Breaking the Barriers to Collaborative Product Development

7/27/2019 Breaking the Barriers to Collaborative Product Development

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P T C . c o m

White Paper Collaborative Product Development Page 1 of 10

Expanding the Enterprise:

Breaking the Barriers to Collaborative

Product Development

Learn How Best-Practice Technology is Enabling Partners, Customers and

Distributed Global Teams to Work Together

Abstract

Product development has never been easy, but in today’s global market,

the pressures facing industrial manufacturers are greater than ever. With

more and more stakeholders involved in the product development process,

collaboration and communication are critical to driving competitive

advantage. The fact is, the product development team has grown outside

of the engineering department, to now include cross-functional internal

resources, suppliers, partners, and customers located around the world.

Your challenge: to bring all these globally dispersed product stakeholders

into the same virtual room – in real time– to help drive your next generation

of innovative products. If you ignore this mandate and fail to connect your

global team, your product development process is likely to become a long

and painful effort marred by miscommunication, poor resource utilization,

and costly rework. If you succeed, you will be leveraging a highly tunednetwork of global resources to maximize existing bandwidth, increase

innovation, speed time-to-market, and reduce costs.




Cross-functional Collaboration:

Extended Teams, Partners & Customers

In the vast world o industrial manuacturing today, there are as many

‘avors’ to product development as there are product development

organizations. While some see product development as merely synony-

mous with engineering, truly eective manuacturing organizations

know that product development now involves a variety o cross-unc-

tional participants rom marketing, procurement, manuacturing, sales,

and service departments.

And in today’s global manuacturing environment, many o these

resources may not even be internal; ever-increasing outsourcing is

now orcing suppliers and manuacturing partners into direct roles

in the product development process. In addition, thanks to Internet-

based communication and visual ization tools, your customers—

located down the street or across the ocean—now want more direct

involvement in every acet o product development.

The growing ecosystem o participants in product development is

adding massive complexity to the product development process.

These cross-unctional, interdepartmental, and external third-party

team members are bringing with them multiple priorities, drivers and

expectations that have to be consolidated and managed. Decision-

makers with varying degrees o engineering knowledge must be able

to review and provide eedback on design and execution at multiple

stages o the product liecycle.

In addition to integrating these new human resources into the pro-

cess, you must also take into account the corresponding technologysystems and processes they bring with them into the development

cycle. These technologies and processes must also be incorporated

into your product development liecycle, so that all involved can

exchange, interpret and retain data and present it in a way that is

relevant to each user. In practical terms, this means your collabora-

tive processes and supportive technology must be highly optimized

to coordinate so many access points and to manage each project’s

timeline, scope and ultimate success.

When Physical Distance Increases Product

Development Complexity

Another barrier to success, which most industrial product design

teams ace in today’s world o global product development, is physical

distance. True, technology and communication advances now pro-

vide instant access to a global talent pool, and manuacturers are

taking advantage o these new resources. In act, in a 2008 survey

conducted by PTC o more than 350 industrial decision makers, 89%

o those surveyed reported working with global teams on product

development. However, managing a global development team means

that you must collaborate while dealing eectively with multiple

time zones, language barriers, cultural dierences, and in-county

laws and regulations, among other actors.

Despite these inherent challenges, many manuacturers see multiplereasons to engage global resources. Some frms are setting up design

centers in low-cost areas so as to lower operating costs and increase

proft margin. Some are tapping into overseas labor markets because

o a shortage o skilled engineering resources in their own geog-

raphies. Some are acquiring companies overseas, then integrating

them into their current product development inrastructure. Still

others are partnering with third-party vendors to deepen their port-

olio with specialized expertise, or opening local ofces to provide

regional support to targeted overseas markets.

