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The widespread movement toward engineering collaboration represents a major trend for companies wanting to improve teamwork among people in different locations. A variety of technologies to support collaboration are now commercially available including synchronous meeting solutions, co-modeling systems, visualization software, digital mockup, and many others.

For the most part, these tools use Web technology and the Internet to allow people in different facilities across town or around the world to interact, resolve problems, reach consensus, and otherwise work together online. Using these technologies is much quicker and more effective than telephone, fax, or mail delivery....

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There has been a lot of confusing discussion recently, particularly among people in the CAD user community concerning the definition of collaboration and the real value of the technologies that support it no matter how it is defined. The root terminology problem seems to stem from the haphazard use of the term “collaboration” in the marketing materials of the CAD and PLM vendors. It is probably not possible to get all of the various solution providers to adopt a single definition of collaboration because this would not serve their marketing needs.

PLM vendors now use...

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As CIMdata announced in yesterday’s edition of its CIMdata PLM Late Breaking News, Siemens AG has announced their intent to acquire the UGS Corporation for US $3.515 billion, pending all necessary governmental reviews and approvals. After this acquisition, UGS will become a unit within Siemens’ Automation and Drives (A&D) Group, a €12.8 billion business unit headquartered in Nürnberg, Germany. Siemens and UGS stated that the long-term strategic views of the two firms are quite consistent and that the acquisition will allow them to blend Siemens’ and UGS’ complementary programs to deliver “Totally Integrated Automation”...

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ANN ARBOR, Michigan, November 3, 2006 — Document management is a foundation element for any enterprise. The term “document” is a broad definition that includes files and information of many different types, formats, and media, all of which must be managed in a consistent manner. Managing documents includes capturing them, categorizing them using meta-data information, placing them in secure repositories, providing search mechanisms and schemes, and providing access to documents based on a user’s role and authorizations. Some of the challenges in doing effective document management include:

• Ease of use
• Establishing one logical repository (which may...

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isicad 2006, organized by Ledas Ltd. (www.ledas.com) and supported by SibCongress and Sib3, and held 31 May–2 June in Akademgorodok, Novosibirsk, Russia provided a forum for Siberia-based Russian companies to learn more about PLM and to share experiences with those who have already begun adopting PLM solutions and technologies. More than 300 individuals attended isicad 2006 (the second isicad forum) including more than 200 users and approximately 80 solution providers. Twelve companies demonstrated their solutions at the isicad 2006 exhibition hall. They included PLM, CAD/CAM, services solution providers, and technical publishers. The...

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Effective product design cost estimating (PDCE) is an important factor in determining whether a company should commit to building a product. Failure to accurately estimate the cost of a design will have a significant negative impact on a company’s market success and profitability. Underestimating the cost may require additional expenditure of resources, cause delays in bringing the product to market (missing the prime selling window) or result in having to charge a price higher than the market for that product will support. Benefits that can be achieved through more effective PDCE include:

• Improved ability to...

ANN ARBOR, Michigan, March 2, 2006 — Earlier today, Dassault Systèmes (DS) announced their intent to acquire MatrixOne for a total of $408 million. They expect to finalize the acquisition in the second quarter of this year. CIMdata is positive on this acquisition and believe that it has the potential to be an excellent move for DS, MatrixOne, and the industry.

MatrixOne is one of the leaders in providing lifecycle management focused PLM solutions. Their revenues in their FY05 (ended in May 2005) were $124 million, and CIMdata recognizes them as one of the six key “PLM Mindshare Leaders.” MatrixOne has...

ANN ARBOR, Michigan, January 25, 2006—IBM and PTC today announced a non-exclusive relationship in which the two companies have established a cooperative market agreement to address specific markets. IBM and PTC will jointly market and sell solutions based on PTC’s suite of products, with a focus on their Windchill offerings. According to the announcement, this partnership will primarily address the emerging PLM market in China, but will also include programs in the US and Europe focused on targeted accounts within selected industries, including electronics, consumer packaged goods (CPG), and life sciences.

According to IBM, this relationship will be supported by a...

ANN ARBOR , Michigan , July 7, 2005—PTC has announced its intention to purchase all of the assets of Arbortext, a market leader in dynamic enterprise publishing. We believe that this acquisition is strategically important and will create a number of advantages and opportunities for the combined entity. The primary consideration is that the synergistic combination of the companies’ products will create benefits for customers by providing dynamic enterprise publishing integrated within a Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) environment.

Several challenges to fulfilling the promise of this activity remain. A detailed integration strategy and schedule have to be implemented. The organizational structure...

ANN ARBOR, Michigan, June 6, 2005 — PTC announced today their acquisition of Polyplan Technologies Inc., a private company based in Montreal, Canada. Terms of the acquisition were not announced. PTC stated that this action was a key to its strategy to enable simultaneous product and process development through enhanced manufacturing process solutions. This move is not surprising and CIMdata is pleased to see PTC take this action.

The Digital Manufacturing market, a sub-sector within the overall PLM market, is rapidly gaining visibility and is one of the fastest growing opportunities for PLM suppliers. CIMdata estimates that expenditures for Digital Manufacturing...