Product Lifecycle Management. Towards Knowledge-Rich Enterprises

Latest technological advances, driven by an increased industrial competitiveness, lead to the development of more complex technical products, which implement technologies from multiple fields of expertise (mechanics, electronics…). The successful design of such kind of products requires the ability of the involved team to communicate, collaborate and integrate their knowledge and know how. This usually causes data integrity problems, making it more difficult to access product information and knowledge distributed in various and heterogeneous systems, for knowledge management and reuse purposes. In such a context of knowledge management, methods and tools for information extraction and visualization play a major role, given their capacity to extract, represent and organize engineering information and knowledge throughout product lifecycle. The paper proposes a semantic relationship based management approach to improve product Beginning Of Life (BOL).

There are lots of activities in the product lifecycle, which are grouped into three main phases: beginning of life (BOL), middle of life (MOL), and end of life (EOL). Thanks to recent emerging technologies, information flows of whole product lifecycle can be visible and controllable. The PLM under this environment allows all actors of the whole product lifecycle to access, manage, and control information flows. These flows can be used to streamline several operations of BOL, MOL and EOL. In order to recognize the benefit of these information flows, first of all, it is necessary to comprehend them in detail. For this purpose, this study will deal with several aspects of information flows in PLM. It will clarify the concept of information flows and identify which product lifecycle information are required for streamlining lifecycle operations, and classify them into several types depending on their characteristics.

The research study analyzed the strategies used to managing knowledge during the definition of a new product, specifically, the conceptualization stage of preliminary product definition. This study analyzed knowledge needs and some performance conditions that R&D teams had to deal with within the context of QPD. The goal of this study was to understand the social and ICT factors that intervene during the process of product definition. A modified Benefit-Tools-Organization-Process-People (BTOPP) framework was used to describe the people, tools, processes and organization of R&D teams during the International Competition of “24 hours of innovation”. Results show that teams require a wide range of ICTs and a flexible knowledge support system.

The paper deals with the Computer-Aided Tolerancing and Product Data Management. It is especially focus on data and knowledge management system to support and improve the tolerancing tasks in product development process. The first part of the paper introduces an overview about the recent developments related to tolerancing supports and data management systems. Based on a literature survey and industrial issues, the second part proposes a functional architecture and specifications of the data and knowledge management system addressing the numerous needs clarified by tolerancing experts.

In today’s highly competitive environment, addressing product management throughout its lifecycle in a more comprehensive way has become a necessity. A lot of attention has been paid to the decisions taken within the early stages of product development, which can have a great effect on the entire product life. Knowledge provides a firm with valuable and unique capabilities essential for the successful product development during its early stages. Therefore, a firm must understand how to manipulate its various knowledge sources to enhance its own performance. This article examines the dynamic behavior of the interactions and feedback mechanisms between different sources of knowledge. Using System Dynamics simulation we identify the impacts of a firm’s innovation policy on its innovative performance later in the lifecycle, and find that, in general, focusing on the exploitation of external knowledge sources is a suitable strategy, but various internal factors should be considered as well.

The context and problem of identifying and thereafter representing, analyzing and managing information and knowledge about an organization has always been very crucial to achieve business goals in an efficient and flexible way. Particularly in a PLM context, the issue of information overload is growing in importance. An emergent challenge consists in providing a context-driven access to federated information and knowledge and fostering cross-discipline collaborations between actors to improve quality in product development. This paper highlights key issues for knowledge definition and representation. We propose a bottom-up approach based on the User Story Mapping method (USM). This method is user-centric and leads to the definition of current and/or expected scenarios and processes along with a collaboratively agreed vision. Common concepts and viewpoints are therefore derived and generalized through a process of merging defined roles, activities and usages sequences with a focus on the product content. This bottom-up approach provides a federated and common understanding of information throughout the industrial product and process lifecycle; which combined with appropriate tools and methods, such as questionnaires, standards specifications, knowledge based approaches, etc. results in the definition of the knowledge network and domain and therefore improves capabilities for sharing and reusing this knowledge in collaborative product development. The proposed approach is applied in the context of the FP7 European project LinkedDesign (Linked Knowledge in Manufacturing, Engineering and Design for Next-Generation Production) based on three application scenarios.

This paper describes a description approach for modeling product-process information in the contexts of assembly oriented design and product lifecycle management (PLM). The growing evolution of models, methodologies, systems and tools over the entire product lifecycle has highlighted limits and difficulties – such as the awareness and understanding in engineering – that did not exist before. An emergent challenge remains in increasing awareness and understanding of actors in the management of product information and knowledge. This requires effort in new inspired approaches in the qualitative representation and reasoning of the product and processes, in ontological applications, knowledge-based approaches, models, etc. The main objective is to make assembly information consistent, accessible and exploitable by data management systems and computer-aided X tools by introducing a logical foundation. In this context, product-process relationships are considered and described in the part-whole theory supported by mereology and its extension, mereotopology, then implemented in an ontology.

