Inspiration can strike anywhere and at any time—all creative people know that, especially designers.  It is not unusual to see a designer’s desk littered with sketches on cocktail napkins, newspapers or the back of Publisher’s Clearing House prize notifications.  The trouble is trying to consolidate this information in a clear, organized fashion.  A good PLM system helps to solve this problem by creating simplicity. And with greater ease of use, there is more time for creativity.

Take this example:

Sunday: A very pregnant designer is one item away from finishing an entire line. As she sits at an outdoor café table, she becomes fascinated by a woman wearing a pink-polka dotted dress and a man in a green turtleneck (yes, an odd choice). She has an idea.  She scribbles something down on a napkin at the table, and then runs home to make a more detailed sketch on Adobe illustrator. Later, she finishes up and imports the sketch into her company’s PLM software. On the other end, her boss receives an automated email that says the designer’s task of finishing the line has been completed.

Monday: The designer gets an email from the boss the next morning. The boss is pleased. “Get me a design line list based on all your sketches by Wednesday,” she says. The designer spends the rest of day and evening drawing polka dot and green turtleneck inspired clothing and assembling fabrics and materials. By 7pm, she has the whole line arranged neatly on the design item list. She sends the information to her boss and goes home.

Tuesday: The next morning, the designer has another email from her boss. “Wow, that was fast…I love it all!” her boss says. “Send these down to product development so that they can start the specs on all the pieces? We need samples for the buyers in a month. Get going!” That night, the designer, the new project lead, uses the company’s VerTex PLM software to quickly and effortlessly assign the creation of the technical pack to the product development team. When she leaves work, she feels funny.

Wednesday: Early the next morning, the designer goes into labor two weeks early and is rushed to the hospital. She’ll be out for a few months and she still had some outstanding tasks remaining. In the past, a missing design or development team member could spell disaster—locating all her files, designs and notes could have taken days or even weeks.  All this uncertainty disappeared, however, when the company started working with their VerTex PLM system. Crisis averted.

Thursday: The Product Development team finishes the technical packet at 3pm and sends the information to their boss. The minute the technical pack is completed, the VerTex PLM work flow notified the costing and sample departments that the line items were ready to be made.

Friday: The next morning, as the designer sits in a hospital bed with her new little bundle of joy, her design team gets word that the technical pack has been approved. Later that day, the specifications are emailed to the manufacturer via the synched PLM system.

Two Weeks Later: The samples are returned from the manufacturer. The creative director quickly assembles the design and product development team for a fit session. The entire team is notified of needed changes by their individual dashboards and begins collaborating on a revised technical packet. With their Vertex PLM system, there is no confusion about which technical packet is the most current.

Two More Weeks Later: Venders take turns viewing the samples and a big buyer is secured. The company then quickly confirms with their manufacturer that they will be able to create and deliver the garments to each of the buyer’s sixteen stores by the onset of the fall season. Each step is deftly monitored on the company’s VerTex PLM system: sourcing, manufacturing schedules, and delivery times.

Two months later: Sales of the new line soar and the Company and their design team receive much acclaim. Unfortunately, the creative talent that created the successful product is still on maternity leave. Good thing all her work was saved into a centrally located database and the remaining design staff can use some of her past ideas to supplement their own in creating new and unique products.

Six months later: The Company continues its meteoric rise. Because of its efficiency, team spirit, and creativity, talented designers see the benefit of working at the company and join the team. The company also begins opening up their own chain of stores. Meanwhile, the original designer sits at a café—now, with an occupied stroller—planning her future.

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To find out more about Business Management Systems, visit the company’s supplier listing.

Company cites Centric 8 PLM’s industry best practices, out-of-the-box functionality, mobile apps

(CAMPBELL, Calif., Feb. 21, 2012) Dsquared² S.p.A., the high-end Italian fashion house, has selected product lifecycle management (PLM) software from Centric Software, Inc., for all product lines.

Dsquared² has purchased the entire Centric 8 PLM suite to manage the product development and sourcing process of its women’s and men’s apparel, footwear, bags and accessories lines. The company will use Centric 8 to increase overall process efficiency, from concept to pre-production, and to accelerate the introduction of new collections, according to Gianfranco Maccarrone, Dsquared²’s CEO. “Centric’s PLM system will help Dsquared² obtain greater visibility and control of costs and margins, a critical aspect in the current fluctuating market,” says Maccarrone.

