Technology Product Life-Cycle Management Journal

Meridian Systems Announces New Prolog Developer Network Program

2009-07-22T11:51:00.000-07:00

Meridian Systems, the Plan-Build-Operate technology solutions leader for project-based organizations, announced today the Prolog Developer Network (PDN), a developer-oriented program that is now available to Meridian customers and technology partners who intend to extend Prolog® software solutions on their own. PDN subscribers can access shared knowledge, tools and technical resources to effectively build Prolog integrations, and quickly leverage the power of Prolog Connect, a new Web Services development platform for Prolog software.

“Meridian’s market leadership in construction project management software continues to drive innovative programs, such as PDN,” said Sallie Sutter, vice president, client services, Meridian Systems. “PDN uniquely supports its members with easy access to a variety of expert resources, allowing customers and partners to reduce costs and save time when extending Prolog to other business systems and applications.” visit the Meridian PDN portal for complete details

3SL® Inc. Releases Cradle®-6.0 Requirements Management and Systems Engineering Software

2009-06-29T13:24:00.000-07:00

3SL®, a developer of innovative systems engineering products, today announced the release of Cradle-6.0. Cradle-6.0 is unique. It provides a complete end-to-end solution for requirements management, model-based systems engineering, risk management and verification and validation (V&V) across the entire systems development lifecycle in a single product with a single User Interface. Cradle ensures end-user requirements are met by tying them to the methods and implementation details throughout development. As changes are made, the application provides traceability to understand and record the effect of a change in requirements or technical functionality to the rest of the program. Cradle-6.0 dramatically simplifies the processes of modeling a project and showing the links between end-user requirements and the plans on how to implement them. The streamlined workflow makes Cradle even easier to use while reducing the time it takes to get new users up to speed and effective.

“Customers using the Beta version have been amazed at the new benefits and improvements in usability,” said Mark Walker, President of 3SL. “Making tools more intuitive and streamlining the steps for modeling projects leads to projects that are accurate, complete, on time and within budget.” See the 3SL web site for complete details

Oracle Unveils New Release of Oracle’s Agile Product Lifecycle Management

2009-06-22T11:17:00.000-07:00

Latest Enterprise PLM Offering Helps Mitigate Risk, Reduce Costs and Increase User Productivity

Oracle today unveiled Oracle’s Agile Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) 9.3, a new enterprise PLM offering with advanced risk analysis, an enterprise PLM backbone that integrates other applications and hundreds of productivity-enhancing innovations. This latest release equips customers to drive profitable innovations, mitigate risk, lower development and product costs and improve productivity across the entire product lifecycle. Agile PLM 9.3 represents the latest milestone for Oracle’s “Applications Unlimited” program. See the Oracle press release for complete details

Oracle Buys Intellectual Property Assets of Conformia

2009-06-19T12:21:00.000-07:00

Oracle announced that it has acquired the intellectual property assets of Conformia Software.
Conformia’s Product and Process Lifecycle Management (PPLM) software has unique capabilities for Life Sciences companies to manage drug design, development and transfer to production across Bio, Pharmaceutical and Chemical drug components. Oracle plans to integrate Conformia’s product and technology into Oracle Agile PLM solution to offer an end-to-end solution for managing drug development, packaging and commercialization. Oracle plans to provide integrations to Oracle applications, Oracle Health Sciences applications and 3rd party systems. This combination will enable Pharmaceutical and Bio-technology companies to accelerate innovation, meet regulatory objectives and improve productivity. See Oracle's press release for complete details of this transaction

Developing and Launching "Whole Product Offerings"

2009-05-29T12:56:00.000-07:00

Whole Product Offerings (aka "WPOs") are central to the success of any new product development and launch. Development, product management and marketing teams now face the mandate from senior management - and customers - to deliver Whole Product Offerings globally.

Gone are the high tech glory days of designing and launching a complex feature-rich "box" which sits in the data center, wiring closet or service provider node. Customers - enterprise and consumers alike - have long since demanded total solutions, which most commonly include:

Hardware
Operating Systems
Applications
Services
Support

... and full interoperability with solutions from other vendors.