With widespread use of digital tools in industry, an increasing amount of data and knowledge can be edited, shared and made accessible throughout the product lifecycle. As such, new technologies, that provide a formal framework for managing and organizing the intellectual assets of a business, can significantly influence the application of knowledge and the extent to which this knowledge will serve as a source of sustainable differentiation. Similarly, much suggests that the management of knowledge can positively influence and support the links between individual activities in the value stream, hence enabling the product-centered approach, which is fundamental to product lifecycle management (PLM). This paper draws on our experiences as a PLM and Knowledge Management (KM) supplier and highlights industry examples in aeronautics. It explores the potential application of a combined approach that utilizes digital support to encourage the effective use of KM throughout the product lifecycle.

In many industries, such as leisure boat production, product design and process engineering are often based on diffuse criteria and a lack of data about the actual use of the products. If design and process development are not based on facts, there is a great risk of setting the wrong quality criteria and performance requirements. In the leisure boat industry the lack of data from how customers actually use their products results in product design based on experience (looking backwards), subjective judgments and input from certain customers or key persons. This often results in too high or wrong quality standards and consequently over-processing. ECO-boat MOL has studied this situation in the leisure boat industry. The paper describes how this research project has approached the need for more fact-based design through three different sources. The project also (re)defines work processes in design and production that take advantage of the new data and information.

PLM is a widely recognized approach to reduce time to market, increase process efficiency and control product lifecycle. However, service-oriented management is becoming increasingly popular to create new business infrastructures able to self-organize tangible and intangible manufacturing assets in a distributed and interoperable way [1]. The final scope is to manage not simply the Product but also Services along the value chain. The great modern challenge is the implementation of such a service-oriented approach and the shift from PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) to SLM (Service Lifecycle Management). This paper proposes a structured method to define a TO-BE service-oriented scenario and elicit business requirements towards the creation of an SLM-based ecosystem. A case study is developed in collaboration with an Italian company leader in household appliances. It focuses on washing machine, investigates AS-IS and TO-BE business scenarios by adopting Functional Analysis and Business Use Cases (BUC), and then defines the necessary business requirements to implement a service-based approach and create the future SLM ecosystem.

Fast changing environment put huge pressure on companies, which have to develop products increasingly faster in order to stay competitive. Change propagation in requirements engineering and life-cycle-management is a key competency to increase the efficiency of product planning. We propose a method using structural complexity management methods to achieve consistency between these two domains. Requirements modules and life cycle planning have been connected by matrix subtraction in order to identify changes in both domains. The result is an increased level of transparency of the regarded system. Additionally, traceability of change for supporting product planning in the early phases of a design process is enhanced.

Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) is an integrated business approach to the collaborative creation, management and dissemination of engineering information throughout the extended enterprise.

Concretely, PLM enables a supply chain to become much more competitive by an effective collaboration among customers, developers, suppliers and manufacturers at various lifecycle stages of a product.

Our objective is to propose a PLM model for a supply chain in order to increase its overall performance through better control of products at all stages of their lives. Thus, we will track product’s information on a supply chain composed, as a first step, by five actors (supplier, enterprise, warehouse, transporter and customer). Indeed, by integrating the logistics constraints in the early stages of product development, this will avoid additional costs and time waste caused by a product unsuitable for its supply chain.

Industrial companies evolve in a highly competitive economic environment in which economic constraints require permanent adjustment. Whatever the size of the company, it has to manage and optimize in continuous way business processes in order to innovate with respect to the environment. These requirements make information systems at the heart of this issue as far as these systems manage and adjust information flows from the perspectives of business processes. Our work focuses on improving the modeling of information systems.

The integration of manufacturing planning activities into early design decisions is paramount. Manufacturing constraints and opportunities should be investigated early in a product development (PD) stages to launch products successfully. Set-based concurrent engineering (SBCE) paradigm is pronounced in literature and believed to form the foundation of lean thinking in PD. In SBCE, alternative product-subsystems are explored simultaneously and weak design choices are progressively eliminated as more knowledge about manufacturability becomes known. However, there is a methodological gap on how to execute SBCE in practice and integrate manufacturing process planning.

This paper aims at conceptualizing the requirements to start manufacturing planning in the realm of SBCE paradigm. At the same time, the paper proposes a dialogue mechanism through which designers and manufacturing process planners are able to explore and evaluate alternative conceptual designs and process plans in parallel. Moreover, the methodology enables design and process knowledge to be effectively integrated for a better decision making.

