Ms 2013.dira - Lowres

Transforming manufacturing
in a connected world
DIRA

Discrete Manufacturing
Reference Architecture
January 2013Third Edition
Automotive
MS_2012.DIRA.Chap1.indd 1
Industrial
Aerospace
High Tech &

Electronics
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Value proposition
Automotive
This reference architecture framework defines six core capabilities at the intersection
of business and technology that are critical for manufacturers to transform their
businesses in todays connected world. These capabilities anchor solutions that deliver
higher levels of innovation, operational performance, and growth.
Who should read this report

Industrial
Aerospace
High Tech &

Electronics
This framework describes a vision of how an entire manufacturing organization

can overcome the challenges of complexity and integration of disparate
information internally and across its tiered partner and customer networks in a
time of accelerating change. Managers, executives, and professionals in product
development, operations, marketing, sales, and other line-of-business manufacturing
functions seeking immediate and incremental business benefits through effective
and thoughtful deployment of technologies spanning mobility, cloud, social, and
big data can benefit from the Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture (DIRA)
framework.
Because it deals with issues such as agility, competitiveness, and, ultimately, the
top lines and bottom lines of companies, DIRA is relevant to the vice presidents of
operations, R&D, sales, and marketing who are involved in assessing business and
technological shifts and in making critical technology and partner choices that will
impact the long-term business health of their organizations.
Whats new in this edition

Since we first brought into focus the transformation underway from legacy systems
of record to collaborative systems of engagement in manufacturing, four underlying
technical trends have emerged in driving this shift: mobility, cloud, social, and big
data. This edition incorporates Microsofts investments in these areas, highlighting
their impact to the business while onboarding four new DIRA partnersAras,
NewsGator, Pcubed, and PROSthat exemplify next-generation solutions by
embracing these trends.
Copyright and Disclaimer

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must respond to changing market conditions, it should not be interpreted to be a commitment on the part of Microsoft, and Microsoft cannot guarantee the accuracy of
any information presented after the date of publication.
This Reference Architecture is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY, AS TO THE INFORMATION IN
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intellectual property.
2013 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Introduction
We have all come to understand that the manufacturing landscape today is undergoing deep
changes as macroeconomic forces shift the structural networks of demand and supply and as
technology transforms the way individuals, societies, and organizations relate to and engage with
one another. Manufacturers are grappling with a plethora of complex issues, such as: the power
shift to networked and informed consumers; the complexity of global supply chains and new market
opportunities; increasing competitive intensity; the tsunami of information flow within and across
the enterprise; and the explosion of devices blurring the boundaries between home and work. It is
no surprise, then, that manufacturers are deeply concerned with the issues at the nexus of business
change and the emerging technological capabilities of cloud, new devices, social computing, and
big data.
The Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture offers a framework as one form of guidance to
Microsoft discrete manufacturing customers and partners in helping them navigate these issues.
Chapter 1 of this report elaborates on the rationale behind DIRA.
Chapter 2 provides an overview of the macro forces and trends that are shaping the industry
and the role of technology, not only in fostering many of these changes but also in providing
opportunities to manufacturers to transform their businesses and adapt to these changes. The
DIRA framework and concepts are defined and brought into focus in this context, providing a
strong business-centric and solution-oriented lens for technology and solution assessment. The
chapter brings together the germane components of Microsoft technology portfolio with several
examples of how innovative partner solutions are enabling manufacturers to grow and innovate
while establishing a solid foundation for the future.
For those readers seeking greater depth in understanding the Microsoft technologies and
capabilities underlying DIRA, Chapter 3 delves into the technologies empowering natural user
interfaces, collaboration, social business, real-time analytics, cloud computing, IT infrastructure,
and security, among others. Through the lens of an end-to-end change management scenario, the
chapter illustrates key features and capabilities of products applied to business processes within the
context of the DIRA framework. The six DIRA pillars are broken down into technical components
and high-level architectural and technical product descriptions, along with guidance on their role
within manufacturing scenarios.
Chapter 4 illustrates some example application frameworks and solutions that draw upon key
DIRA concepts. It briefly discusses the evolution toward componentized, model-driven solutions
and business processes that are increasingly easy for end users to customize, thereby enabling
far more flexibility and adaptability to change at lower cost and without complex and lengthy
development cycles.
The report concludes with a rich series of essays by key Microsoft partners that explains how their
solutions incorporate Microsoft platform capabilities to deliver on the DIRA value proposition. The
DIRA initiative ultimately measures its success through the delivery of the best value realized by
customers from their investments in Microsoft products and our partners solutions.
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Contents
6 Executive summary
7 Chapter 1: The need for a manufacturing reference architecture
1.1 The big shift is underway // 7
1.2 Challenges in the business-IT environment // 8

