PTC Provides Product Lifecycle Management Tools to Extend SharePoint 2010
Everyone’s looking for a piece of the SharePoint 2010 action and PTC has just extended it’s Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) software by building four new solutions on the busines collaboration platform.
PTC was one of the companies originally invited to take part in the Microsoft Technology Adoption Program for SharePoint 2010. As a result, it has released new solutions linking Windchill – its flagship PLM product – and SharePoint.
Windchill is a content and process management software that enables companies to streamline the development of products with a specific focus on “time-to-market”. It is targeted at the industrial, hi-tech, defencse and medical device industries and enables global enterprises to communicate and work across different locations worldwide.
Some features of Windchill include:
– Content and product information stored in single location
– Cross-enterprise production outlines and collaboration possibilities
– Lifecycle process support with automation of repetitive tasks
With the new SharePoint 2010 extensions, the ability to collaborate and speed up those processes will improve both Windchill and SharePoint 2010’s capabilities through four different new solutions.
Windchill PPMLink
With configurable stage and gate processes along with scorecards that aggregate project management measurements, PPM Link extends SharePoint 2010’s project management capabilities. It also includes product-related metrics that give users better insight into product performance.
Windchill Web Parts
Web parts give a single view from SharePoint 2010 of all product-related information as well enable users to search and view data and content from other applications including enterprise resource planning and finance applications. It also extends the assignment and executive reporting features.
Windchill SocialLink
With SocialLink, PTC has extended Windchill by adding SharePoint 2010’s social computing abilities. This means that users of any of PTC’s products will be able to use SharePoint 2010 content tagging and filtering. Activity feeds will share necessary information to all the different product communities, and even to external communities that are linked by their interest in a particular product on development. Features here include:
– Intelligent extraction and sharing of content on aspects of product development to relevant communities
– Expertise identification by constant profile updates based on Windchill use
– Easy access to all PTC solutions through a familiar, user-friendly tool bar
Windchill ProductPoint
Comes with CAD vaulting, sharing and visualization as well as data reuse and mark-up while new data loading tools enable migration of content from PTC’s engineering data management solution Pro/INTRALINK 3.x into Windchill.
These are the first PLM solutions built around SharePoint 2010 with PTC citing one of the principal advantages as the ability of all level of product developers to work and collaborate in a familiar environment.
[Photo courtesy of iotglobalnetwork.]
