Product Lifecycle Management Solutions from IBM and Dassault Systemes Boost Efficiency at Leading Premium Vehicle Manufacturer

BMW Group Expects a Reduction in Development Time and an Increase in Operational and Financial Efficiencies - Several Hundred BMW Group Suppliers Will Adopt the Same World-Leading Collaborative Design Solution

IBM and Dassault Systemes recently announced that BMW Group, one of the world's most profitable car manufacturers and leader in the premium vehicle market, is developing a new vehicle program with IBM Product Lifecycle Management technology with software from Dassault Systemes. The powerful solution is helping BMW Group to streamline product development and contain costs.

IBM PLM Solutions, with CATIA V5 for collaborative product development and ENOVIA for product data and lifecycle management developed by Dassault Systemes, will enable BMW Group to reuse standard vehicle components to create multiple variants that can be used from one model to the next. Integrating all product information throughout the vehicle development lifecycle, the new PLM platform is set to boost operational efficiency, increase collaboration between development teams, reduce time to market, and ultimately deliver better premium vehicles for increased customer satisfaction. The two-year rollout represents a significant IT investment by the BMW Group.

IBM has also been engaged in an extensive CATIA V5 rollout program to integrate BMW Group suppliers with the PLM platform. Several hundred suppliers contributing to BMW's new car program will be equipped with IBM PLM Solutions by the end of 2004. This collaboration will enable material suppliers to significantly improve efficiency by reacting to the design changes that are customary in new vehicle development far earlier in the product development cycle and eliminate unnecessary time delays that translate into costs.

Long-time partners with BMW Group for product development, IBM and Dassault Systemes' team of consulting professionals are supporting BMW Group to revolutionize the way a car is conceived and developed. With world-class PLM tools and industry expertise, BMW Group continues to strive for the optimum development process across all domains.

BMW Group is now prepared to develop entire vehicles virtually, which are the basis for complete virtual validations, i.e., crash test and other vehicle safety and performance simulations, significantly reducing the need for costly physical prototypes. Anticipated benefits include a significant reduction in both development time and cost via a process which facilitates faster and more innovative design.

CATIA V5 will be used to create a digital master car model that can be used to develop a full family of vehicles. ENOVIAVPM will run concurrently with CATIA V5 and CATIA V4 for total integration of vehicle design and manufacturing information. It will also enable BMW Group to efficiently manage all vehicle-related information - linking common standards, processes, applications and methodology.

"We have been working with BMW for more than twenty years. During that time, we have studied their development processes, listened to their engineers, and together come up with PLM solutions that perfectly fit BMW Group's development strategy. It's a win-win relationship built on trust and respect that has helped BMW Group, Dassault Systemes and IBM become leaders in their respective domains," said Bruno Latchague, Executive Vice president, Development and Support, Dassault Systemes and Dr. Manfred Sammet, IBM PLM Management Executive for the BMW digital car program.  Cars from the other BMW Group brands, MINI and Rolls Royce, are also developed using IBM PLM Solutions.

Yantai Raffles Shipyard Chooses Product Lifecycle Management Solutions from IBM and Dassault Systemes for Competitive Shipbuilding Advantage

Premier offshore builder of ships and oilrigs adopts solutions to become the most efficient and economical shipyard in the world.

IBM and Dassault Systèmes recently announced the signing of a contract with Yantai Raffles Shipyard (YRS) for product development and data management software. YRS has acquired IBM's Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) Shipbuilding Solutions with software developed by Dassault Systèmes in its aim to become one of the most efficient and low cost shipyards in the world.

The PLM Solution fulfills YRS' critical need for web-based product development collaboration to link its shipyard in Yantai, China with its headquarters in Singapore and its offices in Houston, Texas, USA. With the integrated IBM PLM platform, comprised of CATIA V5 for collaborative virtual product development and ENOVIA LCA and ENOVIA Portal 3d.com for real-time product data management developed by Dassault Systèmes, YRS is already realizing the benefits of seamless sharing of all vessel lifecycle information between product development teams in the company.

The advanced PLM solution has enabled the shipyard to streamline design processes for all its vessels, from floating storage and off-take (FSO) ships to oilrigs and luxury yachts.  YRS is already experiencing substantial return on investment through lower material costs and improved quality - a combined competitive advantage.

"Our customers deserve the best and we give them the best.  Our prices are very, very competitive against any shipyard in the world and we sell on good quality and delivery.  This is only possible if we use the best technology on the market to build our ships and that's why we chose IBM PLM solutions," said Brian Chang, Chairman/CEO, YRS.  "Today, we are able to collaborate with owners, suppliers and designers in an exciting new way. Being able to vision a digital model of a ship before production begins is an unforgettable experience for our customers. PLM technology from IBM and Dassault Systèmes is shaping the way suppliers, partners and clients think about us."