This paper introduces a concept applied for a new PLM-supported process in steam turbine service business. The concept has been developed and instantiated in an industrial case: The paper starts with an analysis of engineering processes and the IT landscape in a globally acting company offering MRO (Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul) services for steam turbines. Illustrations show how digital product and service data is generated, edited, enriched, and managed throughout the lifecycle of a steam turbine. In order to enhance the already PLM-supported service process the concept for the new PLM process was defined within the company. The concept implements one single PDM system with interfaces to one dedicated ERP system. Illustrations of the new PLM process show how to manage product and service documentation generated throughout the steam turbine lifecycle. The paper provides first-hand experiences made in a PLM migration project, which implemented the new PLM process.

In the development of complex products product configuration systems are often used to support the development process. Item Usage Rules (IURs) are conditions for including specific

items

in products bills of materials based on a high-level product description. Large number of items and significant complexity of IURs make it difficult to maintain and analyze IURs manually. In this paper we present an automated approach for verifying IURs, which guarantees the presence of exactly one item from a predefined set in each product, as well as that an IUR can be reformulated without changing the set of products for which the item was included.

Reverse Engineering (RE) of mechanical parts consists in creating a 3D virtual model using data that are often gathered by 3D measurement systems like laser scanners. The resulting point cloud is then transformed into a geometrical model. The purpose of RE activity is to make maintenance or redesign operations easier. The boundary of the literature is the component, isolated from its product assembly. Because of on-field maintenance, a long time running in-use product may not reflect its Digital Mock-Up (DMU) anymore. In order to maintain an efficient lifecycle, the changes made have to be considered. This paper focuses on the development of a knowledge-based RE methodology to support the DMU maturity management: to identify the maturity defaults, which correspond to unreported changes, in the CAD assembly model in order to make it matching the real product. That approach is supported by a Core Product Model data model extension.

Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, manufacturing industries have primarily been responsible for adverse effects on the environment caused by pollutants such as carbon dioxide. Therefore, there has been tremendous pressure for these industries to be globally competitive within the range of environmental regulations and laws, which has been greatly increased and reinforced these days. In addition, manufacturing industries have been confronted with new challenges owing to the depletion of energy and natural resources, economic stagnation, and increasing human needs that become very diverse. Thus, low-carbon green growth, cleaner production, and eco-friendly products are main issues, and sustainable manufacturing is the driving direction in the future manufacturing industry.

PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) is one of the innovative manufacturing paradigms that leverage e-business technologies in order to allow a company’s product content to be developed and integrated with all company business processes through an extended enterprise. In this paper, we designed a new information model and a PLM system for sustainable manufacturing using UML methodology. We performed thoughtful analyses of existing PLM and sustainable indicator, basic schema and information model for supporting sustainable manufacturing engineering are developed. This paper also presents apractical case study showing information model and sustainable engineering by using commercial PDM software.

Product life management refers to every method or tools which participate to the collaboration of actors involved along the product life. The main topic concerns the organization of this cycle by mastering the evolution between its various phases. Collaboration is a main bottleneck since every phase will involve different experts. The main issue in collaboration is to ensure a good understanding of requirements and constraints of collaborators and to manage conflicts between different experts. Negotiations are expected to solve potential conflicts. This is usually done in project review where the experts must converge towards a common solution. In this paper we investigate the efficiency of a tool formalizing and structuring the project review activity. This tool takes advantage of emerging technologies, here a multi-touch table. We illustrate the discussion with a use case concerning the development of personal computer housing.

This paper proposes that Systems Engineering and Product Lifecycle Management are closely related. In fact, the contention is that one of the threads that has led to the formation of Product Lifecycle Management is Systems Engineering. Product Lifecycle Management extends Systems Engineering and uses many of its methodologies and processes. However, this connection between these two areas has not gotten the proper attention from either industry or academia. Cross-pollinating Product Lifecycle Management and Systems Engineering would benefit both disciplines.. The paper is based on the author’s observation and work at large organizations with significant Systems Engineering disciplines, such as NASA, the United States’ Department of Defense, Boeing Corporation, Lockheed Martin, and others. The discrepancy between Systems Engineering claims of being involved in the entire product lifecycle versus the reality of Systems Engineering ending its involvement with the product at requirement verification informs the perspective of this paper.

Although much PLM implementations and research have focused Q1Qon data storage and management, real value of data is achieved through its reuse, as data is considered to be an asset that acquires its value only by its consumption [1].The general data reuse process is described and two variants identified: 1) data reuse that results from stakeholders’ personal initiative; and 2) organization-driven data reuse. The data reuse process can lead to two positive outcomes: either the data is reused as-is or it is evolved/adapted to a new context. The data reuse process is analyzed and decomposed into a series of activities. Challenges associated with these activities are identified. Some of these challenges are analyzed so as to identify their constraints and their enablers – one of which is data spreading among multiple information systems (PLM, ERP, MPM, file systems, etc.). This paper therefore helps identify the steps toward improving data reuse.