Headquartered in Milan, Dsquared² attracts a sophisticated and forward-thinking clientele, including many celebrities, with its unique philosophy of “alternative luxury,” according to Maccarrone. “For our purposes, Centric’s PLM system clearly stood out from the other PLM solutions we addressed,” he explains.

“Not only is Centric 8 a complete PLM solution able to manage the product lifecycle in an end-to-end manner, it also embeds best practices from the fashion industry as standard functionality – with no need to customize,” says Maccarrone. The CEO also cites Centric’s ease of use, a critical factor for PLM system user adoption. “What has impressed us most, though, is Centric’s PLM mobile strategy, which extends the functionality of PLM,” he says.

“Our work with Dsquared2 is an excellent opportunity to continue our leadership in the worldwide, high-end fashion brands market,” says Chris Groves, CEO of Centric. “Helping the company’s design and marketing teams develop products with the full Centric 8 PLM suite—including mobile apps—is a tremendous application of our Agile Deployment^SM methodology for PLM software.”

Dsquared² (www.dsquared2.com)

Dsquared² designs, develops and markets a portfolio comprised of women’s and men’s collection, footwear, bags and accessories. The company operates 16 retail stores in cities throughout Europe, the Middle East and Asia, including flagship stores in Milan and Paris. The ready-to-wear collections of Dsquared² are licensed worldwide by Staff International S.p.A., a company belonging to the Only the Brave Holding Group, that also produces iconic brands including Maison Martin Margiela and Viktor&Rolf.

Centric Software, Inc. (www.centricsoftware.com)

Centric Software is a leading provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software for apparel, luxury goods and consumer goods companies. Centric 8 delivers easy-to-use functionality to manage critical, inseparable business processes, including product development, sourcing, line planning and profitability management, through a modularized system that implements and delivers value rapidly.

With Centric 8, companies are able to cut costs and inefficiency, speed new products to market, drive margin improvement, and improve global collaboration and compliance. Global enterprises including INTERSPORT France, Colmar, Christine Laure, Balenciaga, Christian Louboutin, KlimUSA, Bass Pro Shops, Bravo Sports, Longchamp, Silver Jeans, Sundance Catalog and United Stationers use Centric solutions to achieve revenue growth, reduce costs and deliver trend-right products to their customers.

(Haarlem/Netherlands, 14 February 2012) Piazza Italia recently selected iShopShape as the partner of choice for their project to modernize and professionalize the retail planning and Visual Merchandising process. It has been announced during the annual Piazza Italia convention which was held in Naples, Italy. More than 200 people were attending the convention and got presented the first results of the company-wide Mockshop and Styleshoots implementation.

Scope of the project is to improve compliance over all stores in order to obtain uniformity of the store image and product presentation. As a result, costs of guideline production decreased and store quality improved significantly.

The Managing Director of Piazza Italia personally addressed the audience and shared his excitement with the crowd. Piazza Italia is recognized as one of the market leaders in Italian Fast Fashion Retailing. During its presentation the Management pointed out that with the embrace of new technology Piazza Italia can stay ahead in this challenging and competitive market.

Piazza Italia runs MockShop for retail planning and creating perfect Visual Merchandising Guidelines. StyleShoots is key at Piazza Italia for professional image capturing of the total range. High quality images are used in the entire business process as well as in the online environment.  Next on the agenda is improving store compliance with ShopShape, the web and mobile application that streamlines store communication and facilitates store compliance management.

About Piazza Italia

Piazza Italia is established in 1993 and has become one of the most successful businesses in Italian fast fashion.  Delivering fashionable products at affordable prices, Piazza Italia is committed to their customers. The company is managed by three young, technology driven, fashion entrepreneurs with a deep understanding of retail.

Head Quartered in Nola, near Naples, Piazza Italia supports 110 own and operated stores, 35 franchise stores outside of Italy and realizes nett revenue of more than 240 million Euros per year.

 About iShopShape

iShopShape is a global provider of Fashion PLM and retail execution solutions that optimize the processes from design to retail. With its extended product portfolio, iShopShape empowers its customers to effectively develop ranges that perform well using the unique visual technology. Connecting the essential fashion business processes from early design to actual sourcing and producing with web based products often results in shorter lead times and effective merchandise planning. iShopShape’s integrated solutions help customers to make more efficient use of each of their stores and shop-in-shop retail spaces. Leading retail customers of iShopShape are well-known chains including Conpibel, M&S Mode, Sportler, Peek & Cloppenburg, Kaufhof and Lindex. They use iShopShape technology to built ranges and optimize communications with their individual stores and outlets, leading to conversion ratios of up to 30 per cent. Prestigious brand owners like Guess, Marlboro Classics, O’Neill, Adidas, Puma, Garcia, s.Oliver, have been able to streamline their vital business processes with iShopShape resulting in cost effective increase of sales performance.

