The last post turned the corner from giving guidance on how to approach, justify, and define your path to PLM and started the conversation on how to choose a vendor. In the last post, we talked about understanding your business. Here is some more homework you need to do before bringing the vendors in. It will save time, and help you start conversations with the right people in the vendor community.

Understand the Vendor Landscape

Not all vendors are created equal. PLM is a big category of solutions, and vendor suites are much less similar to each other in PLM than in more mature areas such as ERP where functionality has come to parity over time. Even the suites of the largest vendors - Dassault Systemes, PTC, and Siemens - vary widely in scope. And, despite the breadth and depth that these large PLM players provide, they may not be the best fit for your particular business. For example, a "software as a service" solution like Arena Solutions might be a better fit if you don't have a lot of internal IT resources and want a rapid implementation without the need for much internal IT support (although some of the big guys offer hosted solutions which is a step in that direction). Or a specialist might fit the bill for your needs, whether they specialize on a particular industry like Infor's Optiva solution (process) or a specific solution like Sopheon (product planning and portfolio management). As you begin to consider your needs (and the requirements for your vendor), consider the following:

• Functionality - OK, this may be obvious, but remember don't just review the functionality you need today, you should understand the breadth and depth of functionality that supports your strategy
• Industry focus
• Size of your company compared to those they serve
• Deployment options (hosted, SaaS, etc.)
• Availability of 3rd party consulting help
• Availability of 3rd party technical resources
• Availability of additional solutions in the vendor's "ecosystem"
• Company history and future direction (investment, acquisition, etc.)

There is a lot of overlap between the internal considerations in the previous post (know your business) and the considerations above. I moved items between the two lists for some time, and then decided that you could create your own list and decide for yourself. The important thing is to understand the interaction between your needs and how they are supported by the vendor community. Then, pick some vendors to learn from and begin to map the vendors against your requirements.

Next, we'll take a look at some of these considerations in detail.

I look forward to your comments. Feel free to share your experience in selecting a vendor, your suggestions might save someone a lot of headaches...