SAP boasts over 5000 companies using lifecycle data management (1500 of those for product development), over 4000 companies using project management, and over 750 companies using EH&S. Customers tend to be clustered in the industries of industrial machinery, automotive, consumer products, high-tech, aerospace, and chemicals life sciences. What's missing is a view of the number of customers using a core combination of lifecycle data management, cProjects, cFolders, RPM, or xAPP Product Definition, in a virtual product development environment. These users are in the best position to comment on the general health and value of the PLM suite. A new cooperative announced in April 2005, called the PLM Alliance, is comprised of a group of SAP development partners, including CENIT, CIDEON, DSC Software AG, and .riess. These partners offer joint development, marketing, and implementation services around SAP PLM. They propose to introduce an SAP PLM "core system," which would include functions like CAD integration, vaulting and data exchange, document management, office integration, release and change management, output management, and catalog part integration, all bundled for rapid implementation. Given their background and expertise in CAD integration, SAP workflow, and SAP web applications servers such as cFolders and cProjects, they are well suited to serve as SAP PLM systems integrators. Their presence will be felt foremost in Europe, but should extend naturally to North America.

SAP's PLM product development and release strategy are clearly founded on the significant advantage of integrating all aspects of enterprise. Recent PLM application enhancements have centered on improving the NPDI process through focus on the product and project portfolio management dimension, improvement of product definition integration aspects, better use of RPM and collaborative project team capabilities, better product design cost estimation (PDCE), and enhancement of the user experience through improved usability and flexibility. Furthermore, the need to streamline the entire implementation process of SAP PLM must not be overlooked. SAP has recognized this need, and has worked on defining various paths as optional starting points for initiating a PLM implementation project. These paths might depend on various pain points, such as the need to extend product structure controls, or to attack a lack of operational controls in research and development (R&D).

SAP's PLM solutions and release strategy are diagramed below to illustrate the tightly integrated components:

mySAP PLM 2005	mySAP PLM 2007
mySAP ERP 2005 (Ramp-up: October 2005)	mySAP ERP 2007
cProject Suite 4.0 (Ramp-up: October 2005)	cProject Suite 5.0
xRPM 4.0 (Ramp-up: October 2005)	xRPM 5.0
xPD 2.0 (Ramp-up: November 2005)	xPD 3.0
	xEM 3.0 (2006)

As this diagram illustrates, there is a rough two-year plan that heavily leverages the enterprise integration nature of mySAP.com products. This could be a hugely positive characteristic of the plan for companies using the corresponding required releases of mySAP ERP, or a potential challenge for companies using much older releases of R/3. Regardless, companies requiring PLM capabilities will always be able to migrate forward, or hire assistance in migration, thanks to the abundance of SAP systems integration partners.

SAP boasts over 5000 companies using lifecycle data management (1500 of those for product development), over 4000 companies using project management, and over 750 companies using EH&S. Customers tend to be clustered in the industries of industrial machinery, automotive, consumer products, high-tech, aerospace, and chemicals life sciences. What's missing is a view of the number of customers using a core combination of lifecycle data management, cProjects, cFolders, RPM, or xAPP Product Definition, in a virtual product development environment. These users are in the best position to comment on the general health and value of the PLM suite. A new cooperative announced in April 2005, called the PLM Alliance, is comprised of a group of SAP development partners, including CENIT, CIDEON, DSC Software AG, and .riess. These partners offer joint development, marketing, and implementation services around SAP PLM. They propose to introduce an SAP PLM "core system," which would include functions like CAD integration, vaulting and data exchange, document management, office integration, release and change management, output management, and catalog part integration, all bundled for rapid implementation. Given their background and expertise in CAD integration, SAP workflow, and SAP web applications servers such as cFolders and cProjects, they are well suited to serve as SAP PLM systems integrators. Their presence will be felt foremost in Europe, but should extend naturally to North America.

SAP's PLM product development and release strategy are clearly founded on the significant advantage of integrating all aspects of enterprise. Recent PLM application enhancements have centered on improving the NPDI process through focus on the product and project portfolio management dimension, improvement of product definition integration aspects, better use of RPM and collaborative project team capabilities, better product design cost estimation (PDCE), and enhancement of the user experience through improved usability and flexibility. Furthermore, the need to streamline the entire implementation process of SAP PLM must not be overlooked. SAP has recognized this need, and has worked on defining various paths as optional starting points for initiating a PLM implementation project. These paths might depend on various pain points, such as the need to extend product structure controls, or to attack a lack of operational controls in research and development (R&D).

SAP's PLM solutions and release strategy are diagramed below to illustrate the tightly integrated components:

mySAP PLM 2005	mySAP PLM 2007
mySAP ERP 2005 (Ramp-up: October 2005)	mySAP ERP 2007
cProject Suite 4.0 (Ramp-up: October 2005)	cProject Suite 5.0
xRPM 4.0 (Ramp-up: October 2005)	xRPM 5.0
xPD 2.0 (Ramp-up: November 2005)	xPD 3.0
	xEM 3.0 (2006)

As this diagram illustrates, there is a rough two-year plan that heavily leverages the enterprise integration nature of mySAP.com products. This could be a hugely positive characteristic of the plan for companies using the corresponding required releases of mySAP ERP, or a potential challenge for companies using much older releases of R/3. Regardless, companies requiring PLM capabilities will always be able to migrate forward, or hire assistance in migration, thanks to the abundance of SAP systems integration partners.