The most popular and comprehensive Open Source ECM platform
Let us know more
PLM Obsolescence: Engineering Giants Struggle to Keep up with Technology
Large engineering companies are burdened with trying to upgrade and replace their legacy software. For example, Boeing and Airbus each have more than 2500 different software apps and tools that they use to manage the PLM processes for building their aircraft. The problem is that the PLM landscape of the software that they have cobbled together over many years consist of many products that are aging, obsolete, and don’t have any features or access to newer technologies like IoT, M2M, 3D printing, mobility, and virtual and augmented reality. Engineering companies have become very dependent on the older software and are now really struggling to reinvent themselves by spinning up and plugging in newer technology into their design and manufacturing processes.
A recent article by Engineering.com does an in-depth look at the problem of PLM obsolescence.
Håkan Kårdén, Eurostep Group’s CEO, said that “obsolescence in the context of IT and PLM means that solutions and software have become old and too expensive to run, or you have a combination of old things but you really want to have benefits of all the new cool stuff that has been developed.”
Brian Chiesi, engineering director at aircraft manufacturer at Boeing, said “that’s the way it is. Currently we’re a bit encumbered with the customizations that we’ve put in place, and we’re also encumbered with the proprietary data standards that are used inside those systems. So today, for us to incorporate new technology and capabilities becomes a very hard integration activity.”
Anders Romare, Vice President, Infrastructure Services at Airbus, said that “the biggest gain we can have is to gain access to data. Today, it is very difficult to access the data from many end users – it’s locked into different systems, sometimes in a data format that is difficult to handle. If we could provide data access to a broader range of people in the company, and thereby democratize the data, that would have a tremendous benefit for the people and company – really unlocking the power of the data that you have in the company.”
