Cloud PLM & PDM to Manage Files, Parts, BOMs, Inventory and Purchases

In this era of manufacturing, customers are demanding instant gratification. This means that manufacturers have had to evolve how they work in order to satisfy their customers. To meet the needs of their customers, manufacturers need to accomplish one thing: Go from development to production quickly and efficiently.

To accomplish this goal, manufacturers need to leverage tools in order to help them. However, manufacturers are still left using Excel which creates separated data silos and requires much more back and forth with digging through folders, files, and emails looking for the right Excel. 

This is why we created OpenBOM. As a system to organize product information and streamline information processes in organizations and beyond Since our inception, we have evolved and manufacturers of all sizes use OpenBOM to help them go from development to production quickly and efficiently. 

OpenBOM helps manufacturers to go from development to production quickly and efficiently by allowing them to accomplish the following:

1. Make better decisions faster
2. Convey the engineering design to the rest of the business and suppliers
3. Streamline their new product development processes 
4. Create a single source of truth for the engineering and procurement

OpenBOM’s goal is to solve the problem of data management complexity and decision support for industrial companies from SMB/SME manufacturing organizations to large enterprises.

Every engineering team and manufacturing company struggles with making decisions using accurate information. Think about the product and BOM complexity from the picture below.

Think about organizational complexity working with multiple teams, contractors and suppliers.

OpenBOM brings new methods of work by introducing engineering teams, manufacturing companies, contractors and suppliers to agile product development methods.

Overall data management and objects

OpenBOM provides a global digital thread SaaS platform that includes elements of product data management (PDM), product lifecycle management (PLM), and enterprise resource planning (ERP) to help industrial companies to collect data, organize information, collaboration, and lifecycle management processes.

OpenBOM plays the role of an integrated PDM/PLM/ERP solution for SMB/SME organizations and provides a system of engagement and intelligence for large enterprise companies.

OpenBOM provides a digital thread support for your multi-disciplinary design digital thread by aggregating data coming from multiple design (CAD) systems and services.

The foundation of the OpenBOM platform is distributed multi-tenant data platform capable to manage product data and all related pieces of information (engineering, manufacturing, supply chain, procurement, financial, etc.)

OpenBOM is integrated with all engineering (CAD) systems and, if needed, with other PDM, PLM, and ERP systems.

The core of the platform is a flexible data model capable to manage product information, product structure (BOM), and all relationships of Bill of Materials with other systems, products, vendors, contractors, and suppliers. By doing so, OpenBOM builds a global BOM knowledge graph and uses it as a foundation of data management.

On top of a sophisticated data management platform, OpenBOM provides a very simple and intuitive user experience with the foundation using familiar spreadsheet-like editing paradigms and collaborative tools.

OpenBOM architecture is built using a modern tech stack including polyglot persistence data management, microservices, and REST API.  OpenBOM is hosted on AWS but is also available on other PaaS platforms.

Why BOM is the foundation of the OpenBOM product data model? Product Structure (or Bill of Materials) is a key element of the product data model and provides an essential foundation for any data managed in OpenBOM.

The bill of materials software is something that is often considered a simple thing. After all, what can be complex in a list of parts? However, as we can see in practice, manufacturing companies are usually underestimating the complexity and fail to manage it properly. BOM engineering is a complex discipline that requires sophisticated data management and if you’re trying to avoid it, the results can be brutal and painful. The results are usually very painful and coming faster than you can think – missed components, wrong cost estimation, delayed product deliveries, and frustrated engineers and customers running around trying to figure out where is the last and most updated bills of materials. At OpenBOM, we believe in openness and simplicity as the main drivers to help companies to get up to the speed with data management science behind the Bill of Materials. It should be easy to start using OpenBOM and discover how to do it step by step. The Bill of Material is a structure representing all items needed to make a product. Depending on the product and business it includes a different level of detail about how the product is engineered, manufactured, assembled, sold, and maintained. Every engineering and manufacturing business should be concerned if parts and assemblies, as well as any other related data, are not managed properly.

What should be the content of the Bill of Materials?

Very often companies are asked – what to include in the Bill of Materials. A very simple answer to this question is EVERYTHING. The idea of not having something in a BOM is bad and to hope that you will remember what is needed is a recipe for disaster. Very often, we’ve been asked about what is a typical data set of the Bill of Materials. Here is a quick summary of what I think is absolutely essential.

