Product Lifecycle Management

Product Lifecycle Management is a strategic approach to creating and managing a company's product-related intellectual capital, from its initial conception to retirement.

Products can be divided into :

1. Discrete products(Airplanes, Medical devices)
2. Process/Formulated Products(Food and Beverages)
3. Software(and even services)

Lifecycle :

• From concept through Engineering, Manufacturing, In Service and until product is retired/disposed
• The lifecycle length varies by Industry: A typical Short lifecycle would be Retail and Apparel and a long lifecycle would be Aerospace and Defense

Management :

Manage the creation, storage, change, version and configuration of all the data, information and relationships required to design, build, maintain and support the product.

Why is it important?

Companies that focus on PLM are able to grow revenue by 2-4% and reduce operational and product development costs by 10-30%.

It's impact areas are as the following :

1. Time to market
   • Faster product launches to shelf(4 - 55% improvement)
   • Reduce search time/improve product development(10 - 60%)
2. Cash
   • Reduction of development activities(20%)
   • reduction in write-offs(15-20%)
3. Sales
   • Increase new product success rate(10-20%)
   • Increase in new product output(20%)
   • Increase revenue due to better product mix, faster time to shelf(2-4%)
4. Cost
   • Reduction in direct materials cost(5 - 15%)
   • Reduce operational and development/engineering expense(10-30%)
5. Cycle Time
   • Reduction in change control cycle time(10 - 75%)
   • Reduction in design cycles(5-35%)
   • Reduction in time-to-volume(10-15%)

Example of a PLM :

1. Concept/Ideation
2. Program & portfolio Management
3. Designs/Systems Engineering
4. Internal & Supplier Collaboration
5. Manufacturing Engineering
6. Prototype/Virtual Validation
7. Production and Quality
8. Maintain and Service
9. Retire

PLM is a combination of People, Process, Data and Technology.