations
- About the Author
- About the Research
Executive Overview
Tech-Clarity conducted an online survey of over 500 PLM users to gauge their satisfaction with their PDM/PLM systems. The survey attracted a wide and experienced base of users. One-half of survey respondents have more than five years of experience with PLM, and over three-quarters have used more than one PLM system in their careers. The survey evaluated satisfaction with the PLM system, the use of it, and how well their PLM system is supported. Perhaps more importantly, they were asked whether PLM helps make their jobs easier. The results show a varied level of PLM system satisfaction. The most interesting findings relates to PLM satisfaction based on the individual’s role in the organization and how often they use their PLM system, specifically:- The higher in the organization, the happier respondents are with PLM (Figure)
- Design engineers (those that contribute the majority of the deliverables to PLM), are less satisfied compared to those leveraging the information downstream
- Infrequent users are less satisfied with their PLM
The research shows that there is significant room for improvement in PLM. Today’s PLM is a valuable business system that offers benefits to executives and downstream users but frequently burdens companies’ direct contributors and challenges infrequent users due to complex user interfaces which result in long learning curves. Although users express satisfaction with the current state of PLM, they were quick to offer areas that need improvement. The most frequently requested changes include improvements to:
- Ease of use / user interface
- Configurability / customizability
- Search
- System performance and stability
- Integration with design applications and other enterprise systems
Conclusion
Our conclusion from the data is that PLM satisfaction is relative strong but varies widely. Based on the data, respondents’ comments, and our experience we believe this correlates with their familiarity with PLM and how they use it based on their role. PLM users are satisfied with their PLM systems because they appear to have modest expectations or they have used PLM systems for a long time and have grown accustomed to how they work. Many recognize that the system they use is on par with what they expect in the industry, saying for example “It is good enough, I don't want to change anything now.” It appears that users are as satisfied with PLM as they are with the general state of enterprise software and perhaps don’t feel there are better alternatives. Long learning curves and poor usability, however, will hinder user adoption as PLM demands increase with the rising complexity of products and product development environments. We also believe that the expectations for PLM to come close to the ease of use and simplicity of consumer-based applications like Dropbox, Google Drive, and others will grow. As users get used to these systems in their everyday lives their desire for comparable usability will increase in the workspace. There is opportunity for improvement to place less burden on engineers while still adding value at the enterprise level and downstream. The PLM industry needs to address usability and configurability along with improved system performance and stability. Today’s status quo products must evolve to take advantage of concepts from newer software solutions including the social, mobile, and connected applications that are becoming commonplace in personal use. As one survey respondent commented “We need a future PLM. The current PLM is not ready to solve future challenges.”Recommendations
Based on industry experience and research for this report, Tech-Clarity offers the following recommendations:- Leverage PLM to add value across the enterprise and the value chain
- Look for more intuitive systems to help less frequent users
- Choose systems with better ease of use and fewer clicks in order to place less burden on users, especially design engineers
- Make system performance, stability, and reliability a criteria
- Place importance on the ability to customize the PLM system to support specific roles and specialized processes to ensure productivity and value
- Pay special attention to common improvement areas such as user friendliness, user interface, search, mobile access, Multi-CAD integration including ECAD, and ERP integration when evaluating systems
- Start thinking ahead now. Begin planning for the future state of PLM to address user needs for tomorrow’s more complex products and product development environments, higher user expectations, and fast-moving markets
A Ten Point Guide Using the Internet of Things to Change the Game for You Business eBook shares ten tips for companies who would like to know what they should think about to evolve their business and its products for the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT offers new opportunities for innovation, but it came be difficult to know where to start. These ten tips provide guidance to help companies identify where they should focus their initial efforts.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report title above to download the full PDF for more details (free of charge, no registration required). Special thanks to IBM for sponsoring the distribution of this research. For more information, visit IBM’s continuous engineering page.