Regardless o their motivation, companies are fnding that distrib-

uted global product development is a proven method o staying com-

petitive in an increasingly global playing feld, and it is a trend thatis only increasing. In act, in the previously mentioned survey, over

44% o respondents said that globalizing key business unctions and

processes was one o their top three corporate initiatives, up rom just

28% the year beore. While advanced technology, processes and tools

have made these long-distance collaborations more likely, the very

nature o physical separation still adds additional complexity to the

collaborative relationship.

So, how do you successully build these global, cross-unctional,

collaborative product development networks? Achieving eective

collaboration oten requires manuacturers to alter their processes

and their product design structure – changes that industrial companies

have historically been reluctant to make. As a result, many ail torealize the anticipated ROI. Gartner Group studies show that about

50% o outsourcing deals – a predominant orm o collaborative

product development or industrial manuacturers – end in ailure.

Despite that statistic, nearly a quarter o the industrial decision-

makers responding to the PTC survey said they needed to improve

their collaborative global relationships. Realizing value rom distrib-

uted product development requires an understanding both o the

challenges o collaboration, and the tools, technologies, and processes

needed to address those challenges.




The Challenges of Collaboration:

Technology and Processes

Technology Challenges: Keeping the Product Data Set

Complete and Secure

Technology is the single, underlying backbone o collaborative product

development; it is the advancement o inormation technology that

has made most orms o collaboration a practical reality. Technology–

including data management, project management, or web-based

collaboration tools – enables manuacturers to manage the entire

liecycle o a product, rom its conception, through design and manu-

acture, to service and disposal. This extended product liecycle, known

as the “Digital Product Value Chain,” incorporates a variety o processes

and supporting sotware systems. The two main components o the

Digital Product Value Chain are Product Liecycle Management (PLM)

and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). PLM reers to the creation,management, and sharing o product development inormation, and

includes tools or design (CAD/CAM /CAE), engineering content and

data management, process management, documentation manage-

ment, engineering calculations, and visualization.

ERP, also known as Manuacturing Resource Planning (MRP), includes

operational planning, order management and fnancial planning, and

material requirements planning (including both worker resources and

raw materials/parts), and product data management. For both PLM and

ERP, the underlying unctions can be comprised either o a single system,

or point solutions connected with multiple integrations. PLM and ERP

systems are each typically independent but integrated, as the unctions

o each vary too widely to be managed within a single architecture.

Typically, new product development begins in the product develop-

ment system – that is, the sotware application or set o applications

that encompass all the aspects o PLM described previously (CAD /

CAM /CAE, etc.). For most engineers , this solution set is the primary

technology used or creating, managing and sharing product devel-

opment inormation. The complete product design that is created in

the product development system will be translated into a bill-o-

materials (BOM) and communicated to the ERP system or manuac-

ture and assembly.

Because the product development system is the main col laboration

tool used during product design, it has a direct impact on the abilityo extended teams to work together eect ively. Today’s best-in-class

product development systems allow industrial manuacturers to:

Get Digital.• By eliminating paper and moving to a purely

digital product modeling approach, companies can make

their intellectual property highly portable between locations,third-party partners, and internal team members. It is this

portability that allows engineers in dispersed ofces and across

multiple time zones to collaborate on product design around

the clock. The consistent use o 3D CAD (computer-aided

design) sotware, in particular, is a prerequisite to any

meaningul outsourced design st rategy, while the use o

complementary CAM, CAE, and visualization technologies is

required or these partnerships to realize their ull potential.

Get Control.• Using an eective inormation and process

management environment, companies can ully capture

digital data content, securely control its various versions and

confgurations, manage concurrent changes, and automatethe ow o inormation between members o the product

development team. Having a baseline o inormation and

process control is a c ritical prerequisite or avoiding chaos

during the transit ion to, and ongoing operation o, global

product development.

Get Global.• The introduct ion o Internet-based collaboration

technologies enables companies to establish “virtual team rooms”

that allow dynamic sharing o digital product inormation across

both geographic and company boundaries. When collaborat ion

tools and data management solutions are integrated, companies

can share enterprise inormation with oshore partners in a

select and secure manner, thus boosting productivit y withoutcompromising the proprietary nature o intellectual property.

