PLM turns to styled plastics and packaging

An IBM Product Lifecycle Management Solutions product story

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team May 23, 2006

A single set of integrated applications help industrial designers greatly reduce time to market on creative new product styles while optimising cost and manufacturing ramp-up.

Demonstrating their continued commitment to deliver industry-leading PLM capabilities, tailored to the needs of mid-sized businesses, IBM and Dassault Systemes have announced the addition of Product Lifecycle Management Express Styled Plastic and Packaging to their Product Lifecycle Management and Express Portfolio.

IBM's PLM Express portfolio has been helping mid-sized companies gain the benefits of PLM since 2003.

Styled Plastic and Packaging provides consumer goods and industrial products companies with a single set of integrated applications that help industrial designers greatly reduce time to market on creative new product styles while optimising cost and manufacturing ramp-up.

IBM is also announcing significant enhancements to its entire Product Lifecycle Management Express Portfolio through the addition of pre-configured, role-based offerings for specific industries.

With the additional function that is now included in the PLM Express Portfolio, mid-sized companies will be able to respond faster to changing customer requirements and bring products to market quicker with improved quality and more innovation, boosting their competitive market positioning.

To differentiate their products and increase market responsiveness while remaining competitive, mid-sized manufacturers need to leverage the business benefits of PLM like larger companies.

IBM's Product Lifecycle Management Express Styled Plastic and Packaging, combining ease of use and affordability, is designed to answer their needs.

Including the subdivision surfacing and the functional modelling technologies embedded in Catia V5, this integrated solution accelerates design cycles and drives innovation in complex, free-form-shape product environments.

It helps mid-sized companies to increase profits and minimise development costs by enabling product designers to move quickly from initial concept to detailed design and product testing without any data conversion.

Designers can react rapidly to customers' latest taste changes and deliver a wider range of innovative products by easily incorporating the latest market trends into their products, along with innovative technologies.

The solution also helps shorten development cycle time by reusing experience collected from previous projects and reducing the number of physical prototypes.

"For new products, we have reduced design time by up to 44% and overall development costs by up to 60% which gives our company the flexibility it needs to meet customer requirements right the first time", says Grant Stratford, Technical Manager at Securistyle, a leading provider of innovative window hardware solutions, based in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, UK.

IBM is also now delivering more functions with the PLM Express portfolio of solutions to mid-sized manufacturing companies, enabling them to easily acquire an integrated, end-to-end PLM solution from IBM.

In addition, IBM's broad and comprehensive PLM product suite has been simplified and grouped into competitively priced "bundles" that align to specific engineering job profiles or product development functions, tailored to the requirements of mid-sized businesses and configured precisely to the needs of their engineers.

Companies of any size can start with an initial configuration and add capability as needs evolve.

The complete solution, including implementation services, can be financed more simply than ever with the introduction of IBM Financing Advantage for convenient and flexible low monthly payments.