Part Number: This is a unique string that identifies every single component in the product. Not all part numbers are the same. You probably heard about OEM, Manufacturing, Suppliers and many other part numbers. Those are additional pieces of information. You might not use all of them. But, to have a unique Part Number for every single item is a must to have to keep things organized. Description: It usually gives the organization a simple way to look at the details about parts and components. Used for search, simple identification Description is not unique and must not be used to reference parts for any purposes except human interaction. Part Number is used for everything else. Part Name: Names make it easier for organizations to track components. Many systems have internal names with specificity useful to Operations, Test, and Engineering teams. A separate nomenclature might be with customers in Sales organizations. Unlike part numbers, part names aren’t necessarily unique. Consistent use of part names like connector, adapter, and cable, can help keep everyone on the same page. Unit of Measure: A very important piece of information that helps to identify how to measure the quantity of the part. Type (s): Usually absorbs the different types of information to classify part of help to identify how to manage the part. Organizations can apply multiple types to classify parts and how data about part can be processed. Revision and Phase: This is used to identify the level of maturity and specific changes. Companies are using various practices when creating new part numbers of revise existing parts. In addition to these parameters, organizations are usually including information about the manufacturer, suppliers, cost, and other pieces of data in BOMs.

Part vs Usage of the Part.

The information I mentioned above is usually the same about the item (part, purchased assembly). However, another group of information is typically included in BOMs and it represents a specific part usage.

• Quantity: it is the ultimate way to say how many pieces of the part you need in this product. Note, in some cases (for instance BOM), quantity can be only calculated.
• Reference Designator: Typically used in the electronic Bill of Materials usually represents a uniquely identified instance of the part (assembly).
• Location: It is typically used in mechanical BOMs to differentiate between instances of the part/ assembly.

Effectivity

A very important element of the Bill of Materials. Effectivity is usually representing specific characteristics saying if a part (or assembly) can be used and under what conditions. There are different types of effectivity – date, configuration, serial number.

Configurations, Configured vs Resolved BOM

Last, but not least piece of information is related to complex products having multiple configurations. A BOM that contains information about multiple configurations usually called “configured BOM” and the BOM that represents information about a single configuration is called resolved.

SIngle-level, Multi-level, Flattened.

A list of components represented as one level is usually the basic way to plan the BOM. However, components are connected into assemblies and those usually have sub-assemblies. This is a simple single-multi-level structure. A flattened BOM is a report that summarizes the usage across multiple levels.

OpenBOM Bill of Materials core elements are represented using the Reference-Instance model and described by the following picture. You can see references (items) and their instances combined into parent-child relationships.

OpenBOM provides a super-efficient and easy-to-use user interface to view, control, and collaborates around the Bill of Materials.

OpenBOM creates and maintain a product knowledge graph that span across multiple domains – engineering, manufacturing, maintenance and support.

OpenBOM platform is different from many other existing PDM and PLM platforms.  Here are 6 key differentiators of OpenBOM platform:

• Multi-tenant data architecture
• Graph base data model queries and graph data science
• Real time data sharing and collaboration with simultaneous editing
• Global scale and connectivity
• Flexible real-time data schema and integration services
• Out of the box New Product Development (NDP) process support connecting engineering and procurement

• Multi-tenant (including flexible multi-tenant data model)
• Modern data management (scale + semantics)
• Integrations with CAD, PDM, PLM, ERP, and many others
• Collaboration capabilities

OpenBOM strategy and vision is to transform manufacturing company product lifecycle and operation using data. The value proposition includes removing of pain to data management and integration, collaboration and decision support.

OpenBOM solution strategy scales from New Product Development process support and extends into Decision support and future AI solutions.

OpenBOM is multi-tenant data management platform capable to provide solution to multiple companies and support tight collaboration with product structure (unlike all legacy single tenant PLM platforms)

OpenBOM is available as a multi-tenant instance on AWS via openbom.com, but can be hosted in your company AWS account using enterprise subscription. We plan to make OpenBOM available via AWS Marketplace. OpenBOM can be hosted using other hyper scalers such as GCP or Microsoft Azure.