Further information is available at www.ishopshape.com.

USA Accessories Company use a UK solution for clarity and management.

The New York based company Madison88 Ltd, have selected Fast React Systems as their sourcing solutions provider by implementing Vision.

As a leading supplier of private label accessories, the company are experiencing huge growth which is to continue over the next few years. Madison88 design and develop their own products, have direct manufacturing capabilities in China and strategic partnerships in Italy and throughout.

With over 50 years’ experience in the industry, providing to approximately 40 customers including well known department stores, speciality chains and designer brands, Madison88 sought Fast React to deliver a solution that could not only manage the rapid growth of the company but give clarity from design through to delivery.

Vision will enable Madison88 to visually plan, track and manage their critical path activity, highlighting any unwanted issues before they arise. Vision will also allow the design and development team to help develop and plan new product ranges and costings. The solution will include Range Planning, Critical Path Management, Purchase Order Tracking, Product Costings, Supplier Collaboration and Materials Management.

Chris Cantasano, COO at Maddison88 comments: “We chose Fast React after numerous conversations with their competitors. We believe Fast React is the most knowledgeable in understanding our industry, business model and our problems. They offered what we feel should be the best solution for Madison88.

“The process so far has been very professional and we believe that based on this performance it will undoubtedly continue. Using the Vision software, we will see many of our supply management problems reduce. By visibly seeing these issues we will be able to reschedule in advance, eliminating air freight charges and late deliveries.” said Mr Cantasano.

Fast React Managing Director, Andrew Brown said: “This is an exciting project for us. We understand that companies like Madison88 often experience rapid growth and the Vision solution has been developed as a single point of reference in the business to help improve coordination allowing the business both to manage growth and increase performance at the same time.”

Following on from my previous interview with Gary Barraco of ecVision, our detailed coverage of the NRF show also continued this week.  In my second interview from the show, I spoke with Donny Askin (recently-appointed President of Software Solutions), Bill Brewster (Vice President of Global Sales and Marketing) and Peter Bambridge (Director of Software Solutions for Northern Europe) of Gerber Technology about the past twelve months, their thoughts on PLM’s place in the broader retail industry, and the company’s plans for the coming year.

Our extended coverage of the show is still being collected on a dedicated page, and comprises my “Best of NRF 2012“, published on the day of my return, followed by a full, detailed report on the show (and PLM’s place there) as well as a gallery of photographs taking during my visit.

Also new to WhichPLM this week are expanded PLM suppliers Singletree Technologies, who have joined the growing ranks of vendors listed in our new and improved PLM Supplier Listings.  You can visit the Singletree Technologies microsite now to find out more about the products and solutions the company offers.

In the news over the past seven days were the Product Development Partnership (PDP) and Lectra, both of whom announced new appointments.  In PDP’s case, the company has appointed Andrew Dyer, an apparel industry veteran, as a Specialist Consultant to handle new educational initiatives.  Lectra announced yesterday the nomination of Laurent Alt as the new director of their 220-employee-strong Software R&D department.

As always, I look forward to hearing from our readers with any comments on the week’s news and WhichPLM developments.  Suppliers and event organisers wishing to add their upcoming roadshows, seminars and webinars to the WhichPLM Events Calendar can also contact me directly on ben@whichplm.com

(Paris, February 16, 2012) Lectra, the world leader in integrated technology solutions dedicated to industries using soft materials—textiles, leather, industrial fabrics, and composite materials—is pleased to announce the nomination of Laurent Alt as the new director of its Software R&D department.

Lectra’s R&D department is 220 employees strong, including 200 people in France. Every year the company consecrates major investments in R&D: €68.8 million over the past four years and €18.2 million (8.9% of revenues) in 2011 alone despite the economic crisis.

