Selection and Evaluation of PLM Tools for Competitive Product Development

PLM solutions propose methodologies and tools aiming at improving the product development process and competitive engineering. In particular Engineering Knowledge Management (EKM) has proved to be a key enabler for reducing lifecycle cost and time, improving quality and helping to ensure safe products. Nevertheless the selection of the most proper tools for a given product development process is not a trivial task. The application of a methodology for the selection and evaluation of new PLM technology to be adopted for improving product development processes is presented. The focus of this work is illustrated in two different study cases that apply and test the developed methodology: one belonging to the consumer products sector, the other belonging to the machine tool sector.