Embracing Product Lifecycle Management approach involves integrating a product repository in the company information system. From customer’s needs to disposal stage, several product representations exist. The product repository purpose is to secure consistency of one product representation with the others. This paper presents an operational modeling framework that supports product repository implementation. In order to ensure consistency, this framework identifies correspondences between entities of languages (“trade” languages and standard languages). The presented concepts are illustrated with correspondences between language entities of

product designed

and

product planned to be built

Bills of Materials.

The development of innovative products is characterized by uncertainties that are the result of insufficient experience and incomplete knowledge, finally leading to risks. A multitude of different methods for risk estimation is available in literature, but only scattered approaches are known that support the reduction of risks in a methodical manner. In this publication four different strategies for risk reduction are investigated that either are based on an adaption of the product or of the development process. The results of the investigation are transferred into a concept for a risk response method that is based on a risk response model and represented by using Multiple Domain Matrices. The application of the method is exemplarily demonstrated within a development project.

In this paper an innovative approach is presented, which enables modeling and exchanging information about the uncertainty of product properties along the product life cycle providing improvement for product development. A system which is called “COPE” (Collaborative Ontology-based Property Engineering System) is proposed, which uses the advantages of an ontology-based approach. The proposed system captures information about product properties and the circumstances as statistic of fuzzy information, and combines them with the product model, to provide information about the actual and possible future product life cycle processes and the future product properties to the stakeholders.

Every company strives to come-up with innovative products that satisfy customer requests efficiently and effectively. The principles and working methods of Lean thinking have been suggested in literature for companies to optimize stakeholders’ interests throughout their product development (PD) process. However, the application of the Lean PD remains unclear from practitioner’s perspective. As a consequence, there is a low level of awareness about it and its associated elements.

This paper first identifies and presents key challenges and gaps that exist to implement Lean PD in practice, using some of the results of a field study done in Italy. Then, learning methodologies that are developed to fill practical gaps will be presented along with the results achieved in terms of increasing awareness about lean product development.

A prototype results from the need to verify various qualities of the product at different stages of its development. In set-based design, multiplying prototypes is particularly critical to enable a broad exploration of the design space before committing to a solution. The exploration targets the choice of the best of all viable concepts on one hand but on the other hand also focuses on documenting them to better orient the search during the next attempts. This ultimately contributes to gradually improving the company’s engineering knowledge. According to current aerospace industry practices and considering the set based development paradigm in Lean thinking, an approach to handle multiple prototypes information with Digital Mock-Up (DMU) technologies is forwarded in this paper. This approach postulates that prototyping and testing activities may be supported by a Manufacturing Process Management (MPM) solution with a special use of three key functionalities, namely: Product Data Management (PDM) and MPM instantiation, MPM links, and Configuration Management (CM). These aspects are essential when handling multiple prototyping sets along with their test results.

New product development (NPD) processes are characterized by uncertainty and iteration making them difficult to plan and manage. A novel dynamic model of NPD that explicitly models communication techniques is used to examine ways to improve span time and effort performance through improved coordination. Results of simulations under various scenarios of epistemic and aleatory uncertainty illustrate how coordination and adapting agile NPD methods to non-software product development can be used to attain significantly better performance.

Innovation is a critical ingredient of today’s organizations. Innovativeness helps organizations to maintain their success and position in the market. Numerous research studies examine the factors that impact successful organizational innovation, for example organizational learning capability, organizational structure, etc. Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems have been widely implemented to support organizational innovation as well. In this paper, we will discuss the role of PLM systems in fostering the organizational innovation success. Moreover, future trends based on the current PLM systems that would provide further support to the organizational innovativeness will be explained.

Remaining competitive in the twenty-first century in the world market is more and more difficult. Trying to keep a place in the market on cost and quality alone is not a valid strategy any more: others can do the same product just as well and at a competitive cost. Could teams and larger groups in organizations be more creative using them? This paper describes an experiment done with 300 university and engineering students from around the world during an event named “The 24 hours of innovation” held in 2011. Student teams had to find creative solutions to problems submitted by manufacturing companies in consecutive 24 hours. Results obtains show that many teams using appropriate creativity processes and techniques have well performed in that competition, helping them to create solutions to industrial problems submitted. Those findings could be applied to real organizations facing similar challenge to innovate.

In this paper, the Change Management (CM) and version control mechanisms used in the mechanical and software domains are presented respectively in the Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) and Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) approaches. Based on their comparison results, this paper discusses branching / merging concepts and presents them as an opportunity for PDM improvements.

The complexity of a mechatronic Product-Service-System (PSS), as a combination of products, IT-components and services, requires a profound system’s understanding already in the early phase of the planning process. For a lifecycle oriented planning the different lifecycles of the subsytems and their interrelations with regard to context and time, as well as overlaps through the introduction of a new generation or a facelifted version have to be considered and predetermined. In this paper a framework, based on various existing lifecycle models, is presented to analyze and to deal with these different lifecycle constellations. The framework addresses both the description and temporal representation of singular lifecycle phases in the context of the overall PSS-lifecycle as well as lifecycle constellations of subsequently following PSS- versions.

