What is BIM/IPD? & What is PLM/PDM?

What is BIM?  We hear it talked about.  We see the marketing.  We hear there are real savings to be had and money to be made on this BIM thing.  But what does it mean?  Especially, how does it affect our businesses?

To be clear; BIM and PLM are PROCESSES not SOFTWARE.  Both acronyms are used to describe a collaborative approach to design/construction/maintenance: meaning LIFE-CYCLES. PARAMETRIC MODELING SOFTWARE and CENTRALIZED DATA are simply utilized to foster collaboration throughout these life-cycles.  Life-cycles of buildings or products.

BIM stands for Building Information Modeling and is usually associated with architectural projects.  PLM stands for Product Lifecylce Management and is associated with Industrial/Manufacturing processes.  Whatever the label, one thing is definitely in common.  COLLABRATION.  Early and often. 

Traditional processes created "silos of information" which exist throughout the project delivery chain.  Design team members and construction team members are disconnected.   Facilities` is often not even included in the discussions.  BIM seeks to reconnect the information and the people.  CADD Connection unifies these teams through the data/model during the phases shown above.  VDC: After CD....Pre-Con: After DD....IPD: After SD...and CAFM: After Commissioning.

The current state of BIM implementation has been generally described as spotty.  Reasons for the seemingly slow market acceptance are varied.  Issues involving software, hardware, training, strains on network infrastructure and limited document management abilities are often cited as major obstacles and has relegated BIM implementations to large projects or niche markets.  CADD Connection changes those assumptions.  BIM processes can be utilized on any size project.

For the most part, Construction teams are most familiar with the BIM subset called VDC.  Through VDC, GC`s are realizing tremendous efficiencies and reducing costly field RFI's by implementing just a small part of the total BIM process during pre-construction phase.  This process is becoming the industry standard.  This process has been labeled VDC (Virtual Design Construction).

With increasing frequency, both the design teams and construction teams are finding places to utilize the tools of BIM to experience real ROI's.  GC's and Stakeholders are looking to start this process earlier.  Facilites and Maintenance are starting to realize that what happens upstream effects them.  CADD Connection stands at the ready to implement BIM processes no matter what stage.  Even better, CADD adds continuity to these process by protecting, updating and integrating the appropriate details to the model as well as easing the transitions during hand-offs from Design Team to Construction Team to Facilities Management.  Instead of three separate models, CADD Connection maintains ONE model for use by all parties and does so in the most collaborative environment available in the market today.

 Who should be interested in BIM/VDC?

On the PLM side, industrial and manufacturing have long been pushed to find more and more efficiencies to get a competitive advantage.  Just in Time, Lean Manufacturing, Concurrent Engineering are but a few labels placed on these processes.  Generally accepted language in these design markets are PLM and PDM.  PLM is Product Lifecycle Management.  PDM is a subset of PLM (Like VDC is  a subset of BIM).  PDM stands for Product Data Management.  As with BIM, this is a process change supported by technological advances in Parametric Modeling software.

How does CADD Connection support PLM/PDM?