In addition to having your human resources sharing inormation during

the product development liecycle, var ious technology systems must

also share data created during product design as well – including

both downstream ERP systems and, quite requently, other internal

and external product development systems. To limit the number o

needed data transer points, an eective product development system

will support as many o the varied PLM unctions as possible in a single,

integrated system. Picking and choosing product development “pieces”

– or instance a CAD tool rom one vendor, a data management tool

rom another vendor, and a documentation tool rom a third vendor,

is a strategy that might seem, on the surace, to provide more options.Alternatively, it may seem like too great an eort to move users rom

a pre-existing “legacy” system to a new product development system,

motivating manuacturers to keep some PLM tools even when choosing

a new product development vendor.




Integrating multiple product development technology ‘pieces’ usually

requires massive resource eorts, and in the end may result in poor

system-to-system communication, slow and cumbersome transer

processes, and data loss. The lack o data interoperability and the

need or ongoing integration maintenance required o a non-integral

product development system can make product development unneces-

sarily complicated and costly to maintain– or the system integrator,

the system administrator, and the manuacturer.

At a technical level, these architectures suer in terms o usability,

perormance, scalability, security, and availability. Also, by retain-

ing legacy systems or some aspects o product design, you may be

retaining technology that does not oer the most up-to-date eatures

and unctionality, which limits the efcacy o the entire solution.

Conversely, with a single, integrated product development system,

all o the application’s eatures and unctions work together seam-lessly, allowing integration teams to ocus on links to other enterprise

systems. This approach has ar-reaching uture benefts as well, as it

allows or an easier routine upgrade and update processes, as a fnite

number o integrations to the ERP or other PLM systems need to be

updated in kind.

While, ideally, each acet o the Digital Product Value Chain is managed

by only one enterprise solution, such as one ERP and one PLM system,

with little or no duplication, this is requently not the case. As a result

o acquisitional growth, department-level decision-making, distributed

implementation resources, and company politics, companies oten fnd

themselves working with duplicate or overlapping internal systems. For

example, within a single company, engineers in North America may beusing one CAD tool while engineers in an acquired division in France

may be using a dierent CAD tool, even though the two groups are

working together on the same design. When internal teams must work

with disparate tools and systems on the same product development proj-

ects, there is oten a dramatic negative aect on collaboration. While

in some cases the manuacturer in this situation can choose to migrate

to a single, company-wide tool or system, the available resources or

lack o centralized support or such initiatives oten make integration

between existing tools the only easible solution. Integrations between

these systems must ensure that product data, including change and con-

fguration history or product designs, is ully usable across tools, so as

to prevent costly rework.

Even without system duplications, some integrat ions are necessary;

any product development system must share data with other systems

during the product liecycle. Because product development is by its

very nature an iterative process that requires changes at all stages,

data that passes between PLM, ERP and other enterprise systems

oten goes in both directions, as opposed to a simple ‘push’ rom

one system to the other. This means that integration between these

systems must be able to manage a broader set o product and design

data points than each system needs indiv idually, to ensure that inor-

mation is not lost during these bi-directional ows.

Finally, because your partners and customers involved in product

development are generally independent entities with autonomous

decision-making teams, they may be using an entirely dierent set o

tools or their unction in the product liecycle. This can be an issue

or collaborative product development, when product data must be

passed to and rom external partners. The needs o these partners,

in terms o data-sharing, can vary rom relationship to relationship;

some partners might need ull access-control when participating in

product design, while some may just want to view the product model

to ensure their component is compatible with the existing design.

While the responsibi lities and the level o interaction with partners

and customers in the product development design chain may vary,

there is generally at least some level o integration needed. In addi-

tion to providing partners with access to the data they need, these

external integrations must account or multiple, role-driven data

access rules, data security, and the retaining o change and con-

fguration history (or audit trail) when data moves back and orth between parties.