THE NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT IMPERATIVE
With intense global competition, many of today’s product companies struggle to set themselves apart from their competition. The Internet of Things (IoT) offers exciting options for innovation through new business models and services that create new revenue opportunities. Companies that successfully take advantage of this disruption have a chance to create a competitive advantage and bound ahead of their competition. The challenge is knowing where to start. Businesses may even need to rethink their business aspirations and how they create revenue. To be successful, businesses must consider how they transform their business model, the infrastructure they need, and the impact on engineering. Tech-Clarity offers the following ten tips to help companies transform their business to take advantage of this opportunity and prepare for growth and profitability:- Rethink Products
- Consider Delivery Models
- Improve Customer Experiences
- Keep it Secure
- Support Standards
- Identify and Manage Requirements
- Derive Insight with Analytics
- Enable Reuse
- Continuously Verify and Validate
- Plan for Future Revenue
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The CAD Collaboration for Small Design and Engineering Firms eBook explores the challenges of sharing CAD and related design data with customers and 3rd parties and how cloud-based CAD management solutions can help. The report furthers the discussion started in Tech-Clarity Insight - The Basics of Managing CAD about whether a simpler, lower overhead, cloud-based data management solution can cover the basics without the cost and time required to implement more formal solutions. This eBook shares the experiences of small engineering firms including Mechanical Color, Paul Hammerstrom Design, and Zalaco, LLC. The research concludes that Cloud-based CAD collaboration tools can provide the best of both worlds for smaller firms - the basic CAD management features they need with the ease of use of personal file sharing tools like Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, SkyDrive, and others.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free of charge, no registration required).
For the full CAD Collaboration ebook, please visit our sponsor GrabCAD (free, registration required).
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[post_content] => Jim Brown will join Jeff Makarewicz of Giffin, Inc. and Autodesk's Kevin Robinson to share insights about product data management (PDM) on this exciting webcast on Tuesday, April 21. The presenters will discuss the findings from the report and how they impact manufacturers including Giffin.
Register now!
[post_title] => Jim Brown Shares Data Management Research on "Create Order from Chaos with Autodesk Vault" Webcast
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Tech-Clarity Insight: Unlocking Engineering Value for Small and Medium Businesses with Product Design on the Cloud
explores the business benefits of a design environment on the cloud. The report examines the savings from an IT perspective as well as the strategic value and competitive advantage it can provide product development.
Please enjoy the summary below, or for the full report visit our sponsor, Dassault Systemes (free of charge, registration required).
Table of Contents
- Executive Overview
- Lower IT Costs
- Let Innovation Drive Business Decisions
- Create Expense Flexibility
- Enable Better Collaboration
- Extend Access Beyond Engineers and Designers
- Improve Processes
- Overcome Security Concerns
- Conclusion
- Recommendations
- About the Author
Executive Overview
Today’s global environment is so competitive, it has become very difficult for companies to stand out from the competition. To be profitable, companies must design better products, at less cost, in less time while offering customers something unique. This can be especially challenging for small and medium size businesses (SMBs) who face many of the same challenges large companies do, but with fewer resources to address them. With this in mind, they do not have any resources to spare. Yet, research published in Tech-Clarity’s report, Reducing Non-Value Added Work in Engineering, “Engineers spend a third of their time on non-value added work. Even worse, 20% of their time is spent working with outdated information, which often leads to wasted effort and rework.” Figure 1 shows the breakdown of that non-valued added time.
Turning to a design platform on the cloud can be a way to help. The adoption of cloud technology continues to grow as applications for both personal and business applications become readily available.
As stated in Tech-Clarity’s Assessing the Cloud PLM Opportunity, “Cloud computing is generally recognized as the next generation of information technology (IT) architecture. Large and small companies alike are using cloud solutions to simplify their IT infrastructure. These companies are taking advantage of lower costs, faster time to value, and increased agility available from Internet-based applications. Many companies have already moved applications such as e-mail, customer relationship management (CRM), collaboration, and other systems into the cloud.” As an example, companies such as Salesforce.com have proven success with a cloud-based, enterprise solution, even with highly sensitive customer data. ERP is another example that is finding success on the cloud. Based on research done for Tech-Clarity’s report, Modernizing Manufacturing Systems with the Cloud, “…cloud ERP results in a better, lower risk implementation than most companies could support in-house, offering web class performance and reliability.”
