The world of product design and manufacturing is changing based on the globalization policies. Captilization is pushing more and more design and manufacturing jobs to cheaper countries. As a result, the tools that are supporting the product and design activities are changing to support these models. However, they are are not changing fast enough to keep up pace with the changes happening in the industry. Contract Manufacturing (CM) was a model where the product will be designed in one geographic location and the manufacturing will be done in an offshore location. This model is changing to Contract Design Manufacturing (CDM) where part of the design is now moved to offshore along with the manufacturing activities. This poses challenges such as how much design can I share with my partner? If I collaborate with more than one partner on a project, can they both see each other's data via my PLM system? How do I control partner's IP protected data? Are users trained to understand such complexity? While the answers may be simple to the above questions, it quickly becomes complex before we realize.
It will be interesting to see how the PLM tools out there would support such complex business models.
It will be interesting to see how the PLM tools out there would support such complex business models.
