Increasing competitive pressures, tight labour markets and growing environmental compliance objectives require organisations to adopt a more holistic management approach that spans the product and asset lifecycle.
The two companies will develop a combined software solution to make it easier to improve traceability across processes, prototype and test concepts much earlier in development, and to adopt more sustainable product designs.
The goal is to help firms speed innovation and time to market which can lead to improved quality and lowered costs.
"A significant portion of product innovation and differentiation contains electrical, electronics and software components,” said Kareem Yusuf, senior vice president for product management and growth at IBM Software.
“Yet, manufacturing companies are struggling to bring new products to market on time, as the current tools, processes, and information to manage these components are siloed and disconnected.”
"To address this gap, IBM and Siemens are collaborating on a digital thread environment to integrate sustainability practices throughout the lifecycle of a product, from design, production, operation, maintenance and beyond.
“This connectivity will help enable quicker time to innovation and compliance preparedness, and overall improved product quality."
The newly combined SysML v1 standards-based suite of integrated engineering software is expected to support traceability and sustainable product development using digital thread that links mechanical, electronics, electrical engineering and software design and implementation.
Initially, Siemens and IBM are working to connect IBM Engineering System Design Rhapsody for systems engineering with solutions from the Siemens Xcelerator portfolio of software services.
They will also connect the IBM Maximo Application Suite for asset management with Siemens’ Teamcenter software to support an integrated digital thread between service engineering, asset management and services execution.
