Chapter 1: Early Stage Issues

Title: Portfolio Management for Digital Manufacturing Using PLM Systems

Author(s): Jagmeet Singh

Address: Infosys Technologies Limited Plot No. 44, Electronics City , Bangalore, India

Reference: International Conference on Product Lifecycle Management 2006 pp. 14 - 21

Abstract/Summary: "Lack of dashboard information for measuring the performances in complex digital manufacturing environments is causing data & information mismanagement resulting in delays for crucial product launches for Manufacturers".
Digital Manufacturing is playing an important role in new product development. It is helping in reducing development cost, improving product quality and lowering product development time. As the name signifies, it bridges the gap between engineering definition and actual product industrialization in the product's lifecycle. It supports collaboration from the ideation phases to the final delivery to customer, and thus reducing time to market. The concept, still in the evolutionary stages, embodies lots of interactions with cross functions and plethora of information exchanges in the lifecycle of the product.
On the brighter side, the concept of digital manufacturing looks convincing however, the other face of the coin tells a different story. Organisations spend huge amounts to extract relevant information to manage product development (PD) health status. This information being owned by individual business functions leads to data and information mismanagement.
Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) driven initiatives supported with portfolio management capabilities is proving to be one of most appropriate solution in this context.
The paper initially discusses the inadequacies of the present way of information flow & its management in the digital manufacturing environments.
Next, PLM based portfolio management driven solution approach has been showcased for cross functions management under categories like:
Programme Level Portfolio management where the focus would be more on the cost involvements, revenue management, identifying bottleneck, milestones status etc.
Project Level Portfolio management where the concentration would be on the details from the execution point of view. It would cover the generation of business Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) mapped with the organisational strategies.
Downstream Level Portfolio management which would cover the scenariosfrom the implementation side like data quality, data exchange, and designreviews, manufacturing bottlenecks etc.
Benefits like time-to-market, quality products, reduced waste and compliance with global standards have also been discussed.
Finally, an approach has been provided to endorse the contributions of the portfolio management in product lifecycle.

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