“The decision made in 2005, after deep consideration, to maintain Lectra’s R&D and production in France has enabled it to meet the three challenges it faced: compete with the low-cost products of its international competitors that had relocated to China and those of its Asian competitors; increase its competitiveness; and boost its margins. This decision has also enabled Lectra to protect its industrial property,” said Daniel Harari, Lectra CEO. “The arrival of Laurent Alt at the head of the Software R&D team follows Lectra’s ambitious investment policy over the past seven years. Laurent is a man of talent. In addition to his management qualities, his mastery of complex information systems projects, and his knowledge of latest-generation technologies, his experience in CAD and PLM will enable us to reinforce our technological advance all the more.”

“I am thrilled to join Lectra at such an important moment in its history. Few companies have the courage to reinforce their R&D investments in the midst of difficult times,” said Laurent Alt. “My previous experience has prepared me for this new challenge of enabling Lectra to reinvent the rules of the industry, while capitalizing on its business experience and leveraging all the latest technologies.”

Innovation, human capital, and proximity to customers continue to drive Lectra’s leadership. Pursuing its steadfast investment in R&D and strengthening its sales and marketing teams constitute the keys to accelerating the company’s full-scale transformation plan. This will enable the company, as soon as the economic crisis ends, to fully realize its growth potential in its most promising geographic markets and market sectors.

Laurent Alt, a graduate of the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris, began his career in 1987 at Thomson Digital Image where he created the first software for articulated characters and participated in the development of a 3D modeling package intended for industrial design. Over the next 14 years he held positions in R&D management, corporate strategy, and consulting and pre-sales for PLM solutions at Dassault Systèmes. In 2007, Laurent joined SpaceClaim, an American concept design software startup, created by Mike Payne, co-founder of PTC, and then Solidworks, where he directed the 3D geometry tool R&D team. Finally, in 2009 he became CEO at HD3D, a company which develops digital content production management software, in partnership with French audiovisual leaders such as Mikros Image, Mac Guff Ligne, and even Eclair Laboratoires.

About Lectra

Lectra is the world leader in integrated technology solutions that automate, streamline, and accelerate product design, development, and manufacturing processes for industries using soft materials. Lectra develops the most advanced specialized software and cutting systems and provides associated services to a broad array of markets including fashion (apparel, accessories, footwear), automotive (car seats and interiors, airbags), and furniture, as well as a wide variety of other market sectors, such as the aeronautical and marine industries, wind power, and personal protective equipment. Lectra serves 23,000 customers in more than 100 countries with 1,350 employees and $287 million in 2011 revenues. The company is listed on NYSE Euronext.

For more information, please visit www.lectra.com.

Ben - How was the 2011 calendar year for Gerber Technology?  Did you undertake any particularly significant software revisions or updates?  Did you sign any noteworthy clients in the last twelve months?  Did you notice any trends emerge in the industry at large that you feel were unique to the last year?

Bill Brewster, Donny Askin and Peter Bambridge of Gerber Technology

Donny – It’s been a big growth year – a lot of new customers.  We’ve expanded our staff and made some changes in management, me being one of them, after I joined on November 1^st.  Obviously Gerber’s parent company has also undergone a lot of transformation to be become a privately held company, coming off the New York Stock Exchange – now private equity backed.  And half the company was sold off right after the transaction, which has actually allowed Gerber Technology to become a lot more focused on our core competencies and verticals.

Bill – I think from a sales perspective we’ve really grown quite a bit in Europe this year: Scandinavia, France and Italy, with a number of new clients.  We’ve also issued two very significant product releases in 2011, both adding a lot of functionality and a lot of depth to the PLM product that we had.  WebPDM was a very deep product – not as broad as YuniquePLM – but a very deep product in the product development and specification area.  And now that things like multi-dimensional bill of materials have also been added to the YuniquePLM platform, this not only allows our PDM customers to take a serious look at converting over (and we’ve seen a tremendous amount of interest and excitement from our current customer base to make that transition) but it also expands our opportunities in areas like Europe where manufacturing is still an important part of the value chain that our customers are using to bring products to market.  In the US things are more retail-focused.  We still have manufacturing here, but when you look at Italy and France, even if they’re not manufacturing they’re still very focused on the quality of the product that is manufactured for them and as a consequence they require a bit more from a PLM solution – and at Gerber we have all that.

Donny – Yes, and to that end, with the latest version, we’ve more tightly coupled our CAD product.  Interestingly enough, if you look at PLM across other verticals – non-apparel and non-sewn products – CAD and PLM are typically very tightly coupled, but for whatever reason that has not always been the case in this space.  This has already become a very positive factor in us closing business.

