Dassault投资MES

转自：http://www.managingautomation.com/maonline/news/read/Dassault_Makes_MES_Investment_32508

 

 

In its latest attempt to link product design to production, Dassault Systemes today announced that it has made a minority investment in Intercim LLC, a purveyor of manufacturing execution software for highly regulated industries.

 

 

Under the agreement — the financial terms of which were not disclosed — the duo will share intellectual property and create a technology solution that closes the loop between product engineering and the shop floor, the companies said.

 

 

While Dassault and Intercim have had a strategic partnership since 2004, they are now working to tightly integrate Dassault’s V6 PLM architecture — specifically its DELMIA digital manufacturing software, which includes early process planning, modeling, and simulation of assembly lines — with Intercim’s Pertinence software suite for executing processes, tracking workflow, and managing quality during production.

 

 

Intercim’s expertise is in the aerospace and defense industry, whose constituents conduct global sourcing, run multipart manufacturing operations, and maintain very separate design and manufacturing departments. The key to this union, according to Dick Slansky, an ARC Advisory Group analyst, is the ability to tie the “as designed” model to the “as built” product and process, something that no vendor has yet achieved, he said.

 

 

To date, much of the attention has been on tying MES to ERP — integration that coordinates materials, scheduling, and finance, but doesn’t circle back to engineering and design.

 

 

“Dassault is saying it makes more sense to have a system of knowledge that captures shop floor operations and inspection records and … all of the stuff going on down on the shop floor that the engineers don’t know about, and put it into an actionable form that can be directed back to the engineering organization,” Slansky told Managing Automation .

 

“It’s an alignment of manufacturing and engineering,” said Judson Plapp, Intercim’s vice president of marketing and corporate strategy, in an interview. In his estimation, “that’s more important than the alignment of MES and finance,” which was exemplified by SAP’s acquisition of MES provider Visiprise.

 

 

The “as built” information generated from the Intercim software will be integrated into Dassault’s next-generation V6 platform and maintained as part of the PLM system, the companies said.

 

 

“This is a key piece on the road to the digital factory,” said Patrick Michel, Dassault’s vice president of Delmia industry solutions and marketing, in an interview. It not only enables manufacturers to change designs to improve their production processes, but also adds a new dimension to lifecycle management. “From the birth to the death of an aircraft, there is one version of the truth,” he said.

 

 

Michel said the minority investment in Intercim “strengthens the partnership to help define the next-generation solution,” which will offer visual feedback in the form of a real-time 3D model of the production experience.

 

The deal is not exclusive; Dassault will maintain existing relationships with other MES vendors, including a partnership with iBASEt, which also caters to the aerospace industry. In addition, Dassault has partnered with control automation vendors Rockwell Automation and Schneider Electric to link design to control engineering. Both companies market MES offerings — possible areas for future partnership expansions for Dassault.