Is anyone using Agile for PLM, and utilizing what they suggest to manage Pro-E files?

[rmees-2]

Hello everyone, longtime PTC users here.

We're looking for any PTC CAD user who is using Agile PLM, and are wondering how you are managing your CAD files with that integration. Agile suggests a product called Engineering Collaboration (EC), and another solution from a company called Zero Wait State.

What have you learned, what are advantages or disadvantages?

Thanks much,

Randy

[rpassolt]

We have customers using Windchill to manage CAD data and then we have an integrated them with the other systems. Agile will not do a very good job managing the complex relationships that exist in ProE/Creo. Agile (and other 3rd party players)has to use Pro/TOOLKIT to try and manage the data, but Pro/TOOLKIT does not offer all the data management calls so it is trying to manage the data with at least "one arm tied behind it's back". Run away if you can...we have been migrating customers off Teamcenter, Agile, PDMWorks, etc into Windchill because of the shortcomings of these PDM/PLM systems.

[rmees-2]

Agile EC is an interesting software, but how can they market this to PTC users if really nobody is even using this?

[sporter]

There are numerous companies using EC including Sun, Belkin, Lifetech, JDSU, Qualcomm, Kaiser, etc. We have been quite busy implementing it and I know Oracle consulting services is also deploying it as well. The software really has only been robust enough since version 3.0 which was released 2 years ago so there is not a huge sampling. Certainly I believe that PTC's ability to manage their data supersedes any third party vendor (by deliberate design) but I do know that EC is perfectly capable of managing Pro/E data in most environments. When you combine the need to integrate engineering with the rest of the enterprise the shortcomings are more than outweighed by the benefits the company receives from having all groups using the same system. If I was managing a company I would have to weigh the compromises and difficulties I would encounter trying to force an entire company to use an engineering based PLM versus requiring engineering to work with the tool the rest of the enterprise is comfortable with and successfully using for their needs. It really depends on the use case but it is inaccurate to say no one is using EC.

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Steve Porter, CEO
6207 Bee Cave Rd, Suite 260, Austin, TX 78746

[rpassolt]

Best regards,

[sporter]

From: Steve Porter

[SteveVinyard]

Hi Steve, maybe you could elaborate on what Agile EC can do at the Enterprise level that Windchill cannot do. I'm always interested in what other platforms are doing and how. On the note of "No one is using EC to manage..." I think we all have some common sense and recognize this as a bit of hyperbole and clearly it means, as you said, "only a small sample set".

That being said, I'm wary of the Sales Speak (It's great, new version, Big Name Customers, Does Pro/E, Does Enterprise, Integrations). Mentioning how a platform can manage Pro/E well (its Creo now btw) but never bringing up the Family Table intricacies is a big red flag for anyone familiar with Third Party Integrations, so perhaps you can mention some specifics? I can certainly appreciate a perspective from a different PLM angle and am interested in your experience.


Thanks,
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Steve Vinyard
Application Engineer

[sporter]

Steve,

I refuse to use the Creo name as you mention sales speak. It will always be Pro/Engineer to me. To be accurate Agile Engineering Collaboration(EC) is a specific module for Agile PLM that manages engineering data. They offer connectors for Pro/Engineer, SolidWorks, Catia , Inventor , NX etc. It is not an enterprise tool in and of itself. It would be most closely aligned with an application like Intralink or Enterprise PDM from SolidWorks from a pure functionality standpoint. It is not a standalone solution, it runs inside of Agile PLM. Agile PLM is a pure enterprise tool that offers capabilities closely aligned with Windchill, TeamCenter, Enovia and other enterprise PLM solutions. In my mind these are the major players that most companies consider when selecting a PLM tool. As for capabilities Agile tends to excel in the supply chain space, high tech and medical device where PTC tends to do well in industrial and aerospace. Obviously TeamCenter and Enovia also tend to get a good chunk of that market as well. From a EC perspective Agile has all of the functionality you mention. There are some things that a tool like Intralink or EPDM might be able to handle more elegantly but like I said previously in most cases EC's functionality is sufficient. Each company that is trying to decide what tools work best needs to spend a significant amount of time assessing the capabilities of EC to determine if it is a good fit. Not all companies can use EC which is why we created an integration solution between Intralink and Agile. This allows companies that find Agile's enterprise solution to be a better fit and PTC's Intralink capabilities to be preferred to utilize the technology best suited for their environment. Obviously there is a market for all of these applications since I believe all of these companies are performing well. Agile has always been considered a straightforward application that is easy to deploy and has a short time to value. Windchill is considered a more complex tool closely aligned with engineering tools. As Windchill gets easier to use and deploy and Agile develops more engineering based capabilities I am sure this discussion will grow more lively.