Given the extended nature o current product development processes

and the signifcant transer o electronic and digital content on a

day-to-day basis, technology is now a critical part o any secure data

management scheme. For industrial organizations to operate saely

and securely, they must incorporate both technology tools and pro-

cesses that deliver seamless integration across distributed product

development participants. All these part ies must be plugged into the

process “at the right time, with the right access to the right data.” This

challenge is heightened due to the complexity o product data and

the robust nature o industr ial product development processes today.

To support eective internal and external collaboration, companiesmust careully consider their securit y needs, including the integra-

tion between the disparate systems, the overly ing process defnition,

management, and governance, secure end-user access, and secur ity

o data and data exchange.




Process Challenges: Moving Data through the Product Lifecycle

In tandem with technology, processes are central to establishing

eective collaborative relationships – with highly eective processes being critical to successul collaboration. Without eective processes,

even the best technology inrastructure will be less eective. Just as

product development includes many cross-unctional participants,

cross-unctional processes are involved as well. Implementing eective

processes requires a ull understanding o your entire organization’s

cross-departmental product development processes, and how the prod-

uct development liecycle impacts those processes.

For instance, you need to understand your company’s Proposal Response

process in order to understand how changes to an outsourced compo-

nent will aect that process in the uture: How will the change aectdevelopment costs, product time-to-market, and variant options? How

is this inormation distributed to teams preparing customer quotes and

proposals? How are special customer requests, which are outside the

partner’s current capabilities, addressed? How is eedback rom cus-

tomers or the service department communicated to the partner? And

what is the process or incorporating this eedback into later versions

o the component?

Plan Concept Design Validate Production Support

Management

Sales & Mktg.

Engineering

Sourcing

Manufacturing

Service

Process Landscape

Program Management

Por t fo l io Management

New Produc t In troduc tion

Regula tory Compl iance

Qual i ty Management

Change and Conf igura tion Management

Proposa l Response

Requirements Capture and Management

Concept Development

Sys tem Des ign

Deta i led Des ign

Varian t Des ign and Genera tion

Verification and Validation

Des ign Outsourc ing

Manufac tur ing Process Management

Advanced Sourc ing

Tool ing and Fac tory Equipment Des ign

Manufac tur ing Outsourc ing

Technical Publications

Service Program Management

Equipment Management

Performance Analys is

Component and Suppl ier Management

Produc t Marketing Pub l ica tions

Cross-functional Processes of the Digital Product Value Chain






Perhaps the one process that is most crucial to the success o collabora-

tive relationships is the Change and Confguration Management (C&CM)

process. Many industrial organizations today are attempting to manage

a multitude o change processes across an extended global enterprise.

Many companies still use manual, paper-based processes, while others

use technologies that are either homegrown or custom-made, and yet

others use myriad combinations o each, all in an attempt at auto-

mation. This lack o a single, standardized, automated C&CM process

creates a variety o problems, most notably schedule and program

delays, duplication o eort, added expense, and multiple avoidable

errors due to the lack o visibility and accurate inormation.

Disorganized C&CM processes can also result in incompatible or ine-

fcient synchronization o interdependent, but independently man-

aged, product development activities, such as sotware, mechanical and

electrical development processes, or development o connected prod-

uct modules by separate design and manuacturing teams. I changes

have not been eectively communicated and managed across these

independent design and manuacturing teams, you may be aced with

costly, time-consuming design rework very late in the product develop-

ment liecycle.

When working with partners and external teams who are passing data

to and rom enterprise systems, your in-house PLM system must have

a defned change management process, as well as highly eective

integrations and inherent confguration management capabilities.

Designers and manuacturers need immediate visibi lity into changes

and confgurations being made to the product design, and must be

able to immediately identiy any changes in product design thatcould jeopardize integration with the larger product interaces or

manuacturing.

