PDMi – Product Data Management & intelligence

Part of TXTPERFORM2008 Fashion & Apparel PLM

The heart of PLM: The foundation of costs and cycle time reduction for sustainable and profitable innovation

Today consumers are less loyal, more demanding and competition is fierce. Margins are squeezed, and as companies try and launch products faster and more often; this results in product failure rates as high as 75%. The number of collections per year has now more than doubled; Fashion companies are under pressure to deliver “consumer-right” products on budget and on time first time. In such circumstances data proliferation is unavoidable, but if data such as designs, BOMs, product specifications are not readily available, collaboration in a global sourcing environment, between stakeholders, partners and functions who all have varying objectives and drivers becomes complex, the process chaotic, and business objectives are missed. In such circumstances, speed to market and reduction in product costs are close to impossible.

As part of PLM, Product Data Management & intelligence - PDMi provides comprehensive product data management and collection design and development capabilities that ease information generation, management and bring integrity as well as the ability to share across stakeholders throughout the collection life cycle.

• Enhanced data quality: accurate data with permissions based access for one version of the truth
• Timely inter-company and suppliers communication: faster and more precise co-design and development
• Full concept management and story boarding with picture galleries and templates
• Workflow and performance management: common streamlined processes, accountability and proactive issue resolution

Correlated collection related metrics and analytics embedded into the solution allow the assessment of new styles to evaluate if their alignment to budgets and time criteria; numbers and quality of samples can be monitored. It is also possible to see what percentage of your prototypes actually turns into real products. These insights translate into intelligence and actionable knowledge for better decision making and thus optimal development efforts.

PDMi is Microsoft based. The Sharepoint UI provides a level of intuitiveness not seen before in any solution.

PDMi at a glance:

Using PDMi as part of TXTPERFORM2008 Fashion & Apparel PLM, users can tap into the benefits of a unique PLM offering which covers all processes from design to store. The breakthrough of connecting PDMi and Merchandise and Assortment Planning is in the unique capability it provides to have a closed loop information flow from the consumer back upstream into planning and design. The ability to analyze trends such as best sellers by geographies, by any product attributes and/or most popular price point for example, represents a newfound insight that if input into new product and collection development moves innovation closer to the consumer needs and wants and guarantees sustainable profitable innovation. Intelligence and performance management capabilities ensure each node of the process performs in the best possible way so that business objectives are met and continuous improvement becomes a constant in the company’s culture.