PLM: Underutilized and Abused Systems

Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) software is a technology that means a lot of different things to different people.  Part of the reason for that is that many different flavors of the technology have grown up, servicing distinctly different market segments.  Some of these variations include specialized PLM systems for the following industries:

• Discrete Manufacturing  (PTC, Dassault, Siemens, Autodesk, SAP, Oracle, and others)
• Fashion/Apparel Industry (Dassault, PTC, Lectra, Gerber)
• Process Industries (Oracle Agile Process PLM, Dassault ENOVIA, Selerant, Siemens Teamcenter, and Infor Optiva PLM)

PLM software is often very specialized and packaged as a point solution addressing a particular market segment.  And, as a result, PLM software can often be very expensive.   But many PLM systems are underutilized, often because the effort to fully utilize the systems for managing the full range of data and data relationships is hard.

A study by CMstat.com found that  in the aerospace industry, 94 percent of data types managed by PLM systems fell into just four categories:  engineering changes, assembly documents, bills of material, and part information.  The CMstat report called these PLM systems ‘abused’ and underutilized, given the potential capabilities of the systems compared to the extent of the capabilities that were used.  The breakdown of part data stored in these systems was as follows:

• 25.00 percent – Model data
• 18.75 percent – Part/Vendor Information
• 12.50 percent — Warranty Information
• 6.25 percent — Packaging and Test Data
• 6.25 percent — Serial and Tracking Numbers
• 6.25 percent — Cost Data

In fact, very often, PLM systems are used more like ECM or Document Management Systems, primarily to store unstructured data documents.  The 20-80 rule of thumb for the ratio of volumes of structured versus unstructured data being generated in organizations holds also for industries that adopt PLM.  The CMstat study found the following types of unstructured data stored in PLM systems:

• 87.5 percent — Design documents
• 56.25 percent — Technical reports, Specifications
• 56.25 percent — Software documentation
• 56.25 percent — Interface diagrams
• 50 percent — Bill of Materials
• 37.5 percent — Schematics
• 37.5 percent – -User Guides
• 37.5 percent — Manuals
• 31.25 percent — Corporate Documentation
• 25.00 percent — Training Guides
• 6.25 percent — Marketing Brochures

Companies considering the adoption of PLM might first carefully look at how they plan to use the system.  In many cases, an ECM system for storing and managing structured data may be sufficient for addressing many of the requirements, and ECM systems tend to be far more cost efficient than PLM solutions.