Given the success of other cloud applications, it makes sense that those benefits would also extend to a design environment on the cloud. Companies such as AKKA Technologies have found just that. AKKA Technologies is a French company that provides engineering and technology consulting services for the transportation and mobility, aerospace and defense, energy, life sciences, and hi-tech industries. Philippe Obry, Chief Innovation Officer at AKKA Technologies says, “Designing products on the cloud has led to a 30-40% reduction in development time. The time savings come from combining the expertise of multiple team members on a single platform and giving them easy access to the design data.”
Such significant time savings can turn into a real competitive advantage. This report details the business value and return on investment that can be achieved when designing products on the cloud.
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Join Tech-Clarity’s Michelle Boucher on this webcast for consumer goods companies. Michelle will be joined by Raymond Wodar, Director and Business Experience Consultant at Dassault Systèmes and the discussion will be moderated by Kara Romanow, Executive Editor, at CGT Consumer Goods Technology.
The webcast will be held on Wednesday, March 25 at 2:00 EDT.
You are invited to join us to learn:
- The current state of engineering in CPG companies and how companies are managing the obstacles slowing down innovation.
- How leading companies like Barilla and MWV are leveraging technology to eliminate files and emails to cut their innovation cycle from 18 to 6 months.
- What ways companies can leverage PLM to cut innovation time in half, reduce rework and quality errors, and coordinate a complex ecosystem of functions, partners and suppliers.
[post_title] => Accelerate Innovation with Less Non-Value Added Work Webcast
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Tech-Clarity’s Michelle Boucher will present at DriveWorks World to share research on the business impact of a successful Engineer-to-Order process. She will highlight key best practices for both quoting and engineering that will lead to greater profitability.
The event will be held in Chicago March 16th - 20th. More information about the event can be found here and registration details are here.
[post_title] => Improving Company Profitability with ETO Success
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Tech-Clarity Spotlight: A Ten Point Guide for Using the Internet of Things to Change the Game for Your Business offers ten tips for companies looking to take advantage of the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT offers great potential for companies to bring new innovations to their products, but it came be difficult to know where to start. These ten tips provide guidance to help companies get started with the IoT.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report title above to download the full PDF for more details (free of charge, no registration required). Special thanks to IBM for sponsoring the distribution of this research. For more information, visit IBM's continuous engineering page.
The New Product Development Imperative
With intense global competition, many of today’s product companies struggle to set themselves apart from their competition. The Internet of Things (IoT) offers exciting options for innovation through new business models and services that create new revenue opportunities. Companies that successfully take advantage of this disruption have a chance to create a competitive advantage and bound ahead of their competition. The challenge is knowing where to start. Businesses may even need to rethink their business aspirations and how they create revenue. To be successful, businesses must consider how they transform their business model, the infrastructure they need, and the impact on engineering. Tech-Clarity offers the following ten tips to help companies transform their business to take advantage of this opportunity and prepare for growth and profitability:- Rethink Products
- Consider Delivery Models
- Improve Customer Experiences
- Keep it Secure
- Support Standards
- Identify and Manage Requirements
- Derive Insight with Analytics
- Enable Reuse
- Continuously Verify and Validate
- Plan for Future Revenue
Tech-Clarity Insight: The Best of Both Worlds for CAD - Taking the Pain Out of Multi-CAD Data within a Consolidated CAD Platform explores a new technological advancement in CAD that allows direct access to multi-CAD data. The report describes how the ability to open multi-CAD data with a simple File, Open, improves efficiency and collaboration.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free of charge, no registration required).
For the full report, please visit our sponsor, PTC (free, no registration required).
