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PLM: Boeing's Dream, Airbus' Nightmare February 5, 2007
By Mel Duvall and Doug Bartholomew
Seattle, Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2006 – Half a world away, Airbus chief executive Christian
Streiff had delivered a speech announcing that the company's A380 superjumbo would be
delayed by at least two years. The delay and resulting changes to the program were
expected to cost Boeing's fiercest competitor as much as $6 billion in lost profits. The
cause, Streiff said, was due to compatibility issues with the sophisticated computer-aided
design software used by engineers to architect the A380.
Airbus engineers in Germany, where the plane's rear fuselage section was being built
along with the hundreds of miles of electrical wiring that power the main cabin, were
using an older version of Dassault Systèmes' trademark Catia computer-aided design
software—version 4. Engineers in Toulouse, France, where the A380s were being
assembled, were using a newer version of the software, Catia V5.
When the first wiring bundles, large packs of preconfigured wires to power everything
from lights to in-seat entertainment systems, began arriving at the assembly plant in
Toulouse last June, Streiff said they didn't fit properly from the rear section into the front
section of the fuselage. Workers tried to pull the bundles apart and feed the wiring
through the fuselage by hand, but with 300 miles of wire and some 40,300 connectors on
each plane, the immensity of the problem soon became obvious. An unthinkable blunder
had happened—as the computer-aided design files were passed between the different
versions of the Catia software, the company said errors occurred. And software experts
familiar with the incident say the errors included changes in measurements. Those errors
are going to cost Airbus billions.
Boeing was using the very same Catia software from Dassault as a cornerstone of the 787
program. Could the same errors derail the Dreamliner? Boeing believes it has taken the
right steps to prevent the same thing from happening.
But others aren't so sure. Like any other large software implementation, be it enterprise
resource planning (ERP) or customer relationship management (CRM) systems, there is
plenty of room for error. "On paper, PLM looks like it delivers a perfect world," says
Robert Bean, COO of Kubotek USA, a Marlborough, Mass., firm that specializes in CAD
systems. "But we're not living in a perfect world. And when you're talking about
something as complicated as an aircraft, you're dealing with a massive movement of
data." The data warehouse for the Dreamliner project, for example, is 16 terabytes.
In fact, Kubotek released a study in October, the same month Streiff revealed the extent
of the problems at Airbus, highlighting widespread compatibility problems between
different CAD programs. The survey, which queried 2,800 CAD engineers, found that
50% of all respondents indicated they had to redesign a new part or tool on a weekly or
more frequent basis after 3D models were exchanged between CAD systems, due to
errors that were introduced – such as changes to measurements.
Reward Versus Risk
The missteps at Airbus, and Boeing's own reliance on Dassault's sophisticated software,
underscore the reward-versus-risk scenario offered by PLM. The number of modules in
a PLM suite varies from vendor to vendor and the industry being addressed, but there are
usually three core offerings: a CAD system like Catia; a digital manufacturing system,
like Delmia, which allows companies to simulate how a product will be manufactured;
and a product data management (PDM) system, such as Enovia, which manages all the
data associated with a product, such as CAD drawings and specifications.
Using the CAD software, manufacturers can create detailed 3D models of their products
and run those designs through a battery of virtual tests, such as stress, vibration, noise,
wind and even crash tests, long before a cent is spent on manufacturing. Using the digital
manufacturing software, companies can explore how those parts or components can be
produced by simulating the process. Products like Dassault's Delmia help manufacturers
determine how many people, robots or other manufacturing resources will be required,
whether existing machinery can be utilized or new purchases will need to be made, and
whether processes can be automated or will need to be performed manually.
While the PDM piece of the suites is focused on managing the data associated with a
product's development, it really forms the basis of a collaboration platform. Using
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