Maintaining First-Rate PLM Performance

Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) software is an integral part of the innovation cycle for manufacturers. PLM helps create workflows, automate functions, and integrate other enterprise software for collaboration. The real utility of PLM performance is how it streamlines processes and reduces the margin for human error, making it possible to grow, improve and innovate. 

PLM is also an expensive and challenging software to manage. Numerous bugs, crashes, customization issues, automation breakdowns, and other problems keep occurring and slow down the work pace at every organization. To ensure continuity in day-to-day operations and maintain PLM performance, your innovation engine needs to keep running smoothly. Organizations can achieve this with regular PLM health checks. 

Health checks are vital to extending the useful life of PLM software. These tools have hefty license fees, and upgrading costs a lot too. Therefore, the best strategy for organizations is to invest in PLM maintenance to manage and get the most out of their PLM. 

In this blog, we will discuss 3 questions about PLM health checks. We will tell you how health checks for PLM are performed, the benefits of getting PLM health checks done regularly, and what to look for in a PLM support and maintenance provider. 

The Mechanics of PLM Maintenance

Maintenance of PLM and its components is meant to help the end-users resolve any bugs or crashes they face. This includes issues like form creation, errors in text fields, file incompatibility, and stoppage in workflows. 

The process to fix a reported issue starts by raising a ticket that informs your maintenance provider about the problem. The user also shares the priority level to indicate how soon the issue needs to be resolved. The technician then evaluates the situation and notifies the organization, after which they deliver the solution within the given time. However, this is a reactive approach and can be costly if systems downtime occurs.  

The proactive strategy is to get monthly health reports and a complete PLM system health check semi-annually. Through this method, many bugs and faults that have not yet caused problems for end-users can be resolved to avoid downtime or delays. There are two essential parts of a health check: load testing and benchmarking. These measures allow maintenance experts to identify the issues and provide detailed reports and solutions. 

Load-Testing

The process of load testing involves running PLM at full capacity and testing out all the different modules through rigorous tasks. This process helps identify hidden issues by assessing your PLM’s capability to run each function. 

This is done by modifying load-testing scripts to emulate customer scenarios and identifying the issues. Customized load testing enables a more realistic situation and uncovers bugs and problems that arise only in those situations. Therefore, this method is more accurate and saves costs by eliminating unnecessary bug fixes.  

Benchmarking

Comparing your performance to industry standards is essential to gauge an estimate of your PLM’s standing. A load test alone is not enough to know whether your oracle agile PLM is in good enough shape to keep you on par with competitors. 

The benefits of benchmarking involve gauging industry averages for the performance capability of each module on PLM and; comparing the average industry score to the results of load testing from your own software. 

Benchmarking answers vital questions such as if an upgrade is required, the crucial hardware requirements, and the capacity to improve. 

Benefits of a PLM Health Check

We have vaguely mentioned above how a health check enables businesses to continue processes as usual and reveals underlying problems. In this section, let’s go over the advantages of implementing PLM health checks regularly in detail. 

Health checks are a way to ensure high business productivity through proper maintenance measures. Moreover, security lapses need to be identified regularly to safeguard data and operations from internal and external threats. 

A health check informs organizations about their current situation in terms of performance efficiency, security measures, and how they compare to the industry and competitors. By getting this comprehensive report, businesses can also realize opportunities to improve. They can empower their PLM to reach their maximum potential as they will be able to plan better, analyze better and avoid all roadblocks.  

As with opportunities, organizations can also recognize the threats to their PLM and general manufacturing operations. These threats may arise due to the PLM system itself being outdated, in which case experts recommend upgrading software or hardware to meet the latest standards. The hazards could also be of a strategic nature. The problems in strategy can be resolved by consulting with PLM experts who make recommendations based on how the industry regulates manufacturing and growth targets. 

Health checks allow businesses to test their security and disaster recovery measures. Data loss can result in financial losses worth millions of dollars to manufacturers. It also causes operational difficulties and forces some processes to halt, thus leading to downtime. The disaster recovery measures also need to be drilled to certify that the recovery method will be able to do its job in case of a security breach or any hazard. By scheduling health checks semi-annually, organizations can ensure they have the required security protocols.

PLM Integrations

PLM support and maintenance providers also create improvement strategies to overcome the shortcomings in your PLM infrastructure. Organizations can evaluate how they can enhance the performance of their PLM through health checks. Depending on your PLM software, there is a range of add-ons available that increase the functionality of your existing software. Additionally, organizations can explore cloud integration options to allow teams to collaborate and innovate freely. Collectively, these measures enhance the capabilities of your PLM, and through a health check, you can know what steps are suitable for you instead of purchasing random add-ons. 

A smooth-functioning PLM can do wonders for your business productivity. You can also seek guidance from PLM experts on deploying customizations based on your usage of the software and tools. Customizations suited to your business’s requirements give end-users a better PLM experience. Employees’ capability to use PLM performance tools extensively boosts an organization’s business productivity. 

Xavor Corporation – Experts in PLM Support Services

Xavor has a team of PLM experts who have provided support services to Fortune 500 companies for the past two decades. Over this time, Xavor has also resolved over 6,000 helpdesk issues raised by its clients. The experienced PLM team at Xavor carefully listens to PLM users and has designed specific products to help businesses do more with specialized add-ons. 

It has become increasingly critical that companies maintain a healthy PLM environment which means that organizations need to exercise healthy PLM choices. As a response, Xavor has developed a proactive measure to prevent possible performance and availability issues from arising. By utilizing our experience of managing numerous Agile Platforms throughout the years, Xavor has developed a process to assess the health of your PLM Platform and provide an Architecture Review Report. 

Xavor’s Cost-Effective Maintenance Approach 

Organizations considering upgrading to the latest version of Agile PLM might not need to spend that extensively. Through a health check, Xavor can inform organizations if an upgrade is the best move for them. It is possible to save the hefty upgrade cost and resolve recurring bugs and outdated functions through customizations, process extensions, and PLM add-ons.  

Xavor performs load testing as a part of a health check, or after an upgrade to ensure the level of performance. Following load testing, we give recommendations to solve the outstanding issues in your PLM, all integrated software, and add-ons. 

Xavor determines the benchmark for comparison through industry analysis. The set standard has high credibility due to Xavor’s two decades-long experience in providing PLM services across several industries. Clients also have the option to set their own benchmark and let Xavor evaluate their benchmark rating. Benchmarking helps avoid additional costs and mitigate risks associated with upgrades (such as downtime and data loss). It highlights key areas of improvement, and based on that, Xavor provides recommendations for alternate solutions. 

Conclusion 

After the pandemic, organizations have realized the significance of business continuity. Agile PLM Health checks and maintenance are vital steps to ensuring day-to-day operations. Especially for growth-oriented businesses, PLM functioning is crucial to innovation and operational management. Therefore, health checks should be viewed as a necessary measure rather than an additional cost. In fact, the small fee of regular maintenance is a more intelligent financial decision than allowing the risk of massive losses from downtime and operational inefficiencies. 

To get your PLM Architecture Review Report from Xavor’s team of PLM experts, reach out to us here and prepare your PLM performance infrastructure for any unforeseen events.