Bill – From a value proposition standpoint in particular it really allows our users to reduce the number of steps, reduce redundancy, reduce the quantity of data entry and reduce errors in data entry.  This has always been in place in other industries, but here there really are very few PLM providers that can deliver it.

Donny – We also had a very successful user conference this year – Ideation, in Florida – where we previewed a lot of new products: our PLM360 product, for example, allows users to capture views from all sides of a product and mark it up, in order to reduce the need for physical sampling.

Bill – This is very tightly integrated with our PLM solution, too, and also has an iPhone app that allows you to do the visualisation right from the camera on your iPhone.

Gerber Technology's stand at NRF 2012

Donny – Also there was a period where we were very focused on customer engagements, whereas now the focus has come back to strategic positioning of our products.  So, that has impact on our product development and the innovations that originate there.  We’ve actually taken a portion of our development team and told them that they are strictly focused on innovation – we don’t want them supporting the traditional core product – so they’re working on things that will unfold in the next nine, twelve or eighteen months, that we think will actually change the conversation out there.  The fact that we’re committing the resources is, I think, actually the salient story, whether or not we actually deliver that innovation… stay tuned.

Ben - With NRF being a retail-focused show (with point of sale, customer engagement and merchandise planning being so prominent on the show floor), what do you consider to be PLM’s part in retail?  Do you feel as though the focus at shows like this is placed too heavily on in-store solutions, while PLM and other enterprise systems are marginalised, or does PLM still have a role to play?

Donny – Absolutely, PLM has a role to play.  What I think happened was that there was a perception that PLM was only for the big guys, and that perception has changed, I think, over the last several years.  At every step of the process now, no matter what size of business you have, there’s at least a perception that there’s a need for PLM.  Whether there’s an affordability or even product offerings that are tailored to those segments of the market, in some cases that still needs maturing, but we’re seeing a very high degree of receptivity.  People understand PLM, they know what it is, in many cases if they aren’t automated today they’re doing things in Excel.  So, demand is not our challenge right now, it’s really managing growth.

Ben - Finally, do Gerber Technology have any major software revisions, events or announcements lined up for the coming year?

Donny – Nothing that we’re ready to talk about just yet.  We have just delivered YuniquePLM version 4.1, which went deeper as opposed to wider, with a whole new feature set.  I hate to pre-announce until it’s real, and we still have a ways to go.

Peter – Coming back to your question about the relevance of PLM; we’re starting to see a growing number of companies working with us.  One example is Torex, since merchandise planning is often the driver of styles that are then to be planned within PLM, so in a lot of ways it’s about expanding the footprint of PLM.

Donny – That’s an excellent point.  We don’t have a huge ecosystem, so I think this is a great opportunity for us.  We see expanding that ecosystem, as WhichPLM talks about with expanded PLM, as an opportunity for us.  I have some real-world examples already, but that is a real focus for us going forward.

Ben – That’s the one thing to bear in mind.  As long as PLM has a strong core, its relevance and the number of solutions that integrate with it is only going to increase.

Donny – The interesting thing that I was thinking, when we talk about defining what PLM is, is that by nature it’s a misnomer.  Talk to ten different people and you will get ten different answers.  PLM should stretch across everything from concept to domestic warehousing.  But, PLM only gets as far as order by everybody’s general definition, so gaining acceptance of truly expanded PLM as a definition will be an interesting project.

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Ben Hanson is the Editor of WhichPLM

As a consequence the range of software, news and solutions that we cover has become broader and continues to diversify.  But in order to reflect the true reach of WhichPLM today, we wanted to go further.

As part of our continued commitment to our readers, this week sees the launch of the WhichPLM Events Calendar.  An online resource collecting the most important apparel industry fixtures for the coming year and beyond, the Events Calendar is populated with seminars, shows, webinars and fashion weeks that have been specially selected to cater to the interests of our broad readership.

By default the Events Calendar displays the events for a given month, but by pushing the “week” or “agenda” display buttons readers can plan their attendance on a day-by-day basis, ensuring they never miss a critical seminar, conference or show.  Clicking on a given entry reveals more detail about that event, including a map of the location, an overview of the event content and the chance to visit the event organiser’s website to glean further information and register.

