Greetings to all on my first post to the PLM Track

There is so much to PLM that I might get started by saying PLM is the best thing that has come along for item master people in the Oracle E-Business suite since DFF( descriptive flexfields). 

To start with let’s discuss the confusion in terms:

APC = Advanced Product Catalog = PLM = Product Lifecycle Management

Catalog Group in Oracle Inventory = Item Catalog Category in Oracle APC/PLM module

Item category sets in Oracle Inventory = Catalogs in Oracle APC/PLM module.

You will also see EGO if you are inside the EBS (E-Business Suite) which stands for Engineering Online.

Anyone using Oracle EBS and considering upgrading to 11.5.10 or newer should seriously consider and plan for project funds to go to getting PLM up and running in their EBS.  All industries, all users, and all inventory, bom, and engineering users should read up on this module.  This is the future of the item master in Oracle EBS.  It is a big jump for Oracle’s integration to engineering systems like what an “Agile” would offer.  It has a lot of functionality to consider plus it is in HTML instead of Forms.

Currently, you can use APC/PLM in 11.5.9 or 11.5.10 and of course the R12 software.  If you want to try it out without making the jump to 11.5.10 then you will be on Family Pack B.  This is limited but is still a great way of organizing and storing item attributes beyond mtl_system_items table.  If you are one of the lucky and your EBS is up to 11.5.10 then you can pursue the PLM family pack E with Rollup 10 path.  This is the latest in 11i and I have personally implemented this version with relatively no issues.  (I still have some performance issues communicated to PLM development team but they are fixing them in rollup 11 which is scheduled for end of February).

On my current client (always anonymous), I have completely converted their entire item master with initial item template application, item category assignments, special legacy system attributes not clearly mapped to the mtl_system_items attributes, and multi-language item descriptions through a tool called Web ADI.  Finance people might be familiar with ADI as “Application Desktop Integrator”.  This is where they can download and upload to Oracle EBS with Microsoft Excel applications.  PLM users can do some very interesting stuff with Web ADI and PLM including item creation (65K per worksheet into the master org.), item category assignment, item revisions, mass attribute value changes (except for setting to NULL), item organization assignment, and synchronization of item attributes.  This is very cool to an implementor.  How many times have you changed your mind about item values at the last minute and  needed a technical resource?  The only thing it cannot do is assign the catalog group(item catalog category in PLM)

I am going to try to start this blog with easy stuff so the beginners can get a good idea what PLM can do for them.  I will introduce more complex things as I get an audience and feedback.

If you are familar with flexfields, items, inventory, bom, and engineering modules in Oracle EBS then this new module will be a breeze (less difficult to learn).

I am on US time zone East Coast typically.  I will try to monitor closely for feedback.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 5th, 2007 at 3:45 pm and is filed under - Global Oracle Contractors Network. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.