Table of Contents
- Executive Overview
- Realize the Value of CAD Consolidation
- Develop a Plan for Legacy Data
- Consider a Direct Approach to Support Multi-CAD Migration
- Recognize the Impact of Duplicate Objects
- Understand the Business Value of a Multi-CAD Direct Approach
- Extend to Collaboration
- Conclusion
- Recommendations
- About the Author
Executive Overview
In todays' competitive environment, companies rely on their engineers to develop the next great product that will create future revenue streams. To accomplish this and capture market share, engineers must develop innovative products with the high levels of quality and performance customers expect. This is a lot to achieve so engineers cannot afford to be distracted with non-value added work. To support the important work engineers are doing, companies should identify areas that waste time and detract from innovation. One area that can create engineering inefficiency is developing products in a multi-CAD environment. A multi-CAD environment is one where multiple types of CAD software are in use. There are numerous reasons for multi-CAD environments, including:- Suppliers may use different CAD tools
- Mergers and acquisitions of companies that use different CAD tools
- Past corporate initiatives to change CAD tools
After consolidating, there is still the need to take advantage of legacy data from other CAD tools for new or revised designs - this can be a challenge. A new technological approach provides the ability to directly open multi-CAD data, without converting it. With this method, engineers can open assemblies from other CAD tools without creating ‘copies’ of the original data. Data is only converted when it needs to change as part of the overall design.
Collaborating with partners or suppliers who are using other CAD tools can also be a potential challenge. With direct access, engineers can collaborate with multi-CAD data and reference it in their assemblies, without reassembling it when it changes. This report describes some of the technical approaches within CAD tools to make working with multi-CAD data as seamless as possible, while supporting the business benefits of a consolidated CAD platform.
Conclusion
With the competitive pressures manufacturers face, it is important that their engineers are enabled to focus their energy on developing innovative products that will create competitive differentiation and drive profitability. To support them, companies should streamline the engineering process by identifying areas of inefficiency. Engineers commonly need to work with CAD data from multiple CAD applications. However, a multi-CAD environment can be a source of inefficiency because it is harder to share and reuse CAD data. In addition, staffing is less flexible because engineers are limited to the CAD tools they are familiar with. Consolidating on a single CAD platform, while still enabling engineers to work with multi-CAD data, can be a powerful way to address the inefficiencies. One reason for the need to work with multi-CAD data is so that legacy CAD files from other CAD applications can be reused on future designs. However, using this data typically means converting it. Requiring engineers to stop their work to convert CAD data can be very disruptive of the workflow. Converting everything at once can avoid disruption during design, but it is very expensive. Plus, typically only some legacy CAD parts will be needed in future designs. A newer approach is direct access to multi-CAD data. This enables engineers to open files from other CAD tools, directly from their CAD application with the simple menu picks, “File, Open.” With this method, multi-CAD files are opened, but not converted so duplicate objects are not created. Because of this, the engineering workflow is more streamlined, and confusion over which duplicate object is the correct file is avoided.Recommendations
Based on industry experience and research for this report, Tech-Clarity offers the following recommendations:- Understand the complete cost of operating multiple CAD systems
- Evaluate the opportunity to consolidate CAD systems to reduce cost, recognizing the multiple cost drivers go well beyond software license fees
- When consolidating, empower greater reuse by making sure there is a plan for legacy data
- Be aware of the impact converting legacy data will have on engineers and seek to minimize the impact on their workflow
- Understand the database impacts of the conversion process and seek options that will not create confusion for the rest of the enterprise
- Consider a direct approach that allows multi-CAD data to be opened using “File, Open,” without converting it or creating duplicate parts in the database
Jim Brown will join M-Files' Greg Milliken in an informative webcast hosted by Kenneth Wong of Desktop Engineering. The webinar shares the complexity of today's engineering projects and how to combat the resulting negative business impacts. The webcast explains how companies can create an integrated view of their project-oriented information leveraging information management best practices and Enterprise Content Management (ECM) technologies.
Register Now
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[post_content] => Tech-Clarity's Jim Brown shares his views on how the cloud changes the PLM Return on Investment equation. The post, Cloud PLM - A Big Return with a Smaller Investment, is a guest post on the PTC Creo blog.
The post is followed by an interesting PTC video that shares information on their new product, PTC PLM Cloud.
