Under the Hood

PLM v. ERP - What's the Difference and Why You Should Care

Many business owners tend to equate Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) tools with Product Lifecycle Management (PLM). On the heels of last week's successful Oracle + NetSuite conference (SuiteWorld), it seems appropriate to recap the differences between them.

One of the biggest differences is apparent from their first words - Enterprise vs. Product.

ERP represents a business system that is used across entire enterprises for day-to-day planning and transactions. It involves sales, services, purchases, inventory, facilities, human resources, and many other aspects of the business, with the primary objective of tracking the business's life blood - its money.

PLM, on the other hand, is a business system with the purpose of "keeping the heart beating". Its value crosses the organization independently of ERP. The long-term competitive advantage for most businesses derives not just from their cash flow, but from the continuous flow of ideas, especially as related to their products and services. Much of this intellectual property starts ugly and incomplete, and matures within a PLM system into documents and data that are ready to be passed to an ERP for resourcing and execution.

What happens to all of the decisions that have been made up to that point?

ERP systems are superb at answering questions such as "When?", "Where?", and "How much?". But depending on the nature of businesses, they are typically ill-equipped to answer questions like "What to make?", "How to make it?", "Why is one design alternative better than another?". While ERP focuses on inventory, logistics, and financials, PLM focuses on concepts, work-in-process, and revisions as a design matures from a concept to something your customers will want to buy, and that you can sell.

Such up-stream questions often get to the soul of a business model. For many businesses, PLM ensures "doing the right things", while ERP manages the domain of "doing things right". Now, obviously, such philosophies are highly intertwined. And, for any particular business, the lines between systems may not be obvious. When deciding whether a function should reside in ERP or PLM, it is often enlightening to ask whether the function is critical to your success. Does it define who you are or how you are better than your competition? Or, is it critical to measuring your success.

I met many talented and successful business integrators and consultants last week, and I'm sure that many have their own thoughts on this matter. I'd love to read yours.

- Fred Smith, Sr. Solution Architect

Feature Friday: Joining the dots with PLM 360 Connect

So, you’ve taken the plunge and subscribed to PLM 360, configured it to meet your requirements, and it now forms an integral part of your suite of critical business systems, alongside the likes of your ERP system and CRM solution. But have you considered the value integrating one or more of these systems with PLM 360 might bring? The ultimate aim of PLM is to achieve a single common environment for product information, giving one version of the truth for all stakeholders. Synchronising that information with data in other enterprise systems and databases expands that concept further, magnifying the value PLM 360 can bring.

For example, synchronising bills of material in PLM 360 with your ERP solution can reduce time wasted re-keying duplicate information, and help avoid costly purchasing or manufacturing errors. Similarly, integrating PLM 360 with your CRM system can save time and improve accuracy in your RFQ responses. These are just a few examples of what could be realised.

“But, isn’t system integration really complex?” I hear you ask. Well, it doesn’t have to be. PLM 360 Connect is designed to help you do this, but in an efficient way. Just as PLM 360 re-defined simplicity in the PLM world, so PLM 360 Connect changes the game when it comes to ease of integration.

We’re creating a series of PLM TV videos to outline what PLM 360 Connect is all about, and what it could offer you. The first one focuses on joining PLM 360 to SAP, but the principles are the same for many other types of integration. Take a look, and see how PLM 360 Connect could help you join the dots …

-- Gavin England

Photo:Crayola

Managing CAD Components through Items

Today we’ll continue the previous post on Items and discuss their relation with CAD files

Items are easily created from CAD files (Inventor, AutoCAD Mechanical, Electrical, etc.) by promoting file data into a new Item using the 'Assign Item' feature. Note that these can also be created in a manual manner, similar to creating contacts in an email system. Upon the creation of an Item, a unique identifier is assigned using on of the available standard numbering schemes as defined by the system administrator. These components contain a list of system defined properties, such as Item Number, Item Type, and Item Title and Description. These properties will help users easily decipher a particular component from others. These components will maintain an interactive record of their revision history, including changes made to properties, associated and attached files, along with bill of material changes.

Each Item may contain a list of other items that it depends upon, creating a bill of materials (BOM). Users may build a BOM by simply editing the Item and adding another Item as a child. Further, as items are generated from the design files and listed in the Item master, a complete and accurate bill of materials is automatically created based on the assembly structure of the design found within the vaulted design files. By directly extracting the bill of materials, the chance for errors is virtually removed that are commonly found with manual methods.

Why is this important? Companies that track this data using paper based processes or using tactics such as spreadsheet management may now keep a living electronic record of their products. At any given time and date, users will be able to review a revision based or time based view of a product, including the bill of materials, the usage, as well as all related property information and access all related files. This permits companies to quickly and easily access the data they need to support their customers, as well as obtain a better understanding of how change has impacted or will impact their designs. Lastly, search and reuse of existing data is easier with a vast database full of product property information.

-Brian Schanen

A Closer look at Items

While engineering and design departments typically talk in terms of drawings and CAD files, purchasing, manufacturing, and inventory talk in terms of Items. Vault’s definition of an Item is the master record for all entries found in an ERP system. Think of an Item as the unique identifier that tracks all related data to a physical part, assembly, or document. In order to more effectively bridge this informational gap between engineering and the rest of the manufacturing organization, design data placed within Autodesk Vault can be assigned to an Item within the Item Master in Autodesk Vault Manufacturing. The Item Master is represented as a grid of all Items found within Autodesk Vault Manufacturing.

The Items found in Autodesk Vault Manufacturing's Item Master hold the bulk of the information that is shared with the rest of the manufacturing organization. To begin, the Item is the gateway for enterprise to get to key engineering data. The Item keeps track of the key associated CAD data and the correct versions that are required to properly build and manufacturing a product. Further, all critical data that will assist in manufacturing and supporting a product, such as specifications, supplier and catalog information, and engineering calculations can be attached to the Item for future reference. With one key source for the enterprise to look for data, the chance for errors due to personal looking at the wrong data is greatly reduced.

Key information, such as item number, title, description, revision, and type are all stored within the Item. More information can easily be added to the Items. Users can add customizable information to an Item record to provide additional documentation such as plant location or design group. In addition, you can customize fields in the Item record to display important manufacturing or production information without the need for special administration.

Next post we’ll examine Item creation from CAD files in Vault Explorer. Stay tuned…

-Brian Schanen