Product Lifecycle Management. an Overview on Concept and Its Implementation

Adopting a PLM system in an organization may be a difficult task if the concepts and ways of implementation are confused. In this paper some frequent aspects of this process are discussed and some examples are presented. 1. CONCEPT DEFINITIONS There are a lot of definitions proposed for activities under PLM acronym. They come from different actors of economical, business, IT, research or educational environments. Starting from first formulation, the concept had an increasing complexity and today on agrees, in a very large way, that “Product Lifecycle Management is all about controlling how people work together to develop ideas or customer requests into finished products or services” [3]. As in the above definition, the PLM processes are tightly linked with the hybrid or extended product which, according to Thoben et al. (2001) includes tangible entities (materials, manufacturing shell) and as well intangible assets (services). If on considers also manufacturing modularization and its horizontal integration, globalization and environmental, safety and reliability legal regulations, enterprises are vital interested to an optimal management of lifecycle costs via PLM systems [4]. PLM concept had a dynamic evolution in a relatively short time period. Some important milestones were: PERT system (1962), projects management new techniques (1965), production and supplies planning systems (1970), computer aided design (1985), flexible manufacturing systems (1988) and computer integrated manufacturing (1990). Since 2002, when the PLM concept appeared in a modern statement, different approaches were suggested: PLM as a set of capabilities (that allows to an enterprise effectively and efficiently innovate products and services related to the business life cycle www.wikipedia.com); PLM as a business (objectives are to increase benefits, reducing production cost, maximizing the value of product range, John Stark,www.johnstark.com); PLM more than a software package (a strategic business way, integrating people, processes, software and information technology, www.cimdata.com); PLM without a general consensus (according different software vendors the concept is too vague and very difficult to be defined, Purdue University, www.tech.purdue.edu). If summarize, PLM is an integrated business approach, based on information, made up of people, processes, practices and technology, covering all aspects of the lifecycle of product, from idea, design, production, use, maintenance, removal and recycling, in order to increase efficiency and business productivity. How an organization or enterprise succeeds attempting to implement the system depends on many internal factors and may be a heavy task. ANNALS of the ORADEA UNIVERSITY. Fascicle of Management and Technological Engineering, Volume X (XX), 2011, NR2