Product lifecycle management

Product lifecycle management (PLM) is the process of managing the entire lifecycle of a product from its conception, through design and manufacture, to service and disposal.^[1] PLM integrates people, data, processes and business systems and provides a product information backbone for companies and their extended enterprise.^[2]

It is one of the four cornerstones of a corporation's information technology structure.^[3] All companies need to manage communications and information with their customers (CRM-Customer Relationship Management), their suppliers (SCM-Supply Chain Management), their resources within the enterprise (ERP-Enterprise Resource Planning) and their planning (SDLC-Systems Development Life Cycle). In addition, manufacturing engineering companies must also develop, describe, manage and communicate information about their products.