If you are moving your first steps in the PLM business, you have probably already used these 3 words, even if you don’t know how those things are connected to each other.

Words are important, that is why I want to talk about PLM, PDM, and DMS.

This way you could analyze exactly what your company is looking for and what your business needs.

Furthermore, you will soon understand that one word doesn’t exclude the other, but having a clear vision of its meanings can help you define a PLM implementation strategy.

We are Fourteen TEC, an SAP PLM consulting company, specialized in Product Management and Project Management integration.

We have implemented PLM processes for big corporations in the Industrial Automation, Automotive, Aerospace, CPG, Fashion & Energy industries, focusing on business processes, efficiency, collaboration, and productivity.

What is a DMS?

DMS stands for Document Management System, a software to archive, versioning and manage digital documents.

If you need to manage in a centralized way the archiving of payable invoices or 2D drawings, or product sheets you are going to use a DMS system.

The SAP product created for this sole purpose and the ERP installation core is SAP Document Management System.

SAP Document Management System has a key role in:

Avoiding file duplication.
Avoiding obsolete file distribution.
Managing document versions.
Defining an approval and release workflow.
Classifying and improving research.
Defining access control rules.

What is a PDM?

PDM stands for Product Data Management. This word was introduced around the ’80s, to identify the archiving of product-related technical data.

Years ago the products were designed on sheets of paper, and CAD software did not exist.

No one would have imagined that products were going to be designed digitally.

With the CAD software introduction, the product designing process wasn’t the only thing that changed.

Since the introduction of CAD software, people realized they needed a smarter way to manage product data.

Teams started designing products together and needed a way to:

cooperate for the product designing process
check the distribution
check who can see and modify said data

The CAD document management brought to the definition of a system to organize all the product data: the PDM. So PDM is a DMS-based system.

However, it’s important to underline that today CAD is not the only source of new technical data. The entire office suite keeps generating an increasingly growing quantity of product technical data.

The management of these data is a complex challenge because they included information that must be examined during the entire product lifecycle.

For this reason, we are hearing more and more about PLM and less about PDM.

So what is PLM?

First of all, PLM is a process. Different software has been implemented to manage it, like Mars PLM for SAP.

PLM stands for Product Lifecycle Management, and it’s the management process of all product lifecycle data, from concept to market. PLM has an integrated approach based on a transversal organization of different technologies and company departments.

To simplify, we can say that the management of a product through the Concept, Engineering/Design, Manufacturing, Assembling, Sales, and Service Maintenance phases, is the product life-cycle.

So PLM manages processes and information during all these steps.

Even if PDM was a great step ahead for smart product data management, its main focus is on engineering and CAD designing. That is why you will mainly hear about PDM inside design offices.

But since products have become increasingly complex and with that the quantity and transversality of the involved data, the need for a more holistic data management sprouted.

That is the purpose of PLM software.

So you have seen that DMS is a document management system. PDM is DMS-based, and it manages product-related technical data, usually design documents.

This is the starting point for a PLM software implementation for your company.

A PLM software, like Mars PLM, will allow you to manage in a transversal and organized way, not only the technical documents but also product data during its lifecycle.

Fourteen TEC is SAP PLM process and software implementation market leader.

In all these years we have created application models, based on the industry and the products that your company sells.

What’s the difference between PLM, PDM, and DMS?

What is a DMS?

What is a PDM?

So what is PLM?

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