Solving Collaboration Challenges: Technology, Processes, and Integration

Technology and Processes

As daunting as the challenge o creating a collaborative product

development relationship may seem, the economic and competitive

benefts make it an initiative that the majority o industrial manuac-

turers deem worthy o pursuing. Collaboration throughout the entire

product liecycle, rom design to manuactur ing and beyond, can bedone eectively with best-in-class technologies and practices. By

choosing the right technology platorms, by consolidating duplicate

and overlapping systems, and by creating highly eective system

integrations, industrial manuacturers can create a strong technol-

ogy oundation or successul collaboration practices.

Today’s best-in-class PLM and ERP technologies are able to support

eective processes via automated workows and advanced capabili-

ties. ‘Automated’ means that product data is moved rom one step in

the product development cycle to the next, t riggered by events or the

completion o tasks. On the PLM (Product Liecycle Management)

side o the Digital Value Chain, in the product development system,

this data can include MCAD and ECAD data, calculations, illustrations

and technical publications. This entire set o product development

data, including a history o changes, moves through the product lie-

cycle as a single representation o the entire product. Because the

entire set o data needs to be kept complete, yet also needs to be

fltered based on the needs and rights o the user, the product devel-

opment tool should be a single, integral system that incorporates

a common database schema, business objects, process models and

web-based user interace, including single login.

The most eect ive product development systems work natively with

the many orms o product data that must be shared across resources,

including data generated rom other PLM systems. This results in

aster data conversion and transer, data presentation that is appro-

priate to the role o the specifc user, and workow management to

keep complex, multi-departmental schedules on time.

In addition, a system architecture that is built upon industry standards

is better able to support the variety o users who must participate in

product development workows– including people rom various depart-

ments within the company, as well as external users, such as suppliers,

partners and customer communities.

The ultimate purpose o the product development system is to opti-mize the business processes that companies need to execute in order to

develop competitive products and achieve their business initiatives. A

system that merely delivers a hodgepodge o eatures and unctions is

not optimized to acilitate the execution o specifc business processes.

Recognizing the act that business processes are what drive product

development, best-in-class solutions automate and optimize business

processes, both those that are contained within the product development

solution and those that extend beyond into other enterprise PLM and

ERP systems. Consolidated enterprise systems can also play an important

role in increasing a company’s competitiveness by allowing continuous

improvements and automation o business processes and procedures.

By start ing with a solid product development system base and an

understanding o the related product development processes, you

can ocus your integration eorts on connecting PLM with ERP and

coordinating with other best-in-class solutions or other enterprise

capabilities (CRM, etc).




Implementing End-to-End Digital Product Value Chain

Processes and Solutions

When implementing PLM, ERP and other enterprise solutions, indus-trial manuacturers oten attempt custom integrations. Oten, this

‘one-o’ approach can ulfll the needs o a given business process.

However, one-o applications typically require high levels o ongoing

administrative attention and manual exception handling. In most cases,

companies don’t recognize or understand the high cost o resources –

human and fnancial– consumed by the ongoing administration o

their application interaces. The more custom code a company devel-

ops, the more code it must maintain, using either its own IT department

or an outsourced development service. Beyond the resources needed

to create custom sotware code, resources are also needed to test and

implement this code; these tasks are difcult and time-consuming or

most traditional IT departments who, as a rule, are more likely to lever-

age commercial applications whenever possible.

One o the most difcult aspects o working with customized sotware

applications is that every time a new release o the source code or

target sotware is available, much o the development process has to be

redone. Scalability is also an issue with custom integrations; as business

processes expand to support a growing enterprise, they oten all short

o evolving business requirements and are too inexible to accommo-

date additional systems. Inevitably, the shortcomings o these integra-

tions are “fxed” with manual processes that are resource-intensive

and prone to error. The result is pockets o efciency with signifcant

process and inormation gaps in the overall enterprise system.

