The launch of the 2023 Outline for Building a Quality Strong Country (hereinafter referred to as the Outline) once again confirms China's determination to embark on the path of high-quality development in the manufacturing industry. The Outline points out the need to deeply implement the strategy of building a strong quality country, accelerate the iteration and upgrading of traditional manufacturing technology, and promote the quality of industrial products to move towards the mid to high end. Currently, China is moving from a manufacturing powerhouse to a manufacturing powerhouse, and improving the product research and development level and quality management of manufacturing enterprises is a necessary path.
PLM product lifecycle management software is the cornerstone of world-class manufacturing enterprises. Since the 1990s, leading manufacturing companies around the world have adopted PLM software to improve the quality and efficiency of the entire process from product design to production and after-sales service. Entering the 20th century, PLM software is also an important platform for manufacturing enterprises to further enhance product and service innovation, and cloud PLM is a key digital means for small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises to quickly achieve high-level and high-quality development.
In September 2023, PTC, the world's leading PLM software company, announced the official launch of China's first cloud native SaaS product, Arena PLM and QMS (Quality Management System) software solution. In the 2023 Autumn PLM Software Grid Magic Quadrant report released by the globally renowned commercial software evaluation agency G2, the cloud native Arena ranks high in the leader quadrant. Facing 2024, PTC believes that PLM software selection should be grasped from 9 aspects, and cloud PLM is the most important trend.
The 9 major capability elements of cloud PLM software
After more than 40 years of development history, PLM software has become a management platform for all data and processes related to product concept, design, development, and manufacturing. PLM software continuously integrates complete mechanical, electronic, and software designs into a single real data source, helping manufacturing enterprises and supply chain partners optimize product development while continuously improving quality.
At the same time, the market environment is becoming increasingly complex. The current economy makes remote work and distributed collaboration necessary, and digital technologies such as IoT and AI are increasing the complexity of product development. PTC believes that grasping the nine key elements of the new generation of enterprise level cloud PLM software can help manufacturing enterprises achieve optimal manufacturing results and embark on a path of high-quality development in complex and ever-changing environments. These 9 key competency elements include collaboration, BOM management, engineering change management, document management, compliance, project management, business analysis, PLM integration, and cloud architecture.
Firstly, cloud architecture is the latest trend in PLM software. Enterprise level cloud PLM can integrate teams located in different geographical locations into a single and unified system. Internal teams of manufacturing enterprises and external teams of supply chain partners can achieve real-time collaboration using a simple internet browser, and eliminate internal and external "data silos", allowing everyone to collaborate based on a "single real data source".
Secondly, BOM management is an advantage of traditional PLM. Cloud PLM can efficiently create, review, and approve the latest BOM list, ensuring that there are no errors or quality issues in product manufacturing, reasonable cost allocation at all stages of production, and timely informing the team of any changes that affect the supply chain or downstream manufacturing.
Thirdly, the engineering change management of cloud PLM provides a controllable design change process, thereby accelerating product development and market launch. The product team can more efficiently implement engineering change requests and engineering change orders, including an automated approval process, while also being able to archive and trace all components, assemblies, drawings, software, and other changes throughout the entire product lifecycle.
Fourthly, document management based on cloud PLM can meet the requirements of today's highly regulated market environment. Product teams can manage and track all product and quality related documents, including product indicators, production guidelines, SOP standard operating procedures, quality strategies, and training records. Cloud based document management enables teams to centrally store documents, establish approval and audit processes, and optimize document extraction.
Fifthly, enterprise level cloud PLM can ensure that processes, strategies, and systems meet compliance requirements for various export controls, environmental regulations, and quality regulations, as well as compatibility with FDA, ISO, RoHS, REACH, ITAR, EAR, and other industry standards to reduce compliance risks.
Sixth, project management in cloud PLM should allow product teams to track various tasks, instructions, and resources across the product lifecycle, ensuring the achievement of all product development cycle milestones. This includes providing visibility to all relevant teams for the product team, helping them make better decisions in project priorities and product releases.
Seventh, the tracking and analysis capabilities of cloud PLM on relevant indicators enable enterprises to have better visibility into products and quality processes, in order to achieve continuous quality improvement. Being able to obtain KPI indicators in a timely manner can enable enterprises to adopt more proactive approaches in the development and launch of new products to reduce potential risks.