The WhichPLM team have undertaken significant research to make sure that our calendar includes the best and the most suitable events from around the world, but as the year progresses we plan to work closely with organisers the world over to ensure that the Events Calendar always contains the latest events and fixtures that are relevant to product development for the apparel industry.

If you are an event organiser and would like to be included, please contact our Editor, Ben Hanson, on ben@whichplm.com.

Andrew Dyer, an apparel industry veteran with more than 20 years’ experience in the design, development, sourcing and branding of garments, joins PDP as a Specialist Consultant.  Drawing on his extensive technological knowledge and unique insight into the product development process, Andrew will focus on delivering comprehensive training to designers and garment technicians around the world, using the industry-standard Adobe Illustrator and other complementary solutions.

In addition to those core design skills, the training initiatives will explain the benefits of data integration between the Adobe Suite and PLM solutions – both Core and E-PLM – as well as outlining best practice methods for data integration and file size reduction.

Working directly with production line teams, fellow designers, and manufacturers the world over, Andrew has been instrumental in the design, sourcing and development of garments for a range of high-street retailers during his career, including: Marks and Spencer, Next, TK Maxx, New Look, BHS, Bay Trading, Top Shop, River Island and Matalan.  Andrew was also responsible for the introduction of computer aided design (or CAD) to the design teams under his management.

“Mirroring the increasing adoption of PLM across our industry, companies of all shapes and sizes are coming to recognise the benefits of technology at every stage of the product lifecycle.  Through our consultancy engagements we have seen Adobe’s solutions become the industry standard for design and development, and we recognised the need for the kind of expert-level education that would enable retailers and brands to realise those benefits.”  Said Mark Harrop, Managing Director of PDP.

“I am thrilled to welcome Andrew to the PDP team; his breadth of experience makes him uniquely suited to delivering our new educational initiatives.  I firmly believe that Andrew will be able to impart a real knowledge of how skills and technology can together transform the right designs into the right products for the right markets.”

By leveraging Andrew’s considerable experience to inform and educate designers and executives alike, PDP hopes to insure its reputation as one of the world’s leaders in PLM consultancy and education for the retail, footwear and apparel industry.

About PDP

The Product Development Partnership – part of the PDP group of companies – provides expert consultation and training services to companies in the retail, footwear and apparel industries who are looking to implement new software or enhance their existing product lifecycle management (“PLM”). With several decades’ combined experience, a unique skill set and global expertise running the gamut from design to delivery, its services are informed, proven and completely impartial.

Find out more at www.pdplimited.com

Our extended coverage of the show is collected on a dedicated page, and comprises my “Best of NRF 2012“, published on the day of my return, followed by a full, detailed report on the show (and PLM’s place there) as well as a gallery of photographs taking during my visit.

The past seven days have seen the full spectrum of news announced here on WhichPLM – from new releases to partnership agreements, and from recruitment to 3D experiences.

First off, Computer Generations Solutions (CGS), developers of the Blue Cherry solution, announced that New York-based luxury fashion brand Diane von Furstenberg (DVF) would adopt the company’s point of sale solution.  Already a long-term customer – using CGS’s broader solution offering – DVF’s choice to extend their technological support right the way through from enterprise PLM to retail point of sale is representative of a larger trend, whereby retailers and brands are increasingly beginning to recognise the benefits of a synergy between core and E-PLM.

Next up this week were E-PLM suppliers FastFit360, developers of the solution of the same name.  The company (who regular readers may recall recently announced that Ralph Lauren had adopted its solution for the development of their Olympic Collection) announced its first major studio release of 2012 – integrating measurement tools into their Studios and solutions.

Also falling under the E-PLM umbrella are vrSoftware, developers of the vrMockshop solution and recent entrants to the WhichPLM supplier listings.  vrSoftware this week announced their intentions to partner with retail design and brand agencies to help meet the needs of the ever-changing fashion marketplace.

Dassault Systemes (suppliers of a range of solutions, both core and E-PLM) appeared in the news twice this week: first to announce the appointment of brand equity expert Monica Menghini as Executive Vice President for Industry, Marketing and Corporate Communications; secondly to reveal its 3D Experience platform.

Finally this week, Tukatech (suppliers of several solutions, including CAD and 3D systems) announced that KKCL (Killer Jeans), India’s largest denim brand, had adopted those CAD and 3D solutions.

Next week will see the launch of our brand new WhichPLM Events section, which will appear – as always – alongside the latest interviews, news and opinion from across the industry.