Commercial middleware applications are helpul, but they don’t oer

any business logic to support manuacturing business processes, thus

leaving a signifcant portion o the integration eorts to in-house

or outsourced third–party integration teams. As a rule, traditional

approaches to integration don’t yield all o the expected benefts.

Process Collaboration/SOA Foundation

Technology Collaboration

Concept Development

System Design

Detailed Design

Variant Design and Generation

Verification and Validation

Design Outsourcing

Program andPortfolio

Management

RequirementsManagement

DataManagement

DataManagement

DataManagement

DataManagement

MechanicalAuthoring

ElectricalAuthoring

SoftwareAuthoring

Analysis &Simulation

EnterprisePDM ERP EAM

OtherEnterprise

Applications

Cross-Functional Collaboration

PLM Functions ERP Functions

Project/BusinessManagement

(OEM and/or Suppliers)Engineers

(OEM and/or Suppliers) Quality Operations Sales Service

SOA Foundation and Reference Architecture




Eect ive integrations consider not only the technology platorms

that need to be connected, but the business processes that these

technology platorms are intended to support. Business Process Management (BPM) is a discipline that combines sotware capabil i-

ties and business expert ise to accelerate process improvements and

acilitate business innovation. BPM relies on an enabling technology

called Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), an IT architecture that

supports integrating a business as linked ‘services’.

SOA is a methodology or approach on how to integrate dierent sot-

ware applications. It is not a sotware product or a communication

standard. However, there are certain kinds o middleware and cer tain

sotware standards that are typically used when implementing an

SOA solution.

When integrating two enterprise applications, there are typically

three main components:

1. An integration layer or module or the frst application that

utilizes an Internet communication protocol such as XML

2. A middleware application (such as IBM WebSphere)

3. An integration layer or module or the second application that

utilizes an Internet communication protocol such as XML

Protocols, such as XML, can signifcantly reduce the work involved in

developing an interace. In addition, an existing interace can be reused

with other applications instead o having to develop a new interace.

SOA can greatly lower the amount o eort in developing composite

applications that rely on inormation rom a number o dierent appli-

cations. SOA also enables IT to simpliy application and system integra-

tion, and to better reuse existing applications. Thus, the overall business

value o SOA is that it lowers the IT total cost o ownership.

Helping manuacturing companies extend the value o their invest-

ments in enterprise applications, by better leveraging vital data

across the enterprise, will not only improve collaboration, increase

productivity and reduce the time and cost to bring new products

to market, but it will also enhance the strategic importance o these

applications to all users in the enterprise.

The combination o PLM with SOA concepts eliminates integration

and process complexity issues by changing the way data is structuredand handled. With this approach, a ‘ederated’ inormation mechanism,

based on open standards, is created, rom which all applications access

and share data. Here, business processes exist independent o specifc

applications and are viewed and accessed by all companies participat-

ing in a product development value chain. This allows business exibil-

ity and better responsiveness to changes in the competitive landscape.

Portals provide access and visibility into all business processes relevant

to particular user roles, enabling support o better business decisions as

well as role-based access to inormation.

Why Is ‘SOA for PLM’ Critical for Collaboration?

A truly successul Digital Product Value Chain requires an under-

standing o:

1. The ‘big picture’ view o the enterprise technology systems

involved in the product liecycle

2. The interdepartmental processes that are aected by product

development and product management

3. The interrelation between technology systems and processes

This big picture view includes both internal processes, and the related

processes o your partners. Thus, in order to be successul, any related

integration eort must also consider all o these extended, collabora-

tive relationships. Only with these relationships in mind are you best

able to:

Formalize repeatable processes around best pract ices at all levels•

Improve people’s capabilities to execute the processes in•

day-to-day work

Deploy sotware and service capabilities designed to•

support process

Plan the changes to coincide with product development programs•

Mapping out the processes enables you to identi y integration points

between your processes and your partners’ processes. This allows you

and your collaboration partners to:

Establish a common understanding o terminology, scope and•

relationships between processes selected or improvement

Prov ide the basis or validation o process ow, including tasks,•

roles and sotware alignment at multiple maturity levels

Prov ide documentation o multi-level, best-practice procedures•

or training

By eliminating traditional inormation silos and making vital product

inormation visible throughout an enterprise, an SOA-enabled Digital

Product Value Chain connects the distinct systems, processes and

resources, and creates a unifed source o all product inormation.

