CPDA ANNOUNCES LEAN EXPERTS DR. DURWARD SOBEK AND MICHAEL KENNEDY TO KEYNOTE AT PLM ROAD MAP 2007

    /24-7PressRelease/ - STAMFORD, CT, June 01, 2007 - Collaborative Product Development Associates (CPDA), a provider of critical analyses for PLM decisions, announces that Dr. Durward K. Sobek, Associate Professor of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at Montana State University and Michael Kennedy, co-founder and CEO of Targeted Convergence Corporation, will make keynote presentations at PLM Road Map 2007 to be held at The Inn at St. John's, Plymouth, Michigan, on September 19 and 20.

This year PLM Road Map brings together two leaders experienced in driving successful action plans for product development. Both benefit from decades of experience in urging American industry to meet the challenge from Japanese manufacturing methods in aligning people, process, and technology.

Dr. Sobek's presentation, What should be Lean about Lean Product Development?, will challenge us all to abandon conventional thinking about product development, and to adopt a new perspective that has significant implications for the capabilities needed in human designers and computer-based tools alike. Sobek's presentation will layout a number of fundamental principles based on his own research and that of the late Dr. Allen C. Ward, that set a foundation for building truly exceptional product development systems.

Michael Kennedy's presentation, Redefining Lean through Set-Based Knowledge, will summarize the critical cornerstones of the Toyota product development system, and clearly differentiate lean thinking as applied to production processes versus development. Even more crucial, he will address and issue challenges for ensuring that PLM implementations will enable this thinking. He will demonstrate how imperative it is that companies integrate their strategies for lean thinking in product development with their strategy for implementing PLM on a broad scale and will offer guidelines for doing so.

Now in its 14th year PLM Road Map 2007 is a strategic conference focused on the critical tradeoffs that shape product development. PLM Road Map 2007 enables attendees to explore first hand the progress, opportunities, and roadblocks leading-edge end-users are confronting.

More information and updates on PLM Road Map 2007 may be found at http://www.cpd-associates.com/index.cfm?content=include_conference07.cfm.


About Dr. Durward K. Sobek

Dr. Durward K. Sobek is an Associate Professor of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at Montana State University. CPDA's long-term associates may recall first hearing from Durward when he contributed to our effort back in the late 1990's with his outstanding Ph.D. thesis, Principles that Shape Product Development Systems: A Toyota-Chrysler Comparison. Since then, he has frequently presented his findings on fundamental principles for product development, and published them with articles in the Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review, and IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management.

About Michael Kennedy

Michael N. Kennedy has been a leader in the redesign of organizational processes for over 35 years. During his 30-year career at Texas Instruments Inc., he was the lead engineer on many development projects including missile system products and manufacturing systems. During his last 10 years at TI, he was a leader in reengineering the core engineering and manufacturing processes, including adopting concurrent engineering, solid modeling CAD systems, CAD/CAM integration, and leading quality initiatives. He has also worked extensively with the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences for benchmarking and incorporating new technologies into U.S. manufacturing.

His recent book "Product Development for the Lean Enterprise" has raised awareness and presented the underlying philosophy behind Toyota's outstanding product development success. He is the co-founder and CEO of Targeted Convergence Corporation with the mission of developing models, training, and tools for implementing the book principles into manufacturing industries. He is currently assisting many companies to implement these principles including Ping, Ariens, Kohler, TRW, Fisher & Paykel, Shure, and Teledyne Benthos.

About CPDA

Collaborative Product Development Associates (CPDA) is a provider of critical analyses for PLM decisions. CPDA offers the latest in-depth, objective information for assessing technology and business goals. Coordinated by a group of experienced analysts, its cohesive suite of collaborative research programs leverages the efforts of top software designers and leading-edge users. CPDA's differentiation is its specific, deep, and pragmatic approach to the market, and a hands-on understanding of the technology required to drive successful implementations. CPDA's collaborative research programs include Design Creation and Validation, Design/Simulation Council, PLM-Integration/Product Definition, and Product Value Management.

Contact:
Cheryl Peck
[email protected]
800-573-4756

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