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Tech-Clarity Insight: The How-to Guide for Implementing PMI – Making Product and Manufacturing Information a Strategic Advantage explores how PMI can help a company and the business value it offers. The report provides guidance to successfully implement PMI, including recommendations to support adoption.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free of charge, no registration required).
For the full report, please visit our sponsor, Siemens PLM, and their Drafting and Documentation page (free of charge, no registration required).
Table of Contents
- Executive Overview
- What Is PMI?
- Why Consider PMI?
- Why Should You Consider PMI Now?
- Plan for Success
- Identify Who Should be Involved
- Establish a Supportive Culture First
- Define Training Plans
- Create Demand Among Customers & Suppliers
- Start with a Pilot
- Capture Best Practices
- Conclusion
- Recommendations
- About the Author
Executive Overview
With so much global competition, companies are struggling to competitively differentiate their products any way they can. Much of this differentiation will come from engineering so it is critical for engineers to focus the majority of their energy on design work that will create that differentiation. This requires streamlining the development process so that engineers are able to focus on innovation. PMI (Product and Manufacturing Information) is a way to achieve this goal. With PMI, the need for 2D drawings is greatly reduced or eliminated altogether. Explains Jeff Erno, a Consulting Engineer for the CAD Tools and Product Definition Group at GE Power & Water, “PMI is very important to our business and supports our overall Model Based Product Definition (MBPD) initiative.” Adds Erno, “It also allows us to be more productive in producing our product definition as fewer views are needed to achieve the same goal and we can build the documentation faster than with classical drawing methods.” GE Power & Water is a provider of power generation and water technologies for utilities, independent power producers and industrial applications. PMI also enables better communication, which leads to fewer mistakes and higher quality. Andreas Pietsch, Development Body in White Manager at Daimler AG says, “It is obvious PMI saves us money by saving documentation time.” Pietsch continues, “Of course there are also less mistakes because specifications are more clear.” Enabling better communications improves relationships with suppliers. More importantly, 3D models can make it easier for customers to work with you, which is a competitive advantage. While PMI offers many advantages, adopting it does require some organizational changes, which can be difficult for any organization. However, with proper planning for PMI, the adoption process can be much easier. This report serves as a how-to guide to implement PMI and make it a success at your company. [post_title] => The How-to Guide for Implementing PMI [post_excerpt] => [post_status] => publish [comment_status] => open [ping_status] => open [post_password] => [post_name] => pmi [to_ping] => [pinged] => [post_modified] => 2022-11-14 22:27:43 [post_modified_gmt] => 2022-11-15 03:27:43 [post_content_filtered] => [post_parent] => 0 [guid] => http://tech-clarity.com/?p=4158 [menu_order] => 0 [post_type] => post [post_mime_type] => [comment_count] => 0 [filter] => raw ) [18] => WP_Post Object ( [ID] => 4363 [post_author] => 2 [post_date] => 2015-03-02 15:54:19 [post_date_gmt] => 2015-03-02 20:54:19 [post_content] =>
How Top Auto Companies Realize Innovation and Manage Complexity - Digitalization Drives Innovation and Program Performance in the Automotive Industry shares survey data and insights from the global automotive industry that detail the best practice processes and technologies the leaders use to drive higher profitability in the auto industry. The report shares that automotive OEMs and their supply chains are facing mounting product and product development complexity amid significant market growth. The report looks at the strategies, processes, and technologies auto companies are adopting (see graphic). Our research then analyzes the Top Performers - those reporting higher revenue and margin growth over the prior 24 months - to determine what they do differently and identifies a number of differentiating approaches detailed in the report.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free of charge, no registration required).
For the full report, please visit our sponsor, Siemens PLM, and their Automotive PLM Leadership Page (free of charge, no registration required).
