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 Chapter 1

Introductory Chapter: Product Lifecycle Management -

Terminology

Razvan Udroiu and Paul Bere

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.81686

1. Introduction

The enterprise business information technology (IT) domains include four main management
approaches [1, 2]: product lifecycle management (PLM), enterprise resource planning (ERP),
customer relationship management (CRM), and supply chain management (SCM). The ERP
goal is achieving the best enterprise resource utilization. This system enables companies to
plan their manufacturing processes and control all aspects of manufacturing including inven-
tory, purchasing, process planning, warehousing and delivery, human resources, finance, etc.
SCM system is focused on the supply chain, having the main goals the design, planning,
execution, control, and monitoring of all aspects related to storage and distribution. Customer
relationship management (CRM) is an approach to manage a company’s interaction with cur-
rent and potential customers [3].
PLM is a business strategy for managing the entire life cycle of products. This strategy includes
the management of conception, design, design validation and simulation, prototyping, man-
ufacturing, quality control, use, maintenance, and disposal of products, having integrated
people, methods, CAx (computer-aided technologies) tools, processes, documentation, and
data management solutions. PLM is a digital paradigm, products being managed with digital
computers, digital information, and digital communication [4]. The main benefits of a PLM
system implementation in companies are faster time to market, improved productivity and
collaboration, better product quality, decreased cost of new product introduction, reduced
prototyping costs, improved design review and approval processes, identify potential sale
opportunities and revenue contributions, maximize supply chain collaboration, and reduce
environmental impacts at the end of product life.

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2 Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology and Applications

2. Products diversity

Standard living increase of the population has led to the development of new materials and
unique services. Those services were hard to be guessed in the past. The diversity of the prod-
ucts is different from one domain to another. All this requires a rigorous planning on waste
and resource management in order to obtain some products or to recycle them after end life.
The arising problems caused by technological development have begun to affect the life of our
planet. This fact has led to the emergence of management measures and decision-making on
emerging issues related to the use of this kind of materials, resources, environmental pollu-
tions, and recycling of end-life products.

The world’s increasing production has led to the use of special materials [5, 6] as composite
materials and smart materials. These have been created and adopted to solve a number of
industry production problems, to replace the traditional materials used for manufacturing
process of the products. These were created to improve physical and mechanical properties
and were developed to solve the production industry problems.
There are different kinds of products on the market. There are different approaches in the
word regarding the classification of the products in the world. An approach can be made fol-
lowing their complexity. We can say that there are simple products, or complex ones, which
are assembled by another product. From the point of view of materials which is embedded in
products, we can say that some products are from a single material, from two, or from many
constituents. From the recycling point of view, at the end of the products’ life, the products
which are made by a single material are easier to be managed. Unfortunately, these products
represent a small percentage of the diversity of existing products. Today the materials’ con-
stituents are very vast, and the constituents of the products are composed of many chemical
substances. These are combined in order to achieve, at the end, a material with custom prop-
erties for certain products.

Another type of the products is represented by a large used, a product in great demand.
These types represented in generally the goods, which integrate more options to use.
The beneficiaries of them have the possibility to have more devices integrate in a single
one. From PLM point of view, each of the extra options is traded like single one, and all
are integrated in a single one. An example of this can be the smartphones or smarts TVs.
Each of them is designed for a specific function, to communicate or to watch and get some
information. At the same time, we benefit from clock, internet access, calendar, games, and
many programs that help us. Also, it is observed in an abundance of mechatronic prod-
ucts on the market. These products contain mechanical, electrical, electronic, and software
components.

Another type of the products is represented by customized goods. These are customized
for each individual customer. They must meet certain specific personalized requirements. In
general for these types of products, the cost price is higher, manufacturing time is increasing,
and life cycle is bigger.