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Steve Porter, CEO
6207 Bee Cave Rd, Suite 260, Austin, TX 78746

[tszymanski]

Hey guys, though I would throw in my experience with Agile EC

I worked as CAD admin for a medical company in Minneapolis, MN that made the leap to a companywide PLM system a few years ago 2010. The steering team ultimately chose the Agile solution. In phase one of the PLM move we implemented CAD/DOC/Change management. I was involved with the setup, migration, installation, and training for Agile EC. I will give Agile credit for what it does well, simple user interface, managing flat files, workflow management, change management, a one stop repository to find data, etc.

However, for handling CAD data...it was difficult to transition to, to say the least. We moved from Intralink 3.4 to the Agile Engineering Collaboration Client (EC Client). It was basically marketed as an add on to the Agile PLM system that worked like Intralink works as far as checking in and checking out CAD objects.

In the CAD world, it took us from a PDM environment we had in Intralink to a file based system using the EC Client. The EC Client is basically a tool that understands the relationships that CAD has between all the parts/assemblies/drawings, etc., and then will gather all that data and copy it to a folder on your system so that you can work with them in your CAD authoring tool. So ultimately you are taking a step back if you are using a PDM tool right now. File folders, working directories, backup, save as, search paths, all those things you didn't have to think about with a PDM system become very important again. So there is a lot of un-training that has to be done to get users to think through their file management so that changes are not lost or made accidentally.

The EC Client did have a few nice features in it, but nothing that warranted the pain of going from a PDM system back to a file based system. Oh, and the performance of the EC Client was considerably slower than Intralink.

All that being said, I have not used it for over a year

Thanks,
Terry

[sporter]

Terry,

I think this is a fair assessment of the tool. I have noticed when we transition a company from an existing PDM tool like Intralink of EPDM that there is a lot more resistance due to the fact that sometimes things were handled more cleanly previously. No one likes to take a step back in functionality but as I mentioned in my first post sometimes the need to have everyone on the same system can outweigh the issues encountered by one group. It does continue to improve but I am fairly certain that PTC will always maintain an advantage in managing their own data. I personally think Intralink 3.4 was one of the most functional, stable applications for managing CAD data. It set a high standard compared to any other CAD data management application including later release of the Windchill based Intralink starting with 8.0.

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Steve Porter, CEO
6207 Bee Cave Rd, Suite 260, Austin, TX 78746

[dgrobe]

i would like to add to this.  We currently use Creo 2.0, with agile3.4 i believe.  We have also installed this Agile EC to be the connector for creo and agile.  I will tell you this, its not very good at all.  Either the install, and system is messed up, or the software is buggy.  We cant get redlines to work, cant use the EC software to create ECO's, (although that might be due to our way of doing things).  However, the simplest things like deleting an item in Creo, then checking it in, should redline the BOM, but it in fact doesnt.  This EC software didnt even make it to production with our company.  We wrote SR;s with oracle, to get it fixed, and its been around 8 months now, and still doesnt work.  We are just doing it the old fashion way, using Windchill as our database, and manually doing our ECO's and part numbers and such.

Sofar this software is a 1 out of 5 score from me.