1.2.1 Emerging needs for manufacturers // 10
1.3 Why a Microsoft reference architecture framework? // 11

1.3.1 DIRAa bridge between emerging business needs and technology // 12
1.4 Role of the framework within the partner network // 14

1.5 Scope of the reference architecture framework // 14
17 Chapter 2: Transformation of manufacturing value chains

2.1 Trends shaping manufacturing // 17

2.1.1 Advances in digital infrastructure // 17
2.1.2 Power shift to consumers // 20
2.1.3 Connected experiences // 20
2.1.4 Globalization and emerging economies // 21
2.1.5 Changing demographics // 21
2.1.6 Sustainability // 22
2.1.7 Complex regulations // 22
2.2 Themes supporting performance across boundaries // 23

2.2.1 Natural user experiences // 24
2.2.2 Role-based productivity and insights // 27
2.2.3 Social business // 31
2.2.4 Dynamic business networks // 33
2.2.5 Smart connected devices // 35
2.2.6 Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure // 38
2.3 Journey to high-performance solutions // 41
42 Chapter 3: Solution building blocks and technology frameworks

3.1 A common collaborative engineering scenario // 42
3.2 Putting it all together // 46
3.2.1 Simple, functional, and easy-to-use business applications // 46
3.2.2 Simplified, familiar, role-based productivity and insights // 47
3.2.3 Social business // 58
3.2.4 Dynamic business networks // 60
3.2.5 Smart connected devices // 68
3.2.6 Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure // 73
2/11/13 11:38 AM
78 Chapter 4: Applying the reference architecture framework

4.1 Applications and solutionsexamples and best practices // 80

4.1.1 Duet Enterprise: a foundation for role-based productivity in SAP environments // 80
4.1.2 Microsoft Dynamics ax 2012: familiar, easy-to-use ERP for midsize and large manufacturers // 81
4.2 Microsoft partner solutions // 82

4.3 Architecting solutions for change // 82
4.4 Conclusion // 84
85 Appendix: partner profiles

Transforming manufacturing: driving growth // 85
NewsGator: Using social business solutions to empower connected manufacturing organizations // 86
PROS + Microsoft deliver pricing and sales effectiveness solutions from global service part manufacturers big data // 89
Transforming manufacturing: enhancing performance // 92

Apriso + Microsoft deliver real-time visibility and control over global manufacturing operations // 93
Camstar: one seamless platform, advancing product quality // 96
ICONICS: visual intelligence for operational excellence // 98
Rockwell Automation: operations intelligence application // 101
Siemens MES: managing complexity with SIMATIC IT for discrete industries // 102
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS): manufacturing 2.0 solution // 106
Transforming manufacturing: driving innovation // 107