Nowadays, the life of the products has been getting shorter. This is due to technological prog-
ress and the requirements of today’s demanding market. The life of the products decreases
because new products appeared and those have replaced the old ones quickly.
 Introductory Chapter: Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology 3
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Passing on to the complex products that include a large variety of materials, from PLM point
of view, the situation is more complicated. The recycling and the managing of the end life of
products are a challenge. We can ask ourselves which will be the costs of a product in reality,
if the recycling costs at the end life of the product are bigger than production costs.

The diversity of industrial products is a very vast domain and includes embedded materials,
the products themselves, the equipment that led to their fabrication, the resources used, the
auxiliary substances, and materials that contributed to the technological process.

3. Product life cycle

The product life cycle includes three main stages: beginning of product life (BOL), middle of
product life (MOL), and end of product life (EOL). These stages consist of processes which
create the PLM process flow.

BOL is the most complex phase of the product life cycle including conceive, design, prototyp-
ing, testing, development, production process elaboration, and manufacturing of the product.

In the second phase of the product life cycle, MOL comprises distribution/sales, product use
of the final customer, maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) of the product.

End of product life is the last stages of the product life cycle. This stage includes retire, dis-
posal, and recycle of the product.

4. Product lifecycle management

According to the CIMdata Inc. [7], “Product Lifecycle Management is a strategic business
approach that applies a consistent set of business solutions that support the collaborative cre-
ation, management, dissemination, and use of product definition information” [7]. Integrating
people, processes, business systems, and information, PLM supports the extended enterprise
[7]. The extended enterprise is a wider entity that includes the customers, the employees, the
suppliers, the distributors, etc., who collaborate in the design, development, manufacturing,
and delivery of a product to the end user. The PLM concept is focused on six important
concepts, as follows: strategic business approach, phases of product life cycle, collaboration
within the extended enterprise, unique and timed product data source and consistency, trace-
ability, and long-term archiving [8].
Product lifecycle management for “X field” is a general term to define a type of management
within a specific field of work, for a specific product. “X field” is a generic term that is related
to a specific industry. Thus, different products require different process developments, result-
ing the following: PLM for aerospace and defense; PLM for the automotive industry; PLM
for the construction industry; PLM for the consumer and retail industry; PLM for the energy,
process, and utility industry; PLM for the fashion industry; PLM for the food and beverage
industry; PLM for the industrial equipment industry; PLM for the life sciences industry; PLM
for the marine and offshore industry; PLM for the oil and gas industry; and PLM for the
telecom and electronics industry.
4 Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology and Applications

Figure 1. The evolution of the concepts related to PLM.

The evolution of the concepts related to PLM is shown in Figure 1. PLM concept was devel-
oped based on product data management (PDM). Product data management is the business
function often within PLM that is focused mainly on design, manufacturing, and engineering
data having the purpose of the management and publication of product data. PDM is the
link between “islands of automation” such as computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided
engineering (CAE), and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), being a PLM infrastructure.
PDM system provides access and security controls, maintains relationships among product
data items, enforces rules that describe and control data flows and processes, and provides
notification and messaging facilities [7, 9].

The fundamental terms about PLM are shown in Figure 2. Processes, technologies, meth-
ods, software tools, and data managed by people are the main fundamentals of PLM that are
involved in the lifecycle stages of the product.
Concurrent engineering [10, 11] or simultaneous engineering is an approach for product
development that integrates all product lifecycle phases and carries out a number of tasks in
parallel, minimizing the product development time. One of the most used methods of CE is
design for manufacture and assembly (DFMA) that integrates two concepts such as design
for manufacture (DFM) and design for assembly (DFA). DFM is a design methodology of the
parts for their easy manufacturing, reducing the manufacturing costs. DFA is focused on the
design of the product for easy assembly, reducing the assembly costs.
Generally, the methods can be classified as follows [12]:

• Methods supporting designers and engineers in the product development stage (e.g., the-
ory for inventing problem-solving (TRIZ, design in context, bottom-up design, top-down
design))