Table of Contents
- Executive Overview
- Key Strategic Plans of the Auto Companies
- The Automotive Industry Faces Significant Complexity
- Identifying the Top Performers
- Collaborate / Design Concurrently between OEMs and Suppliers
- Adopt Next Level Simulation / Optimization
- Transform to Next Level Manufacturing Planning
- Enabling Technology
- Conclusion
- Recommendations
- About the Research
Executive Overview
The global automotive and transportation industry is experiencing a tremendous rejuvenation. The market is alive and sales and profits are growing. Within the last few years, automotive manufacturing has entered an age of innovation and witnessed unprecedented introduction of new models and advanced technologies to meet the challenge of doubling fuel economy and halving emissions. In parallel with the booming auto market is a growing level of product development complexity. This increased complexity results from a variety of factors ranging from advanced materials for vehicle lightweighting to the increased role of software in product innovation and product performance. Some like to say today’s cars are like computers driving around on wheels with over tens of million lines of code – but that’s a huge understatement. Today’s automobiles are an intricate orchestration of mechanical, sensors, controls, and software and are increasingly interacting with other vehicles and their surroundings. The resulting complexity is immense. How is the industry responding? Tech-Clarity analyzed survey data and reviewed automotive executive presentations to determine how automakers and suppliers address complexity and take advantage of the industry renaissance. We found that top-performing companies are going beyond today’s best practices in manufacturing and leveraging digitalization to realize innovation. These companies have transformed their vehicle development processes to take greater advantage of digital product models and simulation, leading to growth and profitability. Specifically, our research shows that Top Performers in the automotive industry are:- Continuing their lead in collaboration and concurrent design
- Expanding their use of digital product models to optimize products early in design and better validate mechanical, electrical, and software systems
- Expanding their ability to synchronize and integrate design and manufacturing
- Use more integrated, holistic PLM capabilities that allow early, model-driven systems optimization
- Integrate systems across the lifecycle to align and share design data from concept through production
Enterprise PLM Survey
Please share your views on how manufacturers leverage Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) processes and systems.
- If you already completed the survey –> please share with a colleague or on social media using the “Share/Save” options above.
- If you haven’t taken the survey –> please:
CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE SURVEY NOW!
In addition, 100 respondents will receive a $10 Amazon gift card. See rules and eligibility requirements below.
The survey should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. Individual responses will be kept confidential.
Rules
To be eligible for this offer, you must be a professional with job responsibilities related to or supporting the development, release, or manufacture of products. Vendors and consultants who sell software, solutions, or services to support product development are not eligible. Students without professional work experience are also not eligible. A valid work email is required to receive the gift card. To verify eligibility, your work email must include the domain of your place of employment. Email addresses will be kept confidential and will not be used for any direct sales or marketing purposes. Duplicate responses will be disqualified. Winners will be notified when the survey is closed.
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Reducing Program Risk with Earned Value Management explores the business value of Earned Value Management (EVM) processes and tools and how they can streamline program execution and drive down risk. The eBook shares a brief overview of EVM in business terms and shares how EVM helps companies gain control of programs, monitor and correct program health, boost visibility and management oversight, and demonstrate program control to customers. The eBook also shares how companies can leverage PLM to file the gap most companies have in creating an Earned Value Management (EVMS) system.
Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free of charge, no registration required).
For the full report, please visit our sponsor Dassault Systèmes (free of charge, registration required).
Why Earned Value Management?
Large programs are notoriously difficult to deliver on time and on budget. But expectations are high on program managers and program management offices (PMOs) even in the face of increased complexity from multi-discipline initiatives, intense budget scrutiny, and globally dispersed supply chains. Earned Value Management (EVM) helps reduce risk on high cost, high risk, time-sensitive programs. It improves a program’s odds for success and provides accountability and traceability into cost and schedule variances. It adds a new level of control, oversight, discipline, and rigor to program management to prevent cost overruns, missed scheduled milestones, and late delivery dates.
EVM improves program management by eliminating subjectivity. The approach lets program managers factually quantify program spending and progress. It provides a mechanism to identify and mitigate issues early before things get too far off track. It also offers a standard, proven way for customers and program sponsors to audit progress to gain confidence that the programs they’re funding are on track. Many companies choose to adopt EVM to improve program success. Others are required to use EVM for specific customers, contract types, and contract values or may need to demonstrate earned value to justify billing. Either way, EVM adds value and improves confidence in program delivery.
