applications showing the biggest gains at 19.1% growth.
In spite of its impor- tance to manufactur- ing, until recent years, PLM has largely been the domain of only the largest companies, predominantly used by aerospace and defense contractors or the auto- motive industry. While this is slowly changing as PLM developers offer more affordable systems including cloud-based
An aircraft maintenance technician simulated in Siemen’s Tecnomatix digital manufacturing software for plant-fl oor ergonomics analysis.
Image courtesy Siemens PLM Software.
PLM aimed at small- to medium-sized manufacturers, even major manufacturers have struggled to wring maximum payback.
A recent CIMdata report, “Aerospace and Defense Industry PLM Value Gap Survey,” released in Sep- tember 2013, noted that with few exceptions, the aerospace and defense industry’s heavy investments in PLM technology have led to uninspiring results: “In most cases, beyond engineering the environment falls far short of the vision—process and information fl ow is still largely fragmented, and information systems are layered with complexity and redundancy.” The report predicted that this PLM value gap—where a small fraction of aerospace and defense companies achieve signifi cantly greater value from their PLM in- vestments than others in the industry—will continue to grow in the next 5–10 years.
Pushing PLM to the Masses In February, Automation Alley (Troy, MI) opened
the new Automation Alley Product Lifecycle Manage- ment Center at Oakland University (Auburn Hills, MI). The center, located in OU Inc., a Michigan
SmartZone business accelerator on the Oakland University campus, is a partnership between spon- sors Siemens PLM Software (Plano, TX), the Michigan Economic Development Corp., Geometric Solutions (Warren, MI), solidThinking Inc. (Troy, MI), and Oak- land University’s School of Engineering and Comput- er Science. The OU PLM Center will offer affordable training and PLM certifi cation using equipment and software including CAD, CAM, CAE, digital factory simulation, 3D scanning and 3D printing. Ken Rogers, Automation Alley’s executive director, said more than a year ago about 30 companies led by Rick Darter, president and CEO of Rave Com- puter (Sterling Heights, MI), met at Automation Alley. “There’s a problem out there. We really don’t have the workforce that’s required to operate the digital equipment in product lifecycle management, model- ing and simulation in the visualization areas,’” Rogers said. “I think we mistakenly think that innovation only happens in places where modern architecture or multimillion-dollar laboratories exist. In reality, all that’s needed for game-changing innovation is having the right people with the right resources.”
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