Chapter 9: Middle and end of life issues

Title: An innovative framework for information flows collection in PLM environment

Author(s): P. Lunghi, M. Botarelli, M. Ginocchietti

Address: University of Perugia – Department of Industrial Engineering, Via G. Duranti, 67 – 06128 Perugia, Italy | University of Perugia – Department of Industrial Engineering, Via G. Duranti, 67 – 06128 Perugia, Italy | University of Perugia – Department of Industrial Engineering, Via G. Duranti, 67 – 06128 Perugia, Italy

Reference: International Conference on Product Lifecycle Management 2007 pp. 577 - 586

Abstract/Summary: The globalization of competition has entailed that organizations of developed countries have to face new forms of competitor with low labour cost and often advantageous exchange rate (and then favourable export selling prices). In such a scenario, innovation and organizational flexibility is becoming fundamental levers to enable enterprises to increase their competitiveness. In this paper we propose an innovative framework with the purpose of promoting innovation in three main aspects: technological innovation, business models innovation and product innovation. The framework is based on the Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) methodology; in particular we are going to discuss the possibility of integrating innovative technologies like RFId (Radio Frequency Identification) and XML (eXtensible Markup Language and derivation). The first is an enabled technology for PLM representing an informative support on the product for both producers and customers. The latter, on the other hand, is an essential component to obtain shared information on product between producers and customers throughout the different phases of the product lifecycle. By considering holistic property the proposed system achieves not only a valid and innovative framework for product innovation support, but also a framework that allows customer participation in the supply chain. The paper is supported by a case study of an Umbrian company which tested the proposed framework.

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