In 2010, an exploratory survey focused on design methods, tools and techniques, was conducted in order to understand what type of design practices are used in Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMES) located in Eastern Quebec. This study reveals that most SMEs declared using a structured design process while very few are regular users of structured Methods, sophisticated Tools, or specialized design Techniques (MTT). Because the results suggest that the design process in SMEs is not as structured as could be expected a new research was launched. Specifically, the research objective consist to identify the most important determinants of design performance and to develop indicators for assessing the design process as well as the other dimensions of design projects. In this model, six dimensions describe what is called the design system: the environmental dimension, the human and techno-scientific axis, management, the design process and the product aspects. The Dimensions are evaluated using an assortment of variables (descriptors) to assess the “design system” of an organization. Each descriptor is related to the following issues: (i) the type of methods, tools and activities used by the organization, (ii) the importance of the descriptor according to the project success, (iii) the performance level of the organization in that matter and (iv) the involvement of the partners. The questionnaire has been tested and refined on a pilot basis by eight partners. In addition to the model and the questionnaire, the paper presents an overview of the survey results and it illustrates how the assessment tool can be used to identify the challenges that a company must face in order to improve its design practices. Finally, it exposes the strengths and weaknesses of the questionnaire and it identifies the improvements to be made before to use it as base of an observatory intended to measure and monitor the evolution of design practices of organizations.

In order to develop high quality products with lower cost and in a shorter time according to the conventional methods, Concurrent Engineering techniques should be applied on projects. Concurrent Engineering discipline requires a collaborative way of working of relevant departments in a factory. With a view to manage all product data collaboratively and to give related information to different departments, product structure should be constituted in a proper way by leading of Concurrent Engineering Department.

In this paper, definition and content of product structure are explained. Product structure content is detailed regarding to aircraft structure which has different sections including all type of detailed parts like harness, equipment and structural parts. Moreover, management of product structure in lifecycle of an aircraft is considered. This topic is studied by examining different phases of an aircraft lifecycle in which the concept of product structure is explained. Furthermore, importance of using PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) tools for management of product structure is mentioned. With the help of PLM tools usage, management of software in product structure is studied by different methods. Advantages and disadvantages of these methods are examined and the most efficient method is proposed for software management.

Experience with data exchange standards has shown considerable limitations in their integration in commercial tools and their interoperability. The current trend is to use XML as a mean of exchanging data. We present in this paper a new standard approach for querying and exporting data from PLM in XML format using XPath/XQuery languages. An abstraction effort and an adapter implementation were required to make PLM content as usable as XML document. Afterward, the resulting XML content could be directly reused or converted to another format.

Today, product development is characterized by cross-company collaboration and an intensive exchange of product data. Engineers typically apply a multitude of digital engineering tools and act in diverse engineering processes. In a current study, the “culture” of today’s collaborative product development was investigated in significant detail. The questions are: How do engineers work today? Which tasks play a major role in their daily business? How much time is remaining for core engineering tasks like design, calculation and design validation? How do engineers assess their workplace (environment)? Where are opportunities for enhancement of processes and digital engineering tools? In total, 1,401 engineers answered the questionnaires. Details of the study and selected findings are presented in this paper. Interesting findings are related to collaborative engineering and engineering design, Product Data and Lifecycle Management (PDM/PLM), virtual product creation, information and process management, and new media in engineering design.

In today’s business environment, customer expectation towards product lifecycle information accessibility and quality is rising. Concepts such as the Internet of Things (IoT) respond to these demands enabling products becoming “intelligent” and capable of interaction. Simultaneously, society is changing with people spending more and more time online. Social networks allow them to interact richly with both their personal and professional contacts. Users of social network share information about their lives with a wide network of people who can respond directly. Being the most widely used social network Facebook’s functionality and usability have continuously evolved, culminating in the introduction of the timeline. The timeline is a representation of the users’ entire life, de facto managing the user’s “lifecycle” information. Considering the above developments, the question arises, whether it is feasible for a product to have a Facebook which acts as its product avatar, and whether that would contribute towards fulfilling the increasing customer demands towards product lifecycle information accessibility and quality?

In the current collaborative and extended-enterprise environment, product definition must be exchanged between original equipment manufacturers (OEM) and other partners who contribute to the evolution of product definition. In many cases, an information package, which is associated with other objects in the DMU, must thus be extracted from the OEM’s Digital Mock -up (DMU) and be sent to partners and suppliers to allow them to perform the required work on their work packages (WP). The objective of our research is to maintain the associations between objects when a work package is removed from the DMU of the originator, modified by the subcontractor, and then re-inserted into the DMU. We propose an association management model to transpose the initial work package associations towards the modified work package, to reconcile these associations with the DMU and then propagate changes towards the latter to maintain consistency.