Eighth, manufacturing companies may have already adopted various software solutions at various stages of the product lifecycle, and connecting these software systems through cloud PLM platforms can further optimize the product development process and accelerate product launch time. The enterprise level cloud PLM system should also be able to easily connect with manufacturing related systems such as ERP and CRM, as well as engineering and design systems such as EDA, MCAD, electronic component databases (such as SiliconExpert, Octopart, etc.).
Ninth, if manufacturing companies are seeking a system that can be rapidly developed, requires minimal IT infrastructure, and can scale with business expansion, then a cloud based SaaS PLM solution is the best choice. Unlike traditional PLM software deployed in enterprise data centers, SaaS PLM allows manufacturing enterprises to avoid expenses such as owning their own data centers, and can also continuously obtain technological updates from PLM software suppliers, saving traditional software upgrade costs and reducing overall ownership costs.
Arena, the cloud native leader for user feedback optimization
The globally renowned commercial software evaluation agency G2 regularly releases the PLM software Grid Magic Quadrant evaluation report, which is a synthesis of real user research and social platform data. In the 2023 autumn PLM software Grid Magic Quadrant evaluation report of G2, Arena was listed as the leader quadrant and was the cloud native PLM with the highest user vote. The evaluation of Arena by relevant users is that it allows users to seamlessly access all necessary information related to quality management, with a user-friendly interface and well structured processes, allowing the user team to easily navigate and execute tasks in various tasks.
As a cloud native SaaS PLM, Arena's advantages lie in improving product development efficiency, shortening implementation and deployment cycles, and enhancing supply chain collaboration efficiency. The design and supply chain of many manufacturing enterprises are in a decentralized state, and continuous design changes lead to issues such as delivery cycles and quality consistency. Arena integrates product information, personnel, and processes into a single enterprise cloud platform, providing a seamless and integrated collaborative environment for enterprises, providing a single product data source for new product development and continuous process improvement, helping enterprises continuously optimize and manufacture better products, especially enabling agile collaboration among teams located on different "islands" throughout the entire supply chain, without the need for complex multi system integration.
Arena connects quality records and processes with product design, providing a closed-loop quality system that helps businesses such as medical devices, biotechnology manufacturing, and automotive manufacturing develop safe and compliant products and push them to the market. Arena helps enterprises control, support, and continuously improve quality processes through a single factual data source, and can control and track quality information throughout product related records such as parts, BOM, drawings, and documents. Arena directly connects quality with product development, allowing cross functional teams to easily identify, collaborate, solve, and prevent quality issues. Arena's automated closed-loop quality process can also provide enhanced visibility and traceability from product concept design to commercial launch.
Arena not only meets the 9 capability requirements of enterprise cloud PLM, but also is a global leader in cloud native PLM. Arena provides a new solution and product development model, helping users collaborate better with agile product development methods. Users who adopt Arena can design and develop products faster, with higher quality and half the time saved. As a cloud native PLM, Arena greatly shortens the average deployment cycle of traditional PLM, and multi tenant SaaS cloud services can easily expand with the development of enterprise business, covering more teams in geographical locations, supporting authorization role based collaboration, and maximizing system availability, scalability, and security.
Currently, Arena has over 1400 clients worldwide, including over 700 high-tech electronics companies, over 350 life sciences companies, and over 300 IoT companies. Currently, 100% of the top 15 leading ODM or contract manufacturers in the global supply chain adopt Arena cloud services.
In recent years, PTC has gradually formed two major business units: a matrix of advantageous products mainly based on Digital Thread, including Creo, Windchill, ThingWorx, and Codereader; A cloud native product matrix that focuses on velocity, emphasizes agility and quick response, including Onshape and Arena. At present, the cloud native Arena PLM&QMS has been integrated with OnShape CAD&next-generation PDM in a native way, allowing users to easily achieve seamless collaboration between CAD and PLM.
Outlook for 2024
With the official landing of Arena in the Chinese market, it will drive the popularization of cloud native PLM and deepen the application and adoption of PLM to a greater extent in the Chinese market. Arena is suitable for various industries, especially in the electronic manufacturing and medical biological device industries with long supply chains and short product development cycles. Arena is also suitable for large, medium, and small enterprises. A company can gradually expand its deployment scale from around 10 people to thousands or even tens of thousands of people. More importantly, Arena will introduce an internationally leading product quality management system into the Chinese market, allowing more innovative enterprises and products to quickly and high-quality go global, thereby establishing a high-quality brand of Made in China!