IBM and Dassault Systèmes' CATIA V5 solution comes with a full set of shipbuilding-oriented functionalities to meet YRS' requirements, from ‘conceptual' to ‘detail ship design' and ‘in production'. Powerful digital mock-up technology and a collaborative design environment ensure that YRS engineers design efficiently and with precision.  ENOVIA LCA and ENOVIA 3d.com solutions enable full collaborative product development, as well as access to both design information and engineering data among the YRS marketing, engineering and production functions, and ensures that YRS staff, customers, partners and suppliers are able to work together in a virtual product development environment.

"With PLM solutions from Dassault Systèmes, Yantai Raffles can simulate all design processes, from the pre-project phase, through detailed design, analysis, simulation, assembly and maintenance in order to avoid conception and fitting errors," said Etienne Droit, executive vice president, Sales and Marketing, Dassault Systèmes. "YRS can also establish pervasive 3D-based communication and collaboration between its sites in Singapore and China.  Simulation of the entire product life cycle before committing to physical production helps accelerate the shipbuilding process, eliminate design mistakes and cut costs."

Extending SMARTEAM to Project Collaboration

Interviewee: Eyal Herman, Product Manager, SMARTEAM
Interviewer: Diane Benjuya, Marketing Projects Manager, SMARTEAM

In V5R13, SMARTEAM will release a feature-rich Project Collaboration product based on best practice business processes currently in use at selected customers. Product Manager Eyal Herman shares his insights on the importance of SMARTEAM's emerging Project Collaboration capability.

Eyal, could you please clarify the relationship between projects and products?
EH: You can group a company's product knowledge into two main categories: data that relates to the description of the product, or deliverables (Documents, BOMs, etc), and data that relates to the processes of developing and changing the product, or project information (tasks, time, resources, and cost).

When developing or modifying a product, companies derive great benefit from utilizing past experience and knowledge. Reusing knowledge includes not just the tangible deliverables from past development (such as parts to redesign and documents to revise); it also includes tasks to perform and required resources.

ST: What is the existing situation in the industry and what's wrong with it?
EH: Today, two separate systems are commonly used to manage product development: the PLM system manages the deliverables and tasks, and a project management system is used for resources and timing. This dichotomy creates data "islands" and ignores the natural relationships between the two bodies of information.

Although many project management systems today enable the relating of resources to tasks, there are severe deficiencies. Without the benefit of integrated product development information, companies remain with:

• Poor ability to reuse project information
• Inability to reuse project and product information together
• Time-consuming task performance, due to no linkage between tasks and their deliverables

ST: How does SMARTEAM plan to deal with this issue?
EH: The new SMARTEAM Project Collaboration product will integrate tangible and process knowledge. Users across an enterprise will be able to collaborate on project information, with BOMs, Parts, Documents, etc. tightly linked to the related processes.

Rather than focusing on project planning capabilities (there are many excellent systems on the market, such as MS-Project and Primavera, which specialize in these tasks), SMARTEAM will store the project plan created in the project management system. People across the enterprise can then access and collaborate on the knowledge and relate it with other types of knowledge managed within SMARTEAM.

ST: What features will the new product offer?
EH: SMARTEAM Project Collaboration capabilities will include:

• Web-based cockpits for Project Managers, Team Members and Executives that provide quick and easy access to the project information stored in SMARTEAM
• High-level, real-time views of projects and task progress, cost and risk status
• An out of the box data model for project collaboration that enables a tight link between project and product data
• Out of the box Integration with MS-Project (as a primary authoring and analysis tool). Other integrations will be offered through services
• Business rules based definition of the relationship between the status of tasks, projects and deliverables
• Storage and management of resources in SMARTEAM, including the ability to use sophisticated queries to assign resources in the project planning system using resources stored in SMARTEAM
• Automation of project execution through a system of notifications and alerts
• Reuse of both project and product data bundled together
• Support for project templates
• Ability to manage cost and risk
• Project-based authorizations, including the ability to define the user's role in the project

ST: How is SMARTEAM's project collaboration solution unique compared to other solutions?
EH: SMARTEAM recognizes that most SMARTEAM customers already have a project planning system in place, such as MS-Project or Primavera. Other PLM solutions offer project planning functionality that does not match up to the dedicated project management solutions available on the market. Rather than require customers to compromise, we enable customers to use their existing project planning system in combination with SMARTEAM's collaboration and knowledge management capabilities. The result is powerful, project-enriched collaborative PLM.

The new SMARTEAM product will support decision-making, with high-level views of projects and task status

Integration with MS-Project, including resource assignment