Product definition technology has evolved in such a way as to encourage the proliferation of data formats used within the product lifecycle for various use cases. One such product development framework being proposed in industry today is the model-based enterprise (MBE), which is operationally driven by the model-based definition (MBD) of products. This paper describes current models of the product development process and the nature of collaborative data. This paper will also suggest a framework for evaluating various collaborative product representations. The nature of the data formats chosen for use in specific workflows have a substantial effect on the ability of users to consume data and the ability for an organization to capture and archive its critical information.

Doing business globally involves very complex and increasingly dynamic processes and demands a high level of flexibility and adaptability from the companies involved. In the automotive sector, the timescale for development of new vehicles has been drastically shortened, while at the same time the number of variants and derivatives has grown. Under these conditions, development processes, involving communication across different disciplines and locations need to be flexible and efficient. In its research project Future PLM, the project consortium investigates future demands for product life cycle management in terms of the way it handles roles and participation of people. The project intends to discover ways in which PLM can be made more successful in future and to pinpoint challenges that PLM will have to meet. A catalogue of requirements for PLM 2020 was drawn up on the basis of the results of interdisciplinary panels, four future scenarios, qualitative and quantitative interviews and of a sector-specific use case for the automotive industry. In this paper the focus is set on an important matrix intersection: human & communication. As a result a concept for informal communication and its demands on a future product lifecycle management are shown together with an example on a social networking tool (e.g. Google Plus).

Advancements in 3D CAD allow product shape to act as a common language to represent and retrieve reusable product information in PLM systems. While shape-based retrieval techniques contribute to the part design reuse process by retrieving similar part models, selecting the optimal candidate for reuse remains a challenge. A more refined shape comparison process is required to locate single shape differences between reference and candidate CAD models, and to represent them intuitively and functionally in relation to part design. We have developed a 3D CAD model comparison method focused on the representation of shape differences between similar models with respect to the reference’s geometric constraints. The proposed method comprises the explicit representation of CAD data, the mapping and differentiation of B-Rep model elements and the re-evaluation of geometric constraints according to shape differences. It will contribute to reliable decision making by promoting part design reuse during the development of new mechanical products.

Most of industries currently spend too much time to find information on past product design process. This considerably reduces the time it can devote to innovation. The authors assume that the design process meta-model seems very interesting for modelling the design rational and then for accelerating information retrieval. Indeed, the model of the design process partly supports every resources involved in decision making activities (i.e. who, what, when, why, where, how). The authors therefore propose the use of a MBE architecture for driving the product modelling based on the design process model. The UML activity diagrams and the IDEFØ meta-model are linked for supporting automatic generation of product models using specific transformation knowledge. The CAD model is partly generated from the product functional analysis.

This paper aims to describe the methodology behind the computer aided design tool TopoVisu. The objective of this tool is to support analysts and designers in their work, mainly by helping detect errors in models and meshes. But the error detection is not the only feature of TopoVisu, it also provides a visualization environment to cope with data portability issues. The paper briefly describes the type of problems that may be detected through the tests implemented in TopoVisu, and the PDF 3D exporting tool implemented as a mean of documentation and communication of the models and their validation.

In the nuclear industry, achieving Long Term Data Preservation is a requirement for nuclear power plants to be safely built, operated over five or six decades and retired. Among them, CAD data suffers from some strong dependencies on the software vendors and its data model thus leading to a possible weakness in the preservation workflow. This paper presents a modeling language, suitable for the 3D representation of a process plant layout, based upon a procedural Constructive Solide Geometry (CSG) approach. The language execution, as well as the layout rendering and exchange, are experimented using a platform independent implementation, based on free software and open standards.

To stay competitive, a large company must make use of its size and gain economy of scale, one way being through reusing designed parts and technology knowledge globally throughout the organization.

This paper describes a case study performed at a company that is implementing a new Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) system, globally across several different divisions, to be able to reuse design across the organization.

The study shows that though global design reuse is the final goal, the way there is long. The true benefits are still in the future, but there are issues with the PLM solution on the designer level. To prevent such a situation in the future, the authors suggest that

benefits shall be defined for all phases

in the PLM implementation, not just as high business goals for the final stage. That way, you keep momentum in the change effort and keep all parties motivated.

Our goal was to create a support for better PLM development target identification. A method titled ”PIA – PLM Impact Analysis” was created in order to help recognizing the most value-adding potentials. The method is supported by a MS–Excel based tool. The method was built and developed in workshops interactively with researchers and representatives from companies.

