Windchill 8 Enables Complete Digital Product Definition

By DE Editors

PTC(Needham, MA) today announced the availability of Windchill 8.0, amajor release of its data management and collaboration software, andPro/Intralink 8.0, the company’s Pro/Engineer data management package.Windchill 8.0 delivers significant enhancements that simplify productdevelopment, even as manufacturing companies find their processesbecoming more complex. Windchill 8.0, a major component of the integralPTC Product Development System, helps make that system simpler, morepowerful, and more scalable than ever.

The simplified productdata management environment of Windchill 8.0 will help customers speedtime-to-market, increase product quality, and reduce product andproduct development costs, says PTC. In addition to the core Windchillcollaboration and data management capabilities, key features of the newrelease include greatly improved local area network (LAN) performance;improved heterogeneous mechanical and electronic computer-aided design(MCAD and ECAD) data management capabilities; superior Pro/Engineerdata management capabilities with the introduction of Pro/Intralink8.0; engineering process improvements to support rapid configuration oflifecycle, change management, and revise behaviors according to companystandards; enhanced configuration management tools; integral partsclassification and reuse; new capabilities in defining and classifyingapproved manufacturer lists (AML) and approved vendor lists (AVL); andexpanded capabilities in document management, search, electronicsignatures, and subscriptions to improve usability and productivity.

PTChas also introduced new Windchill modules that add capabilities tostandard Windchill solutions. These include Windchill PartsLinkClassification and Reuse for loading and managing a classificationstructure, classifying parts, and creating a high-speedclassification-based search; Windchill Archive, a new optional moduleof Windchill PDMLink, for collecting, storing, deleting, and restoringdocuments and metadata to meet regulatory requirements and improveapplication or hardware performance; and Windchill Enterprise SystemsIntegration (ESI), the module for bi-directional integration betweenWindchill PDMLink and ERP systems, which now supports OracleManufacturing in addition to SAP.

Active Windchill customers willreceive the new release free of charge under their current maintenancecoverage. For small- and medium-sized companies, Windchill PDMLink andWindchill ProjectLink may be deployed in a hosted environment throughPTC PLM On Demand, a joint offering from PTC and IBM.

By updatingPro/Intralink to a modern Web architecture based on Windchill 8.0, thisnew release more effectively meets the growing needs of PTC customerswhose engineering environments have become increasingly distributed andcomplex. In addition to the core Pro/Engineer data managementcapabilities Pro/Intralink users enjoy today, key features of the newrelease include complete integration with Pro/Engineer so that userscan perform all their data management tasks directly withinPro/Engineer; expanded support for distributed product developmentincluding improved Wide Area Network performance, scalability,security, and cross-locale support for higher productivity acrossmultiple engineering locations; expanded information access enablingnon-engineering users to access product information with just a Webbrowser; direct path to upgrade to the broader enterprise datamanagement capabilities of Windchill and the full PTC productdevelopment system; and more.

Active Pro/Intralink customers areentitled to the new release free of charge under their currentmaintenance coverage. Pro/Intralink 8.0 will be available at the end ofthis month. Windchill 8.0 will be available later this month and can belicensed through PTC or authorized resellers.

For more information, please visit ptc.com.