PLM?

pete_yodis

Is Onshape intending to develop PLM eventually, or are they going to go the route of partners to provide that?  I ask because Onshape is a database system with the correct platform to seemingly handle this functionality.  I am trying to understand where Onshape will end and other companies may pick up.  Costing, especially in development, is an area where housing that information all under the same database where the design files exist seems to make sense from an organizational efficiency point of view.

lougallo

@PDY Time will tell but our focus is CAD and rethinking that tool and the close necessities for CAD to be successful and efficient.  PLM, as you already know, is its own animal and talking to those systems seems to be the more near term solution.  Still very early days...

pete_yodis

@LouGallo Thanks.  I understand about the need to focus on CAD and that makes perfect sense, especially now.  It seems the underpinnings of Onshape would in the end suit itself very well towards the PLM direction in the future.  PLM seems to be the natural extension of PDM.  I believe there are overwhelming advantages with Onshape on the PDM side of things.  I wonder if folks using Onshape in due time might expect it to encroach on the PLM territory.  I am interested in seeing how well Onshape becomes a hub.  This might negate any need to encroach on this territory.  Arena PLM, in my mind, seems to be the company most similar to Onshape's business model - at least on the PLM side of things.  One version of the truth is a term they use a lot.  Entirely cloud based (and have been for a long time), low barrier to entry, great for small to mid-size companies in numerous locations that are progressive and fast moving and comfortable with someone else housing their critical data.  No local install needed.  Setup your free initial account and kick the tires.  Then decide to go for it and spend a reasonable monthly fee per user.

What would be extremely desirable for me in Onshape is for it to do cost rollups in a design.  Costing as a design is unfolding and changing is something that is becoming more important - rather than waiting until a design is done.  Designing more in parallel rather than serially in order to help compress the development cycle.  If collaboration is one of the main priorities of Onshape, it would be almost a travesty to have to hand the data off to yet another system to do this.  If costing can be handled, then why not quote management.  It would seem to be a slippery slope at some point.  I'm trying to wrap my head around where this tool will/should end and where others will pick up.  I'm sure that is a constant evaluation with you guys too and you have to be very leery of feature creep at this point and creating way too much bloat.  It would also be tricky to manage those relationships with other parties wanting to integrate if they sensed you were going to encroach on their territory.

stevehess

@PDY‌

Thanks for your insightful comments.  As you know Onshape was built with data management in mind.  The data management features of Onshape are at the core of the product and will become more exposed as Onshape matures. 

In time, Onshape will be the system of record for all types of data & meta-data (data about the data) allowing you to run analysis and simulations (cost rollups are a natural fit) without having copy or reproduce the information in another system.  The data stored in Onshape  will be visible and accessible to your other enterprise systems.

Do you have a particular PLM system in mind?

pete_yodis

@SteveHess Thanks for the reply.  Arena PLM is the system that seems aligned with a similar business model to what I currently understand of you and them.  I've been watching them for a while.  http://www.arenasolutions.com/ I had an account at one point (about 10 years ago) and setup quite a bit inside their system.  I was impressed.  It seems there is potentially a lot of overlap in this realm.

pete_yodis

Sorry to be an annoyance on this issue.  Just trying to get my thinking correct.  Regards.

brenden_monahan

@PDY  I agree with your comments about PLM and Arena solutions.  I've been researching cloud based PLM systems for about 2 months now and Arena seems to offer the most functionality.  I haven't created my free account yet but it's on my 'to do' list.

My "Holy Grail" of cloud based software systems would be a fully integrated suite of tools offering solid modeling like Onshape, PLM like Arena, and PCB design like Upverter.

pete_yodis

@bmonahan You're speaking my language with your "Holy Grail".  If Upverter had native 3D and was handled in Onshape - game over.

pete_yodis

@bmonahan https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/123/ecad-tool#latest

pete_yodis

hmmm....

http://www.3dcadworld.com/onshape-future-of-cad-or-future-of-plm/

david_smith431

Onshape could go cloud to cloud with Odoo ERP/MRP?  https://www.odoo.com/page/manufacturing

There is a company that makes a PLM addon for Odoo https://apps.openerp.com/apps/modules/8.0/plm/ They have some addons for Solidworks/Inventor etc.

emagdalenaC2i

Hi David

This Addon is not a MRP integration.

We are working in a new set of Add-Ins for the integration of CAD and ERP and MRP systems. We are really close to finish the integration of SolidWorks and Odoo MRP.

We are partners of Onshape and of course, we want to develop in the next months an Add-In to communicate Onshape with any ERP system, and mainly with Odoo.