So far the PIA method and tool has been tested in two large industrial companies from heavy machinery segments. Results from testing the PIA tool are encouraging. The most remarkable benefits of the tool are achieved by improved communication and discussion between departments and functions, and the systematic way of gathering and analysing data. In the future work usability of the tool will be extended. The gathered data will be analysed and synthesized in order to build better generic future PLM models.

Not all investments in PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) are successful. Measuring the business effects of a PLM is essential, but can only be applied subsequent to solution deployment. It could be more powerful to make an early evaluation of the PLM solution, resulting in the business benefits, making corrections possible prior to deployment.

In this paper, a method to identify risks associated with a PLM solution is proposed based on an architecture model of a PLM solution and available PLM solution guidelines. Its use is demonstrated in an industry case and evaluated as compared to its intended use. The intention is that identified risks can help identify change proposals to the PLM solution or to obtain a better understanding of the consequences for solution deployment.

The findings indicate that the method is a useful support for identifying risks associated with a PLM solution. However, additional testing of the method in real settings is necessary to strengthen that indication.

The adoption of product lifecycle management (PLM) business approach requires the implementation of PLM systems. Currently there is a wide variety of PLM systems in the market, but the scope differences between existing systems hamper the selection process for manufacturing companies. This paper presents a reference model for PLM systems and discusses a preliminary proposal for the evolution of this model. The main expected applications for the model are: serve as the basis for the comparison of different commercial systems on selection processes at the industry; contribute to the definition of the theoretical scope of PLM systems; serve as reference for software companies to prioritize the inclusion of new features in their systems.

To this day, as a result of increasing PLM penetration and continuously changing company structures, several PLM solutions have evolved over time and now exist in parallel within many companies. Disharmonized PLM solutions can impede productivity and flexibility in cross-division cooperation and company-internal reorganization projects. A lot of companies carry out PLM harmonization projects with the goal of improving their current situation due to an optimal coordination, adaptation, and standardization of their existing PLM solutions. The present paper introduces a comprehensive framework which supports fundamental decisions that have to be made in this context. This framework allows an objectified determination of harmonization concepts by using both directly and non-directly monetarily quantifiable measures taking into account the perspectives of all of the actors involved. This approach emerged from the experiences gained from several industrial use cases, including the one that is illustrated in this paper.

The shift from sequential to concurrent engineering has led to changes in the way design projects are managed. In order to assist designers, many effective tools have been developed to support collaborative engineering, whose implementation is perceived as complex. Nowadays, industrial scenarios encourage companies to adopt PLM solutions, even if, sometimes, they can’t understand the benefits. On the other hand, many free solutions with comparable functionalities are developed, which have been increasingly successful.

In this article, we test different associations of software to make a comparison between free software and market solutions. In this experiment, 24 students in a Master’s Degree course aimed to design mechanical products by using software to assist collaborative distributed design, using two different configurations. This experiment allowed us to compare design functionalities between free and commercial solutions, in order to determine ways to improve efficiency in a collaborative distributed design situation. Finally, the feedback generated in this experiment allowed us to adapt training practices in engineering education.

In the context of a broadened product lifecycle management environment, a traditional product information management, also referred to as product master data management (P-MDM) needs to be complemented by other MDM domains. Such MDM domains may include Customers, Financials, Suppliers, Human Resources, Events and other domains. To satisfy such a transversal set of requirements requires a true cross-enterprise semantic integration capability. This capability cannot be met by current off-the-shelf technologies. This paper proposes a research approach that would elicit the definition of a reference architecture and a multi-domain ontology, from research and development work performed notably in ontology engineering, in both academic and industry domains.

Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) has always required robust solutions for representing product data models. Product data models enable information exchange across different organizations, actors, processes and stages in the product lifecycle. In this context, standardization of models plays a key role, since it ensures interoperability between the different systems that support information exchange. These standard models need to support diverse domain-specific requirements from the multitude of disciplines involved during a product’s lifecycle. Due to this diversity, challenges are to (1) develop multidisciplinary reusable models, (2) extend them to support new requirements over time (new products, new regulations, new materials, new processes) and (3) implement the resulting gigantic information models. ISO 10303, the reference standard for PLM-related data models provides two mechanisms that enable specialization of generic product data to address some of these challenges. In this paper we introduce the need for dynamic PLM-related information models, detail the existing ISO 10303 method and identify its limitations. We then present a methodology for enhancing that method using the Web Ontology Language (OWL) and ontologies for representing product data models and the SPARQL Inference Notation (SPIN), a new Semantic Web technology, for validating product data and overcoming OWL limitations.

