CIMdata PLM Industry Summary Online Archive

14 March 2006

Company News

Keys To Lean In Product Development And The Role Of PLM Software

Aras Corporation provided expert insight to help companies successfully implement Lean Development supported by a Product Lifecycle Management [PLM] solution to improve new product quality, shorten development cycle times, and improve product margins.

Lean in Product Development

While Lean has been embraced as a key corporate strategy by a growing number of companies the implementation of Lean has been limited to primarily production and supply chain operations. To date, very few companies have successfully implemented Lean in the product development process. The obstacles to implementing Lean in product development often stem from difficulty applying the Lean principles in engineering and a lack of understanding of the different approaches; Lean Engineering , Lean Design , and Lean Development .

For a full description of the three different approaches simply request a copy from Aras of the paper Lean in Product Development or download at http://www.aras.com/sendtoinnovatorx/100038.aspx.

New BLOG: Lean in Product Development http://leanproductdevelopment.blogspot.com/

. Learn more about the topic and contribute your perspective.

Each approach has associated implementation challenges and will require a different plan. It is important to note that there is no progression between the three approaches, and none of the approaches is a prerequisite for the others. A company can implement one or more of the approaches in any order; however, if either Lean Engineering or Lean Design is applied Lean Development must still be included at some point to effectively plan for Lean manufacturing and supply chain operations.

•  What are the design requirements essential to Customer Value?

•  Will a new product slot into an existing Lean Product Family or will it constitute an entirely new Lean Product Family?

•  Will materials, components, parts, and assemblies be sourced from 'preferred' suppliers qualified for pull-based Kanban fulfillment?

PLM Software's Supporting Role

Because today's geographically distributed product development teams involve primarily knowledge worker processes when implementing any of the three different approaches [Lean Engineering, Lean Design, or Lean Development] software technology will invariably play a role.

One of the fundamental issues with software technology when implementing Lean in product development is that individual tools such as CAD software and simulation tools optimize individual operations without regard to the overall process of product development. The role of point applications in product development is analogous to that of machine tool automation in manufacturing. Speeding up a select handful of operations can actually be counter productive to overall process efficiency resulting in cycle time increases as opposed to improvement due to the wastes created in other functions such as quality and operations. It is impossible to perform new product development in today's globally distributed environment without the many different point applications used for design, simulation, and design collaboration, however, an overemphasis on automating only design without equal or greater focus on the overall process of product development undermines a Lean initiative and can adversely effect corporate time-to-market and financial objectives. 

To effectively implement Lean in product development with any of the three previously identified approaches [ Lean Engineering , Lean Design , or Lean Development ] a company must focus on the overall process to achieve meaningful results. Point applications and tools are unable to support the necessary process aspects required due to limited scope and an inability to manage complex business processes. Enterprise Product Lifecycle Management [PLM] software that combines business processes like phase-based new product program management as well as document, file, and data control plays an essential role in enabling Lean in product development. Key elements in an enterprise PLM solution that supports Lean include:

Program Management Process Structure - Ability to define product development phases, milestones, and deliverables in formats that accommodate the many complexities of the business; Template driven processes that become the working version of a new product program are important to both standardization and productivity. 

Visual Management Dashboards - Ability to see the progress and status of product programs as they move through product development; Dashboards with real-time roll ups of actual project activities are important in eliminating waste due to misinformation and duplication of tasks. 

New Product Program Data Relationships - Ability to capture, store, sort, and easily retrieve product information in a comprehensive context; Managing a single version of the truth in a controlled manner with meaningful relationships to associated information is critical to avoiding mistakes and achieving coordination.

Processes, Data, and Relationship Solution Flexibility - Ability to easily modify business processes and information relationships to quickly adapt to business conditions; As opposed to the rigid nature of ERP and PDM systems, a solution that supports Lean in product development must be easily adapted to continuously improve.

Modern Internet-based Service Oriented Architecture - True Internet based enterprise software enables communication, collaboration, and coordination without the limitations inherent in conventional systems; Software based on a modern Internet service-oriented architecture [SOA] also has a dramatically lower ownership cost.

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