Compliance with ANSI/EIA-748 is required for DoD cost or incentive type contracts valued at or greater than $20 million. For cost or incentive type contracts valued at or greater than $50 million, compliance with the management attributes of the ANSI/EIA-748 32 GLs is demonstrated through a formal EVMS validation process. - Defense Contract Management Agency Instruction 208
Conclusion and Recommendations
EVM helps mitigate program schedule and budget risk. It helps companies manage large, complex, time-sensitive, risky programs. Further, it’s required to do business in some industries. EVM provides control, connects program data, helps monitor and correct program health, provides visibility to improve management insight, and demonstrates control to customers to increase their confidence. EVM requires an organizational and systems investment. Today’s advanced PLM systems provide an opportunity to extend existing infrastructure to connect disparate program information from schedule and cost systems, calculate EVM, and provide management insights in context with products and programs. Based on industry experience and research for this report, Tech-Clarity offers the following recommendations:- Leverage PLM as the backbone for the EVMS, connecting EVM with programs and program deliverables.
- Look for solutions that already incorporate the right data model, processes, and algorithms. There is no need to create this from scratch.
- Look for a solution that offers flexibility to extend reporting and processes to accommodate additional customer or management needs.
All Results for "All"
An Action Plan to Improve Your Product Portfolio
Tech-Clarity’s new eBook, An Action Plan to Improve Your Product Portfolio, helps companies start down the path to better product profitability through PPM. The research shares insights on how to recognize the need for PPM, prepare your organization for the PPM journey,determine the potential ROI, and select a software vendor partner. It’s a comprehensive look at…
Survey: Material Trends for Engineering and Production
Material Trends for Engineering and Production How are new materials impacting your design and production processes? Please share your experience. What are your plans for new materials? What challenges should you be aware of when using new materials? What are so of the best practices when using new materials such as composites? If you already completed the…
CAD Survey
Switching CAD Tools Have you gone through a change in CAD tools? Are you considering a change? Please share your experience. How did the process go? What drove the change? What should companies expect when making a change? If you already completed the survey –> please share with a colleague or on social media using the “Share/Save”…
Webcast – Optimization and 3D Printing Revolutionize Design
Michelle Boucher will join Kenneth Wong, Senior Editor from Desktop Engineering and Simon Floyd, Director of Innovation and Product Lifecycle Management Solutions from Microsoft for a very interesting webcast on Thursday, June 25, 2015 at 2:00 pm EDT. The webinar will examine some of the latest advancements in product development technologies, specifically the combination of topology…
PDM/PLM User Satisfaction Survey
PDM/PLM Satisfaction Survey – Status Quo is Satisfactory but Needs are Changing shares the results of a survey of over 500 PLM users exploring their satisfaction with their Product Data Management (PDM) and/or Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems. The report conveys the perspectives of a large number of PLM users ranging in seniority, position, and industry. The study…
A 10 Point Guide for IoT eBook
A Ten Point Guide Using the Internet of Things to Change the Game for You Business eBook shares ten tips for companies who would like to know what they should think about to evolve their business and its products for the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT offers new opportunities for innovation, but it came be difficult to know where…
Webcast – IoT Impact on Product Strategy / Portfolio Management
Jim Brown joins Patrick Tickle of Planview to discuss the implications of the Internet of Things (IoT) on product strategy and portfolio planning. Hear how today’s manufacturing leaders wonder whether they are a manufacturer or a software company. Spoiler alert – they are becoming both. Register now for the May 13 webcast sponsored by Planview. Free…
CAD Collaboration for Small Design and Engineering Firms
The CAD Collaboration for Small Design and Engineering Firms eBook explores the challenges of sharing CAD and related design data with customers and 3rd parties and how cloud-based CAD management solutions can help. The report furthers the discussion started in Tech-Clarity Insight – The Basics of Managing CAD about whether a simpler, lower overhead, cloud-based data management solution can…
Jim Brown Shares Data Management Research on “Create Order from Chaos with Autodesk Vault” Webcast
Jim Brown will join Jeff Makarewicz of Giffin, Inc. and Autodesk’s Kevin Robinson to share insights about product data management (PDM) on this exciting webcast on Tuesday, April 21. The presenters will discuss the findings from the report and how they impact manufacturers including Giffin. Register now!
