Black Diamond Equipment
Boundary-free product design
Black Diamond’s equipment for climbing and skiing regularly wins awards for its innovation and quality. “This is partly the result of dedication, desire and diligence on the part of an incredible team of people,” says the company’s web site. “It’s also the result of each of us being climbers and skiers ourselves. We’re a company of users – it’s who we are. We’re the greatest dreamers about what could be, and the harshest of critics about what exists.”
Business Requirements
At Siemens PLM Software, we never let a customer fail. We have devoted time and effort to fully understand our clients’ needs. It’s through that collaboration and our own research and development practices, that we have discovered a set of 5 common industry challenges hindering the success of product development pursuits. To address these challenges and remain competitive, manufacturers must leverage a unified PLM platform on a single data model that enables better global new product development and launch.
Complexity
Companies must accelerate top-line growth by increasing product and process innovation. To do this, you must understand your customers so well that you can respond to their changing preferences with speed and accuracy. Unfortunately, one size will never fit all in the world of apparel and retail, so you need to have a product development platform based on a single data model that enables seamless and flexible design, collaboration, and product launch.
Speed
Does your planning, design and manufacturing environment become more complex and costly with each new product introduction? Are your sample approval processes holding you back on your project timeline? Teamcenter® provides an underlying data management, collaboration, and process management foundation, as well as the overarching decision support capabilities you need to increase the speed of your product development process.
Sustainability
Are you drowning in process management requirements that are driven by ever-evolving regulatory requirements in the many countries and regions in which you do business? Has the total cost of maintaining your own approach to regulatory compliance and designing “greener” products spiked as a result? Ensure compliance, environmentally friendly product design, and a competitive advantage by incorporating customer and regulatory requirements into your product lifecycle at the front end of innovation.
Optimization
Do you have highly-skilled employees investing significant time on administrative and rework activities? Optimize your resources through rich calendar management and line planning, supplier relationship management, and the industry’s best workflow. Whether you are working with a colleague down the hall, a designer in Paris or a supplier in Hong Kong, with Teamcenter the right person on your team will always be working on-trend, on-time.
Globalization
In a down economy, companies face mergers, dividing corporate resources and supply chain partners across the country and around the globe. Companies that used to manufacture are now designing, sourcing, and distributing as well; these same companies are also outsourcing much of their work to highly skilled talent around the world. Are you able to leverage all of your global sources within the supply chain effectively? Are they integrated into your development process early in the lifecycle?
Solutions
Siemens PLM Software’s Teamcenter for Softlines, Hardlines, and Footwear addresses many of the challenges apparel manufacturers and retailers face. Teamcenter provides global multi-calendar roll up, nested line plans, supplier relationship management, and tight integration to Microsoft Office for rapid adoption and ease of use, all tied together on a unified PLM platform. With this power, PLM is no longer just a place to manage data; it is a business, product, and supply chain planning platform on which you can improve current and future new product development and launch.
Integrated Specification Development
Softlines, footwear, and accessories can require many prototypes as each component is applied in the development process. Precious time is spent on lab dips, construction details, samples, and approvals, and it becomes increasingly difficult to manage these processes via static documents, multiple programs, and e-mail.
Collaborative Line Planning and Calendar Management
Speed-to-market is critical as fashion cycles are being increased to stay one step ahead of the competition. Lines are fine-tuned based upon historic sales data and forecasts. Production costs are being challenged. So leveraging the proper resources and honing their creative strengths; delivering smooth, efficient hand-offs; and eliminating process bottlenecks are key requirements to your success.
Direct Materials Sourcing and Global Collaboration
Apparel manufacturers and private label retailers need to communicate with vendors quickly and efficiently to source the materials they need, when they need them. Teamcenter’s sourcing and supplier relationship management capabilities enable this communication, streamlining sampling and lab dips, RfX, costing, and supplier performance management.
Modeling – Product & Store Design
At the heart of good product development is iteration; softlines, hardlines and footwear manufacturers need the ability to model new product concepts. The challenge is always, “How do I iterate faster?”
