Arena PLM and QMS

Arena is well suited for document control and quality system processes. It allows for really great traceability of documents and parts and can create easy to read Bill of Materials with important details. The change control process is well defined and has good built in options to notify users when they need to approve a document. Additionally, the quality world allows for easy tracking of the progress of a quality process. Arena also allows linking of items to changes and quality processes so that users always know which file is the most up to date and what issues are associated with any given part.

Good for BOM management of complex BOMs. Negative is unable to update previous part number revisions of BOMs.

The arena would be well suited for any size company. Many different industries could use Arena, but I think there are several that are not as well suited. An industry that requires heavy regulation and quality assurance documents might be better off with a dedicated QMS system separate from a PLM. For example, a GMP manufacturing facility with many SOPs, policies, and test methods.

The implementation of highly effective quality processes, encompassing a meticulously designed change control process that offers the flexibility of customization, presents an opportunity for the incorporation of a comprehensive task management system that can seamlessly accommodate and enhance all aspects of these processes, extending to the management of tasks within Corrective and Preventive Actions (CAPA), thereby contributing significantly to overall operational efficiency and quality enhancement endeavors.

In my opinion, Arena PLM and QMS is well suited for products with a limited amount of parts, and making changes were multiple impacted assemblies are made. It is not suited for projects/ changes to be worked on by multiple people at a time, as there is no autosave feature, and one person can work on a page at a time. I think Arena PLM and QMS is well suited for scenarios needing linking multiple quality events together.

Arena is well suited for companies with divisions in many time zones as information is always available by all at all times.

[Arena PLM and QMS] ties all the departments you want to be collaborating with together, facilitates information effectively, clearly and quickly. With manufacturing overseas, time factor is imperative, the information is waiting for them when they start their day. If something is not captured and locked in Arena, there is no tie back to trace a problem that may have occurred, it is hearsay, and hard to identify. With Arena, there are no questions, it is locked, communicated and all parties are notified. Arena may not be suited for sensitive items, even though users can be limited for viewing, there could be a potential for missing an item.

My experience using Arena so far to incorporate electrical components and synchronize the component database has been smooth sailing. Being able to automatically sync BOMs from our PCB design tool is a useful feature that also allows easy integration with supply chain and sharing with vendors. It seems the electrical design workflow has different needs from mechanical workflows, for example, where having flexibility with the revision control and numbering scheme becomes very handy (for example, a BOM for a circuit assembly may have components change but not the overall design- getting to name a rev however we want, 1.1, lets say, and not being locked into a fixed number or lettering scheme saves a lot of time and work so we don't have to go back to the design software and recreate the design output files with a whole new rev. This may have something to do with the particular way my organization has Arena set up, but it was nice to be able to find a compromise since mechanical items are not managed in that way.

[Arena PLM and QMS] does a great job of allowing me to look up and find linked documents. It is hard for me to say if the system itself is the cause of frustrations or if it is just how our company set it up during the initial launch. In any case, I don't have enough knowledge of the system to personally recommend it.

Arena PLM and QMS are particularly well suited to manage the QMS processes as you can create as many templates of processes to the purpose you want. The management of multiple products configuration is easy to do. But, Arena QMS is less appropriate to management trace requirements when the design is not frozen since the mass import of requirements from a file is not possible.

Arena PLM and QMS is ok if you need internet browser-based, login-from anywhere, cloud-backed-up PLM/QMS service for your company, AND you don't mind being locked into a per-user-account (no sharing accounts) subscription service with no commitments to receiving user interface efficiency or bug improvements (that just seems to be the nature of most IT subscription services). Your daily/annual usage needs to justify the subscription price and your willingness to hand over your entire data system handling to a subscription service. It certainly is nice for some companies. If you're a very small company; you might want to go with lower cost, more manually maintained & administrated systems.

Creating an alternate finished good with minor variations was very efficient. This included color options, packaging variants, and update revisions to existing products.

The Arena Quality Module is very customizable for quality system functions and links to the bill of materials.

Arena is an effective tool for maintaining control of all documents. It's very user-friendly. If I wasn't in a regulated industry that didn't require such strict controls, Arena might be too powerful.

Arena is worth considering if your company has several products with components that are not manageable. If you feel that you can manage using those tools altogether then maybe Arena is not worth considering.

This system is useful over a large organization where people might be distributed (different sites, working from home, etc.) It also offers the ability to assign and track training required by Arena PLM and QMS.

Well suited for basic changes for a small company. Needs to have NCRs/ECOs/ECCRs dependent on each other. If NCRs and ECRs are connected to ECO, should not be able to close them without ECO being released

Best suited for working with DWG maint. Worst suited for creating data searches.

Overall, Arena is a great product to use and has value for all employees (front line with customers, engineering, quality, supply chain management, technical writers, etc.). There is room for improvement with just minor items, like being forced to load a new page when viewing nested items and switching between tabs (such as the specs and BOM tabs).

Arena PLM is great for a mixed environment of CAD and non-CAD users across multiple sites. It is not great for an environment where you have infrequent users that require their own login.

Arena is well suited for a company trying to not dedicate a team towards PLM, Document control coordination, etc. Arena is an excellent platform for getting information between individuals and teams. It appears appropriate for NCR, CAPA, etc., and tracking as well. I'm unsure of less appropriate situations, as our 6 months of using PLM is insufficient to determine this.

[it is] useful for tracking and managing builds across departments and organizations (lifecycle, BOMs, build documents, supply chain, etc.).

Arena is an intuitive and easy to use software for keeping track of the Product Life Cycle and documenting all the necessary information in one place.

I think Arena is very well suited for Document control in a manufacturing environment and easily integrates with ERP tools such as SAP. The change management (ECO) portion is also very excellent, and is easy to follow and understand for everyone involved with the change. One scenario where it is not as well suited is in cases of project management, which would be a great new way to integrate everything in one place for a NPI manager such as myself.

As described in the cons section, the organization of the system can be more organized and made more intuitive to fix. Arena is well suited for small organizations to quickly implement quality control and develop flowcharts.