CIMdata PLM Industry Summary Online Archive
3 January 2008
Implementation Investments
SemEquip Employs Arena PLM to Tightly Control Product Development Process and Support Company's Rapid Growth
Arena Solutions announced that SemEquip Inc ., technology leader of advanced semiconductor implant materials for the world's most sophisticated integrated circuits, has chosen Arena PLM to manage their product development process, giving them the high-level of control they need to support the company's rapid growth. As SemEquip's core product information management system, Arena PLM serves as a single central repository where all product development-related data is contained, enabling the company's entire design and supply chain to track, document, and report on important details related to their products from concept through end of life.
"Our customers are half-a-billion dollar companies, with mature business systems and clear expectations of what they want from their suppliers, especially in terms of quality control and change management. Without the right system in place, we couldn't have met those expectations. Arena PLM is serving us well," said Doug Adams, vice president of engineering and product development at SemEquip. "There's no question that using the right technology levels the playing field for us. This type of control becomes a check-box item and allows us to focus on the benefits of our highly educated team and advanced technology."
Moving from Microsoft Excel, SemEquip is no longer concerned about the barrage of problems associated with using outdated information, including decreased engineering productivity, longer design cycles, and direct hits to the bottom line because of critical errors.
"None of our information is dispersed among personal PCs, lost in a file cabinet or buried underneath someone's stack of papers. Arena PLM gives us a valuable change management control system between our engineers, our suppliers and everyone else working on the product," said Brent Copertino, senior mechanical engineer at SemEquip. "From an engineering standpoint, the revision history we have captured in Arena PLM is a major plus. It allows anyone in engineering to pick up where someone else left off. There's no lost information and we can keep moving forward. Arena PLM allows us to get our jobs done and give everyone else in the company all the documentation they need to get their jobs done, too."
Arena Solutions' on-demand delivery gives companies of all sizes access to the benefits of PLM without requiring them to pay the up-front costs associated with traditional client server systems. With no software to install and no IT infrastructure to maintain, SemEquip was able to garner the benefits of PLM and put beneficial processes in place early in the company's development. SemEquip has not only been able to assert control over their data, but also share it throughout their extended enterprise through a web browser and an Internet connection. This ease of use has enabled them to focus resources on product innovation, rather than system training and administration.
"Any authorized user from any computer connected to the Internet can gain access to key product information," said Stuart Zerneri, vice president of operations at SemEquip. "Arena PLM is a very flexible tool without a lot of red tape. As the use of our products has grown, we've grown our staff -- in engineering, service, sales, accounting, marketing and more -- and all of them need product information. Before Arena, they had to find a core person who had that information and that person would be bogged down with requests. Now, with Arena PLM, we've given everyone access to the tool and they can retrieve data as they need it. From a productivity standpoint the difference is significant."
"We're delighted that Arena PLM is helping innovative and fast-growing companies like SemEquip deliver new technology, new thinking and new levels of productivity to their customers. They are proof that companies don't need to be giant to be powerhouses, they just need to employ the right tools that enable them to remain focused on what's most important -- their products and their customers," said Michael Topolovac, chief executive officer of Arena Solutions.
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