Co-Authors:  Florian Böhme, Jean-Hervé Poisson, Lucas Heckmann, Badia Dandana, & Chris Seiler This is the third article in the CM+Agile series. This time we highlight how Configuration Management is the glue between Model-Based Systems Engineering, Product Line Engineering, and Agile teams. Introduction In today’s ever-evolving engineering landscape, the pace of change is not just constant; it’s accelerating. We observe fast transformation programs, more palpable than ever before in organizations. This is for the most triggered by the increasing comp ..read more

I recently listened to the IpX True North Podcast where Ray Wozny CEO  and Ken Black VP of Education at the Institute for Process Excellence talked about their CM(2) journey, which I really enjoyed. This article will highlight some of the insights they shared. One in particular is the Enterprise Change assessment or what I call Impact Analysis, which Ken indicates is crucial for the successful processing of a change. A step that is often skipped or done poorly.   An example of this I just saw after listening to the podcas ..read more

In the last days of 2023, Martin Eigner posted about Form, Fit, and Function and one of the topics in there was the revisions of Parts. I thought about adding my comment, but it was difficult to capture everything in a short comment. So with this post, I try to provide my insights into the topic, which will be a rewrite of an existing post from a couple of years ago: HELP!!! Parts, Documents, Data & Revisions. And if you want to learn more about part re-identification, please check out the book I released last year The Essential Guide to Part Re-Identificat ..read more

We are nearing the end of 2023, so it is time to reflect on and recognize our achievements. On 10 January 2022, I started with a monthly newsletter, The Future of CM, which reached 1775subscribers at the time of writing this post, which is an increase of 380 subscribers compared to last year.  This year I also started a collaboration with Florian Böhme,Lucas Heckmann, Jean-Hervé Poisson & Badia Dandana resulting in two excellent articles that were very well received. Watch out for more next year! Next to the newsletter in 2023 I also publish ..read more

Why is Configuration Management so hard to implement and embed in an organization? Over the years I have been involved in various implementations of different aspects of Configuration Management. One thing that stood out was how difficult it is to get buy-in, to get real traction to implement the needed improvements, and to make them stick. This is not just my experience, I have heard this from many Configuration Management professionals. These people are passionate, have grit and perseverance to keep trying to move the needle in the right direction. And it is worth it! Any change is hard ..read more

This article will explore another use case to extend the knowledge graph of the CM Baseline, where we will not only look at the product data to create a kind of product 360 but also all the process and event data related to this product data. By adding events as nodes into a Knowledge Graph, you show events of a specific product data node, but also the interactions between these product data nodes from an event perspective. This will create patterns of data that give new insights that both classic process mining and product data analysis were not able to provide.    This post was ..read more

Steadfast Consistency: Delving into Configuration Management with Martijn Dullaart I joined Helena Gutierrez and Jos Voskuil on the Share PLM Podcast. We talked about Configuration Management, Product Lifecycle Management and my journey so far. Here you can find the all the Share PLM Podcasts:  To listen on your preferred platform Header Photo by Matt Botsford on Unspla ..read more

Co-Authors: Lucas Heckmann, Florian Böhme, Jean-Hervé Poisson & Badia Dandana This is the second article in the CM+Agile series. This time we will dive into the required shift in Customer Focus and how Configuration Management can support this shift. Why do corporations like most Western Automotive OEMs struggle with products that have short life cycles? Corporations like most Western Automotive OEMs face significant challenges when it comes to developing products with short iterations. One of the main reasons for this lies in the existing thought patterns, which do not transl ..read more

In recent weeks multiple incidents have been reported involving autonomous vehicles (AVs). Thanks to Philip Koopman for sharing these on LinkedIn (just a selection): 1 September 2023:  EV Journalist Discovers a Deadly Bug in Tesla’s Latest FSD  24 August 2023: Cruise car involved in San Francisco crash 9 August 2023: Watch: Exclusive Tesla Footage Suggests Reasons for Autopilot Crashes 8 August 2023: Cruise Robotaxi collides with turning semi-truck in San Francisco 3 August 2023: Watch SF traffic officers try to get this stuck autonomous Cruise car ..read more

Last week I announced the launch of my first book and today it is available:   The Essential Guide to Part Re-Identification Unleash the power of Interchangeability and Traceability. If you have struggled with Interchangeability, Traceability, Form, Fit, and Function, this book is for you. It is available on Amazon as a Kindle eBook and as Paperback and on Apple Book store as an eBook. There is still time to join the online launch event on 20 June 2023 at 3 PM CEST / 9 AM EDT. What is it about? One of the most important decisions during the impact ..read more