What is Product Data Management (PDM)?

If several people in a company touch the same product, the engineering record cannot live in inboxes and personal folders. Product data management gives that record one place, with control over who changes what and which version is current. This guide covers what PDM is, what a PDM system stores and does, where it sits next to CAD, PLM, ERP and PIM, and when you need which.

What is PDM?

PDM stands for product data management: a central system for everything known about how a product is defined and built. Other systems that need the record, such as ERP or the webshop, read from it.

PDM sits in the same three-letter family as ERP (enterprise resource planning), CRM (customer relationship management) and HRM (human resource management). In each, one kind of record is at the center. For PDM, that record is the technical article data.

The record can run from raw materials to the way the product was built. Design, manufacturing and downstream teams use it: CAD data, models, parts, manufacturing instructions, requirements, notes and documents. A PDM that works is reachable by more than one application and more than one team, and it matches how that company builds.

What a PDM system stores

1. Technical specifications: measurements and materials.
2. Drawings: electronic or manual views of the product.
3. Bill of materials (BOM): the parts and raw materials.
4. Engineering documentation: how the product is constructed.
5. Test results.
6. Other documents: for example, photographs of the finished product.

Where PDM started

PDM began as a way to manage computer-aided design. Engineers needed something better than paper files for the documents around a design. The central system is there so every piece of data tied to the product is managed, not just stored.

Engineers still rely on it. So do people who handle raw materials and anyone else who joins a stage of the lifecycle. A car shows why. The team that fits seats and inner lining needs the specifications of the team that builds the body. Makers of composite products depend on that kind of handover. When part of production is outsourced, PDM is often how the information is sent to, or pulled from, the external company.

What a PDM system does

At the core, a PDM gives you three things: secure data management, process enablement and configuration management.

Secure data management

The system captures product information and hands it to users in the right context through the lifecycle. It manages file ownership, version control through check-in and check-out, revisions and release status. Security protects intellectual property through roles, project-based security and the access rights that go with them.

The record also carries metadata: data that describes other data, such as the author, the creation date, the last change and the revision. Managed well, metadata is how a person or a program finds a specific file. It brings four gains:

• The same term means the same thing, so a difference in wording does not hide a record.
• Data is reused instead of retyped, which cuts duplicate effort and keeps instances consistent.
• The knowledge does not live only in one employee's head, so turnover does not take the record with it.
• People find the right file faster, which shortens product and project delivery.

To get there, managers agree a shared vocabulary and taxonomy, settle differences between departments and retire private naming.

Process enablement

Workflow lets internal product teams and external partners take part in the lifecycle. A PDM can run the company's own change process, and other established processes such as phase-gate reviews.

1. Plan the change

   Someone proposes a change, and the team works out its effect first (a what-if): which parts, drawings and assemblies it touches.

2. Incorporate it

   The engineer checks out the files, makes the change and checks them back in as a new revision. The previous revision stays available.

3. Verify it

   Reviews, including phase-gate reviews where the company uses them, confirm the change. Change management shows the bill of materials before and after.

4. Release and communicate it

   The revision gets release status. Production, the ERP, outsourced partners and every other team that depends on it work from the released version.

Configuration management

You need to see a complete bill of materials, and to line up every source of BOM data across the lifecycle: as-designed, as-planned, as-built and as-maintained. Change management shows the BOM before and after a change. How a BOM splits between systems further downstream is covered in bills of materials in PIM and ERP.

Lifecycle visualization shares a view of the product, its assemblies and its parts without a CAD seat or specialist knowledge. A digital mockup can replace some of the physical prototypes you would otherwise build.

Where PDM sits: CAD, PLM, ERP and PIM

PDM software is often paired with CAD for technical drawing. The data lives in the PDM, and the CAD system is opened from there when a drawing has to be made or changed. The CAD system then does not need its own link to the ERP: if the PDM is connected, the CAD system is connected indirectly.