Unlocking Engineering Value for Small and Medium Businesses with Product Design on the Cloud
Tech-Clarity Insight: Unlocking Engineering Value for Small and Medium Businesses with Product Design on the Cloud explores the business benefits of a design environment on the cloud. The report examines the savings from an IT perspective as well as the strategic value and competitive advantage it can provide product development. Please enjoy the summary below, or for the…
Accelerate Innovation with Less Non-Value Added Work Webcast
Join Tech-Clarity’s Michelle Boucher on this webcast for consumer goods companies. Michelle will be joined by Raymond Wodar, Director and Business Experience Consultant at Dassault Systèmes and the discussion will be moderated by Kara Romanow, Executive Editor, at CGT Consumer Goods Technology. The webcast will be held on Wednesday, March 25 at 2:00 EDT. You are invited to join us to learn:…
Improving Company Profitability with ETO Success
Tech-Clarity’s Michelle Boucher will present at DriveWorks World to share research on the business impact of a successful Engineer-to-Order process. She will highlight key best practices for both quoting and engineering that will lead to greater profitability. The event will be held in Chicago March 16th – 20th. More information about the event can be found…
A Ten Point Guide for Using the Internet of Things to Change the Game for Your Business
Tech-Clarity Spotlight: A Ten Point Guide for Using the Internet of Things to Change the Game for Your Business offers ten tips for companies looking to take advantage of the Internet of Things (IoT). The IoT offers great potential for companies to bring new innovations to their products, but it came be difficult to know where to start….
The Best of Both Worlds for CAD – Taking the Pain out of Multi-CAD Data within a Consolidated CAD Platform
Tech-Clarity Insight: The Best of Both Worlds for CAD – Taking the Pain Out of Multi-CAD Data within a Consolidated CAD Platform explores a new technological advancement in CAD that allows direct access to multi-CAD data. The report describes how the ability to open multi-CAD data with a simple File, Open, improves efficiency and collaboration. Please enjoy the…
Webcast – Ending Project Information Chaos
Jim Brown will join M-Files‘ Greg Milliken in an informative webcast hosted by Kenneth Wong of Desktop Engineering. The webinar shares the complexity of today’s engineering projects and how to combat the resulting negative business impacts. The webcast explains how companies can create an integrated view of their project-oriented information leveraging information management best practices and Enterprise Content Management…
Cloud Changes the PLM ROI Equation – guest post
Tech-Clarity’s Jim Brown shares his views on how the cloud changes the PLM Return on Investment equation. The post, Cloud PLM – A Big Return with a Smaller Investment, is a guest post on the PTC Creo blog. The post is followed by an interesting PTC video that shares information on their new product, PTC PLM Cloud.
The How-to Guide for Implementing PMI
Tech-Clarity Insight: The How-to Guide for Implementing PMI – Making Product and Manufacturing Information a Strategic Advantage explores how PMI can help a company and the business value it offers. The report provides guidance to successfully implement PMI, including recommendations to support adoption. Please enjoy the summary below, or click the report to download a PDF overview (free…
How Top Auto Companies Realize Innovation and Manage Complexity
How Top Auto Companies Realize Innovation and Manage Complexity – Digitalization Drives Innovation and Program Performance in the Automotive Industry shares survey data and insights from the global automotive industry that detail the best practice processes and technologies the leaders use to drive higher profitability in the auto industry. The report shares that automotive OEMs and their…
Enterprise PLM Survey
Enterprise PLM Survey Please share your views on how manufacturers leverage Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) processes and systems. If you already completed the survey –> please share with a colleague or on social media using the “Share/Save” options above. If you haven’t taken the survey –> please: CLICK HERE TO TAKE THE SURVEY NOW! Please fill out this questionnaire to receive…