To increase their competitiveness, companies need to increase the turnover of their products. They should continuously develop attractive new products efficiently in order to increase sales volume and ensure sustainability in globalized markets. The streamlining of routine engineering processes becomes necessary to improve quality and productivity in design and allows more time to develop innovative products. The main goal of our contribution is to develop a design process framework to allow a reduction in routine design processes which will thus increase time available for innovative design processes. The methodology proposed consists of integrating data management, information management, knowledge management, and decision-support methods and tools, such as PDM (product data management), PLM (product lifecycle management), and KBE (Knowledge based engineering). In the area of knowledge management, some methodologies exist to reduce non-added value tasks such as KBE models, Top down design or Design for X (Design for manufacture, Design for assembly, dis-assembly, etc...). Our methodology deals with the reduction of routine design by automatic design project initiation, including knowledge management. This methodology is tested in a firm specialized in rolling shutter components. This approach allows time reduction of “non-added value tasks” and allows justifying any specification by knowledge and know-how gained in the past. When a new design project is created, often it will require one or several manufacturing processes to create the product. So, the designer has to use his own skills and experience to define the task lengths. One issue is how to keep the information usable by every designer, not only the expert. Another issue is how to preserve the knowledge embedded into the product, the manufacturing process and also in the project. Our contribution uses automatic project initiation, stored in a PLM tool. The automatic generation is based on several models which use configuration containing parameters and knowledge. By introducing a tool using this methodology in an industrial firm, we can reduce routine design and improve design robustness. Additional research will be performed towards an ergonomic use of the tool.

Current standard models have improved interoperability in Product Lifecycle Management. But the increase of constrains surrounding information management in an industrial context, and notably for power plant design, like the increase of data, actors, systems and the need of automation and collaboration leads to an increasing use of ontology-based models. However, the design of power plants presents a specific issue, which is rules expression and validation. This need of rules is generated by safety, interoperability or collaboration constrains. The Semantic Web Rule Language (SWRL) is an ontological language based on OWL-DL that allows in addition rules expression. This paper presents SWRL rules and their industrial applications but also limits of this language in PLM applications. It proposes in consequence other rules languages.

The goal of this paper is to determine the role of a product architecture model to support communication and to form the basis for developing and maintaining information of product structures in a PLM system. This paper contains descriptions of a modelling tool to represent a product architecture in a company to support the development of a family of products, as well as the reasons leading to the use of the specific model and its terminology. The fundamental idea for using the architecture model is that an improved understanding of the whole product system, will lead to better decision making. Moreover, it is discussed how the sometimes intangible elements and phenomena within an architecture model can be visually modeled in order to form the basis for a data model in a PLM system.

System integration and simulation are essential phases in design verification and optimization of system capabilities. Currently, different approaches in Systems Engineering (SE) are not entirely taking into account integration and simulation constraints thus complicating the process and enhancing its running time. The target of this paper is to propose a framework bridging the gap between Model Based System Engineering (MBSE) and current Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) and Simulation Lifecycle Management (SLM) functionalities. In this paper we address these gaps between MBSE design concepts and the current PLM capabilities and propose an innovative approach to manage architecture design for simulation. The proposed framework supports the definition of product architectures so as to organize and facilitate simulation and the specification of different types of interfaces enabling the organisation of several product behaviour simulations. An example of this framework based on an industrial case study for the structural analysis of an aero-engine is described and discussed addressing the limits and future developments.

Product lifecycle management (PLM) adoption includes very extensive changes in intra- and inter-organizational practices and requires new types of skills and capabilities. A controlled PLM implementation can therefore be very challenging in practice. PLM maturity models, often at least partly based on the thinking of CMM (Capability maturity modeling) can be used to make the implementation of PLM a better approachable and a more carefully planned and coordinated process. Our objective was to enhance current maturity modeling approaches on PLM implementation, and we have argued for and presented a novel PLM maturity dimension, ”customer dimension”, that we consider as an important addition to current PLM maturity models.

This paper introduces the VPS-Benchmark – a maturity model for performance evaluation and improvement in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with a special focus on virtual engineering. By giving a brief overview on existing approaches for performance evaluation and improvement we point out the demand for a new maturity approach specialized on the requirements of SMEs. The new maturity model will then be introduced. After describing the basic concept of the model, we focus on the performance improvement strategy resulting from its application. The model offers a step by step performance improvement to SMEs. This improvement is based on a so called ACT-concept that motivates SMEs to deal more intensively with virtual engineering and to exploit its benefits by implementing concrete measures.

In recent years, researchers and industrial communities have been increasingly interested in Product Lifecycle Management (PLM); hence the product lifecycles have received considerable attention. The general features of the lifecycles are well known, however the special character of the equipment in research environment: the particularly long life, experimental character, complexity and interdisciplinary, are still not completely understood. The paper analyses the specific requirements and describes a common approach to lifecycle of equipment in research environment such as large-scale scientific facilities generating ionizing radiation. Based on the key findings a lifecycle model is developed. In order to develop this model, research includes a case study carried out in CERN (Geneva, Switzerland), analysis based on PLM, SE product development framework and discussion on the basis of the results. The research was done within the PURESAFE research project, which is funded under the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme Marie Curie Actions.