PDM vs PLM

PDM plus CAD is often called product lifecycle management (PLM). CAD covers the first step in a product's life, the design. A full PLM system goes further: idea, design, production, market introduction, and sometimes use and maintenance at the customer. Chosen well, PDM is the base you extend into PLM. How PLM connects to the commercial side is covered in PLM and PIM integration.

PDM software: separate package or ERP module

You can buy PDM as a separate package or as a module inside an ERP system. The module integrates deeply with the rest of the business processes. It can also be less specialized, and linking software outside the ERP is often harder. In that case a separate package with an ERP link is worth a look. Where the ERP's job ends on the commercial side is covered in where ERP stops and PIM starts.

PDM vs PIM

Product information management (PIM) and PDM do different jobs. The split is the audience: PDM stays inside the company and improves how product data is produced. PIM looks past the walls, at the customer.

PDM, PLM, PIM and ERP: what each system owns

System	What it owns	Who works in it	The question it answers
PDMProduct data managementYou are here	Engineering files and technical data: CAD models, drawings and revisions.	Engineers and product designers.	Which revision of this design is current?
PLMProduct lifecycle managementPLM guide	The product while it is designed and engineered: specifications, bills of materials, changes and compliance.	R&D, engineering, quality and sourcing.	What exactly are we making, and which version is released?
PIMProduct information managementPIM guide	Sellable product content: attributes, descriptions, asset links, translations and channel versions.	E-commerce, marketing, category and product content teams.	Is this product complete and ready to sell on this channel?
ERPEnterprise resource planningERP guide	Transactions and operations: orders, stock, purchasing, pricing and finance.	Finance, supply chain, purchasing and sales operations.	What did we buy, make, sell, ship and invoice?

• PDM manages technical data over the life of the product: CAD files, bills of materials and engineering requirements, for design and engineering. The point is version control, integrity and cooperation inside product development. The object is the technical definition of the product.
• PIM is built for sales and marketing. It holds the customer-facing record: descriptions, photos, prices, marketing features and the rest of what a channel needs. From that record you build catalogs, the online product experience and distribution to sales channels. A PIM also tightens internal processes, but the point of that work is the experience at the end.

They do not compete. PIM can take the technical base that PDM maintains and turn it into channel-ready information. Linked, the data moves from design through the life of the product without a second, unofficial copy.

Which one you need

Engineering-heavy definition points at PDM. Marketing, sales and commerce point at PIM. Many manufacturers need both: PDM to control how the product is built, PIM once it is sold through webshops, distributors, marketplaces or print. Match the choice to your procedures, your customers' requirements and the outcome you want from the product record. For the manufacturing side of that choice, see PIM for manufacturing.

Why product data keeps growing

The amount of article data has grown sharply over the past decades, and several things drive it:

• Bigger assortments. A supermarket quickly holds thousands of products, and a large webshop many more.
• Shorter product lives. Manufacturers of products such as bicycles or computer hardware replace a model with a newer version quickly.
• More data per article. The number of fields per product keeps growing, the fields get more complex, and they differ by product type.
• Comparison. Comparison sites expect products in a category to be comparable on specifications, so the pressure to standardize goes up.
• Thin margins. Margins in many indirect sales channels are tight, so catalog exchange formats need to be cheaper to run and more standardized.

PDM software is what keeps the technical side of those developments manageable.

Benefits of product data management

A solid PDM lets an organization:

• Find the accurate record without a search through inboxes.
• Raise output and shorten cycle time by keeping the workflow and the data in one place.
• Cut development mistakes and cost through version control, document management and change management.
• Coordinate across the value chain, so stakeholders exchange the same information.
• Meet corporate and regulatory requirements, including data security.
• Use one repository, so effort is not duplicated.
• Let distributed teams work on the current record.
• See the product clearly enough to decide.

Related guides

• What is PIM: the system that takes the product to market.
• PLM and PIM integration: connecting engineering to the commercial record.
• Where ERP stops and PIM starts: the boundary on the operational side.
• Master data management: governing records across domains.

Where to go from here

Both tools are free and independent of any vendor.

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A short check that shows whether a dedicated PIM helps your catalog, or whether spreadsheets and ERP still do the job.

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