We are working in the first Meetup of Onshape in Spain right now, and as part of this event we will talk about the CAD and ERP / MRP integration
As you can see in our agenda in spanish: "20:10 Integración de las aplicaciones de CAD y ERP" 

Keep in touch in our website www.close2circle.com

Talking about Odoo <---> CAD integration:
There are 3 ways to integrate Odoo
- CAD <-> Odoo. It is just sharing information
- CAD <--> Odoo MRP. The goal is the Material Requirements Planning
- CAD <---> Odoo MRP II. Here the goal is all the Manufacturing Resource Planning

brucebartlett

@david_smith431 @eduardomagdalena  I am also interested in Odoo to Onshape intergration. I would like to be able to approve a part for production release and have in migrate automatically to Odoo.

Area's I would be interested are:

1. A link from Odoo product graphic (thumb nail) to Onshape part thumb nail.
2. Onshape part meta properties link to fields in Odoo  eg product name, internal reference and revision level.
3. Onshape Bill of Material (when released) to generate/link to Odoo Bills of Material
4. Onshape production drawings to be linked to Odoo Product and attached to manufacturing order

This is a part I have designed in Onshape and setup in Odoo using a saved Onshape graphic

emagdalenaC2i

Hi Bruce

Glad to see you working with Odoo and Onshape.

Our goal is to be able to approve an assembly with N levels for production release and migrate it automatically to Odoo MRP products and Bill of materials.
That is what we are doing right now with SolidWorks and Odoo

brucebartlett

Obviously we will need to be able to create BOM's first but after that I'd be very keen to get something up and going for Odoo. What you describe is exactly what I am after. Not so interested in the SolidWorks as the plan is to run this business with Onshape Cad, Odoo ERP and Google Drive. 

3dcad

@brucebartlett @eduardomagdalena

If Onshape would allow connections to database where all needed information is stored, can you make odoo connect to such db and join the data with other product data?

I would prefer universal approach so that it would be open to any system.

emagdalenaC2i

It is not a simple BD connection if you want to create Products and Bill of material in Odoo or any ERP with MRP

3dcad

Of course it needs data handling in ERP side but it would open push/pull access to data to any erp developer (like me). 

Creating specific things for specific 3rd party software is bit against Onshape nature don't you think?

emagdalenaC2i

The kind of data should be always the same in Onshape.
That is a work in process of the Onshape team.

But each ERP and MRP would use this datas in different ways, so it would be a 3rd party software work do that

matteo_1

Any news about this topic? Is there some "ready to use" PLM integration? Or some development tool and API library to interact with OnS data and distribute them to other PLM systems? cloud or not ...
thank you!

emagdalenaC2i

We are waiting for a release of Onshape that provide us more properties, so we can use more kind of datas in parts and assemblies.

As I wrote before, we are working in the integration of SolidWorks and Odoo.
There are 3 levels to integrate Odoo

1- CAD <-> Odoo. It is just sharing information

2- CAD <--> Odoo MRP. The goal is the Material Requirements Planning

3- CAD <---> Odoo MRP II. Here the goal is all the Manufacturing Resource Planning

We have done the second level and we are working in the last one, a full integration that allow a real time Manufacturing Resource Planning (materials, time, resources with all the manufacturing process information)

Once Onshape has more datas in their documents, parts and assemblies we will start with the integration of Odoo and Onshape.

brucebartlett

@emagdalenaC2C  It will be awesome  to get this functionality.

So what you still need is the ability to create custom properties?

How do you deal with bought out raw materials like bar stock, which normally isn't spec'd on CAD as a quality?

emagdalenaC2i

Hi Bruce

Yeah, we need more properties so we can store all the request information.

In SolidWorks, we have a new command to add all the information as properties of the files (parts, and assemblies) and solids like weldment profiles, etc. 
You can see our default form to set this information. You can set the manufacturing process, commercial or not, storable or not, cost information, etc. It is in spanish, but you can figure it out how it works.


Once we have more properties in Onshape we will define a new command with a form like that for Onshape. 

michael_bromley

Has there been any more progress on this front?  We are looking to implement an ERP/MRP system and would love for it to integrate with OnShape.

emagdalenaC2i

We will have very good news soon

daniel_bacon

@pete_yodis I came across this topic and thought you might enjoy it.  PropelPLM has an approach to integrating our PLM with Onshape.  Like Arena, we are in the cloud and are focused on BOMs, Cost Rollup, Compliance, Quality, and more.  Don't mean this to be an Advertisement, but it seems on topic.  integration demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jw3Kp8Vy3Qo

PeteYodis

@daniel_bacon That is nice to see!