What is the take away for product management and product marketing teams involved in preparing business cases, comparative ROI assessments and manging product/solution roadmaps for management? Answer - not only start with the customer, however, take a holistic view from day one to understand the customers' complete business need. It is no longer good enough to understand your customer's need, rather to understand your customer's customer as well. See article from FreePatentsOnline provides a good starting point for defining a WPO

Product Transitions and End-of-Life Process

2009-05-26T15:58:00.000-07:00

Effective management of the product transitions, especially end-of-life (EOL), is critical for maintaining revenues, meeting your P&L objectives and ensuring ongoing customer satification. While EOL may be viewed as a low priority it is also your business' opportunity position the next generation products and retain your installed base customers.

This is especially true in the high tech sector. Cisco Systems has a web portal dedicated to providing thier customers and parters with up-to-date EOL information across their product portfolio.

Customer Testimonials and Case Studies

2009-05-20T13:48:00.000-07:00

Vendors should not underestimate the value of high quality customer case studies and testimonials. They are invaluable tools in gaining acceptance in the marketplace for new technologies and products. The ability for peers, partners and competitors to see and hear how other companies are adopting your solution and the business benefits they derive are vital to downstream adoption by second and third tier business.

Yes, precautions must be taken not to accidentally divulge propriety customer information and their competitive advantages. Most companies will to provide a case study or testimonial must first clear all "content" with their internal legal departments. Hoffman Marketing Communications provides an excellent overview of the case study development process

Managing a World-Class Beta Program

2009-05-19T12:23:00.000-07:00

Successful beta program implementation and measurement is a critical element to your firm's next product introduction, whether a V1.0 launch or a V2.0+ feature-maintenance release. Many vendors short-change their beta programs for the sake of bringing their products to market more rapidly. However, do not loose site of the most basic of business objectives - delivering bona fide "solutions" to true customer problems, ensuring long-term customer satisfaction, adoption and retention (aka repeat buying behavior) and revenue-profit generation.

As a long-time Silicon Valley product marketing manager I can also atest to the fact that well-managed beta programs are invaluable for the all important "time to revenue ramp" - in other words meeting or exceeding your 6-month, 1-year and 3-5 year P&L goals. A large number of satisfied beta customers ready and willing to purchase and adopt your new product give your P&L a solid boost from NPI Day 1. Moreover, the willingness of these lead-adopters to provide a customer testimonial or even a case study provide immediate credibility to their industry peers, partners and competitors.

VOCOnline provides an overview of beta program management tools in the marketplace. It is undoubtedly a good investment of your firm's PLCM time and budget to use a high quality tool.

Which Comes First - The PRD or MRD?

2009-05-15T13:06:00.000-07:00

Well-defined Product Requirements Documents (PRDs) and Market Requirements Documents (MRDs) are essential components of your PLCM process. Which comes first, the PRD or MRD? Do you truly need both a PRD and MRD?

In theory a classic market and customer-driven MRD should precede an PRD. After all your firm wants to ensure that it is development a "solution" to legitimate end-user "needs" rather than a "solution in search of a problem". And yes, an intelligent PRD includes a prioritization and cost-benefit analysis of "features" ranked by their individual ROIs.

Terminology aside, the most critical factor is to ensure that your business assesses both customer-requirements and market opportunities along with the investment and returns for each major feature of your new solution. Pragmatic Marketing offers a clear model for acheiving your goals.

Business Plans - The First Step in the PLCM Process

2009-05-15T12:58:00.000-07:00

A simply highly focused business plan with a defensible pro forma ROI assessment is the first step in a successful PLCM process for companies of any size and any product arena. Understanding the best-case, worst-case and most-likely ROI for a new product or solution is the bona fide litmus test. Preliminary business cases do not need to be complex or highly detailed, they do need to be well thought out, candid and defensible. Far too often well-motivated engineers, product managers or sales staff bring new product ideas to senior management before giving the "concept" a forthright and open assessment.

Best practice: Under estimate revenue and over-estimate costs.

See the Solution Matrix article for further insights

Does Your Firm Need a PLCM Process?

2009-05-14T12:41:00.000-07:00

The breadth of your product portfolio, the more complex the products and technologies, and the number of foreign ("local") markets you serve are the three leading variables which include your firm's need for a formal PLCM process.

Small and medium sized businesses with a single product or limited product-line can likely do without a formal PLCM process.

Consumer products and commodities likely do not require a PLCM process as well.

An finally, if your firm only serves its own national market, such as the US, Canada or France, PLCM may be more "prcoess" than your business needs.

Nonetheless, businesses with multiple product lines, complex products - such as electronics, biotech, medial and major durable goods - serving multiple national or international markets absolutely need a sophisticated PLCM process to effectively manage their product life-cycles.