February 2009
Escalator supplier and manufacturer, Schindler Group, has announced an improved efficiency by 300 per cent using PTC’s Product Development System (PDS).
A long-standing customer of Pro/ENGINEER, PTC's 3D parametric CAD/CAM/CAE solution, Schindler adopted PTC Windchill for content and process management.
PTC supports Schindler's key product development business processes such as variant design, design outsourcing, and change and configuration management. By implementing a common product development infrastructure based on Windchill, the company improved the collaboration among engineering sites in Europe, South and North America and China and reduced time-to-market for its highly customized products.
Schindler Group operates in more than 100 countries with offices on all five continents and employs 44,000 worldwide. Nearly half its current annual revenue is generated in the US and Asia. As a result of its extensive global expansion, the company realized that it was developing an ever increasing variety of different customer-specific products to meet specific regional requirements.
The company quickly recognized the need to standardize these product variations to reduce development effort, speed time-to-market and provide efficient aftermarket service and the challenge was to design global products with a geographically dispersed development team.
Schindler created a central Corporate Development Organization (CDO) to lead the creation of global products and improve knowledge transfer between regional teams in Switzerland, the US, Brazil, and China; and then sought one single collaboration platform to adequately support its new processes for global product development.
After evaluating two alternative approaches: a direct integration of product development data into the existing ERP system versus the implementation of the PTC product development system; and after an extensive technology benchmark, Schindler chose PTC to support its new business processes and enable global collaboration.
As part of the implementation, Windchill, the integral information backbone within PDS, manages previously distributed content in one single repository and allows role-based access to both internal and external partners.
PTC's Global Service Organization (GSO) merged the existing databases into the new Windchill database, and implemented Schindler's release and change management process as an integrated workflow.
Notification functions ensure that the relevant departments and employees are immediately informed when the status of certain data changes. Automating this process streamlines Schindler's new development processes and keeps development timelines on track.
"The PTC solution offered greater flexibility than a direct integration into the ERP system", said Christian Lehmann, Project Manager at Schindler.
"In product development we want to be able to generate data freely, without having to constantly create material master files and consider how the product will be manufactured. In addition, the solution was easy to configure and operate."
Since Windchill solution has been "live", Schindler relies on a faster, easier development with concurrent design and engineering.
"Without process standardization and the PTC Product Development System, we would have needed to double or triple the human resources at our overseas sites. Accordingly, we have realized a 200-300 per cent improvement of efficiency in our product development", said Bernhard Gysi, Head of Research & Development, Services and Testing at Schindler.
"Today, eighty percent of the data for our global product platforms are housed in one location, Windchill. All other sites access the core development data and adapt it for their specific requirements."
The Group’s goal is to expand on the success of the PTC PDS by moving additional development tasks to its CDO in the future.
"The PTC product development system helps customers streamline and optimize key product development processes to manage data in distributed environments and create economies of scale that help companies create competitive advantages even in tough economic conditions," said C. Richard Harrison, President and Chief Executive Officer, PTC.
"With PTC solutions, Schindler is able to ultimately drive greater efficiency into product development while still supporting key business initiatives to meet a multitude of customer requirements and produce the highest quality products available."
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