• Methods based on past experiences (e.g., design for X) used in BOL, MOL, and EOL
• Evaluation methods of the product responsiveness to needs coming from diverse
phases (e.g., risk analysis and failure mode effects analysis (FMEA), fishbone/Ishikawa
diagram)
 Introductory Chapter: Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology 5
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• Management approaches supporting continuous improvement of the enterprise (e.g., just

in time, lean manufacturing, six sigma, total quality management, and total productive
maintenance)

CAx [4] is a generic term that includes all computer-aided technologies used to process the
information and knowledge regarding the product data along the PLM stages. A CAx system
is focused on a “X” task, and it contains the following main components: hardware compo-
nent consisting in computer and interactive devices, software packages, data, knowledge,
and human’s activities [4]. The “X” task can be product design (computer-aided design)
[13–17]; product manufacturing (computer-aided manufacturing) [13–17]; product simulation,

Figure 2. The fundamental terms related to PLM.

6 Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology and Applications

Concepts Remarks
PLM Product lifecycle management

ERP Enterprise resource planning

CRM Customer relationship management

SCM Supply chain management

EDM Electronic document management, enterprise data management, or engineering data

management

PDM Product data management

CPC Collaborative product commerce

PPLM Product and process lifecycle management

SRM Supplier relationship management is analogous to customer relationship management

MPM Manufacturing process management

CE Concurrent engineering

CPD Collaborative product development

DFMA Design for manufacture and assembly

DFSS Design for six sigma is a business process management method related to traditional
six sigma, based on the use of statistical tools

NPD New product development

Standards of PLM STEP, DXF, IGES, XML, UML

Virtual enterprise (VE) Virtual enterprise consists in “a group of people who work together on a project,
communicating mainly by phone, email, and the internet, rather than regularly going
to a central office to work providing operations as competitive as those in a traditional
enterprise” [4, 21]

Digital mock-up (DMU) Digital mock-up is a concept that allows the description of a product, usually in 3D, for
its entire life cycle [4]

Digital manufacturing (DM) DM links digital product development, digital production planning, and digital facility
planning [22]. DM is a manufacturing process in a virtual environment working with
digital features (tooling, machining, assembly lines, resources, ergonomics, and factory
layout)

Digital factory (DF) Digital factory consists in a digital mock-up of the factory

Table 1. Terms connected to PLM.

analysis, and optimization (computer-aided engineering); product process planning (com-

puter-aided process planning, CAPP) [11, 14–17]; product quality assurance (computer-
aided quality, CAQ); etc. CAE tools are available for a wide range of analyses: finite element
analysis (FEA), computational fluid dynamics (CFD), kinematics and dynamic analysis of
the mechanisms, etc. The numerical control (NC) of the machine tools and programming of
industrial robots that perform tasks as assembly, welding, etc., are the most known applica-
tions of CAM.
 Introductory Chapter: Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology 7
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Also, new technologies such as rapid prototyping (RP), additive manufacturing, and reverse
engineering play an innovative role, especially in the BOL phase [18–20].
The main terminology connected to PLM is presented in the Table 1.
Digital factory is the foundation of the factory of the future, “a comprehensive approach of
network of digital models, methods, and tools—including modeling, simulation, and 3D/vir-
tual reality visualization—integrated by a continuous data management” [23]
New opportunities and future trends for PLM (Table 2) have appeared in areas such as big
data, smart products, the Internet of things, knowledge management, and SMAC (social,
mobile, analytics, cloud) [30]. SMAC is driving business innovation, being a concept that
converges of four technologies, social media platforms, mobile technologies and platforms
such as the iPhone/ iPad, data analytics, and cloud computing. Cloud computing is one of the
key enablers for advanced manufacturing supporting not only storage of product data but
also retrieval and reuse of product and process knowledge.

