Keywords: Product Lifecycle Management, PLM, Global Market Trends, Global Demographics, PLM Industry Markets
According to a recent ARC Advisory Group market research report, global economic development remains the primary influence on the global product lifecycle management (PLM) market. Significant business activity in certain global regions, most notably North America, is driving growth in the PLM market. And while the overall economy in Europe is showing slower growth, the PLM market appears to be bucking that trend in the region, especially for the PLM market leaders. Overall growth in the PLM global market was better than average from 2013 to 2014.
From a technology perspective, the need for manufacturers to develop the new breed of smart, connected products also helps drive the global PLM software market.
According to Senior Analyst Dick Slansky, the principal author of ARC’s Product Lifecycle Management Global Market Research Study, “PLM market leaders and smaller suppliers alike have responded to the broadening adoption of PLM technologies into new markets with strategies and solutions to penetrate new industrial verticals such as process, power, and utilities; and life sciences and consumer product goods.“
PLM Solutions Focus on the Smart Connected Product
Another major trend for PLM is the overall systems approach to the product lifecycle and the concept of the model-based enterprise. Product development across all industry sectors is moving to meet the requirements for smart and connected products, including cars, appliances, consumer products, and mobile devices. In a fundamental shift in product design, all products will need to be designed to be intelligent, connected, and fit the ecosystem in which they must function. ARC sees huge opportunities in both design and manufacturing for Internet of Things (IoT)-based approaches that connect the digital world with the physical world (the “digital twin”). The time-tested approach to good design has been based on meeting the requirements for fit, form, and function. To meet the requirements for IoT, designers now must consider an expansion of function to include connectivity and intelligence.
Plant and factory operations will also increasingly employ analytics to help validate as-built against as-designed by measuring deviation and variation in the build process for discrete manufacturing and plant operations for process manufacturing. Major PLM providers have either acquired or developed their own manufacturing operations management (MOM) or manufacturing execution systems (MES) solutions at the operations level. This extends the product lifecycle to the factory/plant floor and allows manufacturers to close the loop from operations and quality back to the manufacturing processes and product design to support continuous process improvement.
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