ERP manages a company’s resources, while PLM focuses on creating and maintaining a product. ERP is software-based and manages finances, assets, personnel, and inventory, while PLM oversees the introduction, design, production, sale, and maintenance of a product. Both are important for a company’s growth and innovation.
ERP is a system that involves gathering information and tracking a company’s resources over the course of a year or cycle. PLM is more focused on creating and curating a particular product or product line. The differences between ERP and PLM include how the process is completed (one is mostly software based and the other may involve a team of people), what each is for, and how it is reported to improve business practices.
Both enterprise resource planning (ERP) and project lifecycle management (PLM) are important ingredients for a company’s growth and ability to innovate. ERP and PLM differ in that enterprise resource planning is generally a digital application that manages a company’s internal and external resources. ERP looks at finances, physical assets, personnel and inventory. The point of integrating this resource planning program is to facilitate the flow of vital information into every part of a company’s functions and facilitate its communication with external stakeholders. The ERP app generally runs on a single computing platform which helps organize the use of various vendor products.
Product lifecycle management differs significantly from ERP. While the goal is the same as ERP – to drive innovation – it focuses on the introduction, implementation and maintenance of a particular business product. PLM takes a company’s idea for a new product into consideration and oversees the introduction of the concept, the design from first draft to final production to sale, then use and service of the item. The people involved in designing and supervising the product, the data needed to create and maintain it, and all the processes that make it possible are part of PLM.
To exemplify the differences between ERP and PLM, a business might be interested in developing a new technology gadget and might want to use ERP to oversee corporate communication and overall growth and determine if the new product might be needed. ERP would also help the company know if it has the resources needed to create the new product. Once internal ERP determined the need for build resources and resources, the PLM role would begin.
The PLM process should decide what the gadget should be, how it should look and do, and what is available in inventory to create it. Project lifecycle management can also help decide who might help create the product, how it might be built, and how much it might cost. The entire process will keep an eye out for any glitches or other product defaults. Should the new product fail to produce a positive ROI, project lifecycle management would oversee its removal from the corporate catalog. Together, ERP and PLM help businesses thrive by organizing processes digitally.
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