An SOA-enabled, end-to-end solution provides business decisionsupport, increases exibilit y and responsiveness, and improves inte-

gration with the value chain, enabling CEOs to continually innovate

their products, their business processes, and their PLM inrastruc-

tures. SOA also creates an ecosystem in which multiple solution

developers, integrators and IT consultants can collaborate, replacing

competition with cooperation– a proound beneft to the client.

By permitting heterogeneous hardware and sotware to operate together

smoothly through a shared commitment to open standards, SOA truly

delivers on the long-held client dream to mix and match best-o-breed

PLM and ERP applications to achieve a system uniquely suited to their

special goals and challenges. The result can be client solutions tailored

or the various industries, such as aerospace and deence, automotive,consumer products, electronics and industrial products.




Conclusion

For many o today’s industr ial manuacturers, the Digital P roduct

Value Chain involves cross-unctional, interdepartmental, geograph-

ically dispersed, and third-party team members, along with a variety

o technology applications, and a plethora o interrelated processes.

Progress ive manuacturers must move away rom silos o inorma-

tion and processes, and transition towards a view o the product

liecycle as an integrated ow o product data.

To optimize collaborative product development, whether you are

collaborating with internal or external resources, you must have a

complete view both o technologies and processes in order to suc-

ceed. Companies are most successul in attaining the value they expect

rom collaboration initiatives when they ollow these best practices and

supporting methodologies:

Build PLM process on a strong, integral product development•

technology oundation. Best-in-class product development

systems make engineering data and intellectual property highly

portable, eliminating the barriers o time zones and enabling

collaboration on product design around the clock. They support

the control o product inormation and the management o

changes and confgurations– which becomes increasingly

important as product data moves to and rom other PLM and

ERP systems. Product development systems should also support

the sharing o inormation with partners in a select and secure

manner, enabling productiv ity without compromising the

proprietary nature o intellectual property.

Understand your organization’s end-to-end product development•

processes. Include those processes that happen both internally

and externally with partners. By looking at product liecycle

processes across all departments– and not just those processes

within your engineer ing department–you can anticipate which

concurrent, dependant, or intersecting processes will be aected

by changes.

Eective product development collaboration requires eective•

product liecycle management, or PLM. For eective PLM, both

the technology tools and the business processes that support

the entire liecycle o product data need to be connected. These

integrations must incorporate an understanding o the enterpr isetechnology systems and the interdepartmental processes that are

aected by product development, and how these systems and

processes are interrelated. This big picture v iew includes both

internal processes, and the related processes o your partners.

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3951-Collaborat ive PD-WP-1008

Whether you need to respond to increased compet ition, or you need

global resources to meet engineering bandwidth demands, you

must develop strong collaborative relationships to be successul. Without the r ight technologies and processes in place, producti vity

will decrease, changes w ill take longer to manage, costs wil l go up,

and time-to-market will suer. Eective collaboration is not just a

bonus; it can make the dierence between sinking or swimming in a

competitive global market. Understanding the challenges o collabo-

ration, and how to best address them through technology, processes,

and a “big picture view” o the Digital Product Value Chain, is the

secret to realizing the potential benefts o these new product devel-

opment opportunities.

Above all else, when optimizing your processes, choose technology

providers who oer best-in-class solutions, proven expertise, and an

understanding o the entire product development liecycle. Whether your organization consists o distributed internal teams, or a network

o global design partners, you should select providers that understand

the product liecycle ramework both inside and outside o the internal

engineering department, so they can help you achieve success.

Documents

Breaking the Barriers to Collaborative Product Development