Future concepts Remarks

Factory of the future/ Factory of the future [4, 24] is the combination of “virtual” and “real“ that “can self-
smart factory optimize performance, self-adapt to and learn from new conditions in real or near-real
time, and autonomously run entire production processes” [25]

Industry 4.0 Industry 4.0 [26, 27] supposes the introduction of the Internet of things and services into
the manufacturing environment [4]

Cloud computing Cloud computing store, manage, and process data, rather than a local computer by using a
network of remote servers hosted on the Internet [4]

CMfg (cloud Cloud manufacturing [28] uses cloud computing, the Internet of things, service-oriented
manufacturing) technologies, and high-performance computing for solving manufacturing applications

Industrial Internet The industrial Internet “is the integration and linking of big data, analytical tools and
wireless networks with physical and industrial equipment, or otherwise applying meta-
level networking functions, to distributed systems” [27]

IoT (Internet of things) The Internet of things comprises of an intelligent interactivity, via the Internet, sensors and
actuators, etc., between human and things to exchange information and knowledge

Big data in PLM “Big data represents the information assets characterized by such a high volume, velocity
and variety to require specific technology and analytical methods for its transformation
into value.”[29]. Big data challenges include capturing data, data storage, data analysis,
search, sharing, transfer, visualization, querying, updating, information privacy, and data
source

IoT PLM Big data and the IoT work in conjunction. Data extracted from IoT devices provides a
mapping of device interconnectivity

PLM for digital factory PLM system within the Industry 4.0
(PLM 4.0)

Cloud PLM The applications of cloud computing in PLM

Smart PLM PLM system for a smart factory

Table 2. Terms connected to the future PLM.

8 Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology and Applications

5. PLM software

On the market today, there are several software solutions for PLM implementation. The most
known solutions are offered by dominant players such as Dassault Systèmes (ENOVIA™ PLM
Software), Siemens (Teamcenter PLM), PTC (PTC Windchill), SAP Systems, Applications,
and Products in Data Processing (SAP PLM), Oracle (Agile PLM), Arena (Arena PLM), and
Autodesk (Autodesk Fusion Lifecycle). SAP Business Suite is a collection of integrated applica-
tions such as SAP-CRM, SAP-ERP, SAP-PLM, SAP-SRM, and SAP-SCM modules. The most
important tools of these software solutions are material management, configuration and change
management, design and simulation processes, product planning, project management, docu-
ment management, deliver projects on time and under budget, collaboration solutions, product
quality, and product certification, stocks, and sales management. These tools are increasingly
used in large companies, and the offered solutions are customized for different areas of activity.
Company databases offer a better management of company resources, of the customers or of
suppliers of materials in a timely manner. The PLM software solution increases the compa-
nies’ productivity, reduces the manufacturing time of the products, and increases the quality.
Managing company databases that have workstations in different locations is one of the inte-
grated tools of these software instruments. The companies can manage the common databases,
the drawing projects, materials, existing stocks, different stages of product development, as well
as the marketing and distribution part or the product phases use throughout their life cycle.

6. Conclusion

PLM systems can manage information across the life cycle of a broad range of products such as
manufactured products (airplanes, automobiles, computers, mobile phones, toys, etc.), software
product, utility distribution networks (telecommunications), facilities (airports, harbors, and
railway systems), and other products (bridges and highways). In the future, every industrial
product will be smart like smartphones. These integrated a series of requirements and needs that,
besides the basic solution of the product to meet certain needs, will also have a number of facili-
ties which are not strictly necessary but contribute to the comfort of the beneficiary. All this prod-
ucts’ facilities not only make it more attractive but also increase its complexity. Requirements
and products are increasingly diversified, all contributing to consumer welfare, as time passes.

Author details

Razvan Udroiu1* and Paul Bere2

*Address all correspondence to: [email protected]

1 Department of Manufacturing Engineering, Transilvania University of Brasov, Brasov,

Romania

2 Department of Manufacturing Engineering, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca,

Cluj-Napoca, Romania
 Introductory Chapter: Product Lifecycle Management - Terminology 9
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