Aras & Microsoft enable global companies to drive innovative new products to market faster with PLM // 108
Dassault Systmes PLM gives discrete manufacturing companies a competitive edge // 112
Pcubed: driving innovation & product development through social business solutions // 116
PTC: extending product development content to the enterprise // 120
PTC: community-driven product development // 122
PTC: managing product development initiatives through program portfolio management // 124
Siemens PLM: improved desktop productivity for engineers results in faster project completion // 127
Siemens PLM: collaborative and social network-enabled product development // 130
Siemens PLM: real-world applications of Teamcenter community collaboration // 134
Contacts: Inside Back Cover
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Executive summary
For the last few decades, manufacturing companies have invested heavily in enterprise application
software to automate, improve, and measure their business functions and processes. There is little
doubt that these investments have contributed to increasing business productivity and reducing
cost. However, research suggests a great deal of room for improvement in terms of simplification,
ease of use, user adoption, and collaborative engagement across business functions and the
organizations business network.
The business and technology environment continues to change at an accelerating pace, with
growing competitive intensity in every industry accompanied by a shift in power to customers, who
now are connected and well-informed. More complex demands are made of information workers
and business decision-makers, who need access to real, accurate, cross-functional information.
Most business applications are built for, and deployed within, vertical business functionsfor
example, product lifecycle management (PLM) for design and engineering, customer relationship
management (CRM) for sales and service, or enterprise resource planning (ERP) for finance and
human resources management. These applications support structured decision-making within the
business function, most often targeting specialists within the area. But silos exist between these
business applications and the organizations business functions, with the average worker largely
disconnected from relevant processes. This environment makes it extremely difficult for business
users to drive collaborative decision-making that crosses their business networks and spans multiple
business functions outside the context of these applications.
To make effective real-time decisions, technology needs to not only support the structured business
process workflows but the unstructured ways in which decisions are made and communicated. To
improve the return on enterprise software assets, technology must support ease of use and broad
access to contextually relevant enterprise information for all workersanywhere, anytime, and
on any device. And to improve agility and market responsiveness, technology needs to facilitate
collaboration, business insight, and secure information sharing across the organizations extended
network of customers, partners, and suppliers. Emerging paradigms such as cloud computing and
social networking are enabling new business models and knowledge-intensive information flows,
marking a shift in emphasis from systems of record to systems of engagement.
Having an underlying architectural framework that supports the collaborative needs of the enterprise
across both structured processes and unstructured processes is important for success in todays
rapidly changing global business environment. The rapid convergence of cloud, mobility, social,
and big data is transforming how people work and how businesses adapt to these challenges.
Customers of Microsoft and its partners are increasingly looking for guidance that bridges the
gap between these business imperatives and the technical components that enable the delivery of
high-value, high-impact, rapidly deployable business solutions.
This report offers high-level architectural guidance and patterns for the analysis and selection of
software components that address key business concerns. Using the concepts discussed in this
report as guidelines, software providers and those organizations deploying their solutions should
have a fuller understanding of the industrys best practices and, as a result, realize the best value
from their technology investments.
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Everything flows, nothing stands still. Heraclitus of Ephesus (c.535 BCE475 BCE)
Chapter 1: The need for a manufacturing

reference architecture
1.1 The big shift is underway
In a world of continuous disruptive change and ever-increasing competitive intensity, enterprises

are under pressure to push the boundaries of performance with higher levels of productivity
through product, process, and institutional innovations.1 In their report titled The 2009 Shift
Index: Measuring the forces of long-term change,2 authors John Hagel III, John Seely Brown,
and Lang Davison from Deloittes Center for the Edge track a number of measures of economic
performance going back to 1965. Among their findings is that competitive intensity, which is
calculated by the dispersion of market power in an industry, has more than doubled since 1965.
And the topple rate, or the pace at which big companies lose ground, has accelerated, too.
Underlying this evolution are decades of exponential improvements in digital infrastructure built
on sustained price/performance advances in computing power, data storage, and computer
networking. Combined with globalization and shifts in public policy that lower the barriers involved
in moving people, products, money, and ideas, these trends are only accelerating. Companies
need to fully grasp the pace and implications of these changes. These companies also need to
recognize that the rapid advancements in digital infrastructure impacting corporations, workers,
consumers, and society itself are driving the far-reaching transformation already underway. Cloud
computing, mobility, the consumerization of IT, social networking, and big data are forefront
among the drivers of transformation.
Cloud
computing,
mobility, the
consumerization
of IT, social
networking, and
big data are
forefront among
the drivers of
transformation.
In their book titled The Power of Pull,3 Hagel, Brown, and Davison describe how success no longer
comes from simply possessing knowledge (knowledge stocks). Instead, success comes from
participating with others in the creation of new knowledge (knowledge flows) and transforming
the organization to adapt to the flow of knowledge. This shifts the rationale of the firm from
scalable efficiencythe focus of manufacturers for so longto scalable learning, or the ability to
improve performance more rapidly and to learn faster by effectively integrating more participants
distributed across traditional boundaries.
Consultant and author Geoffrey Moore asserts in his AIIM white paper titled Systems of
Engagement and the Future of Enterprise IT that while existing enterprise systems (known as
systems of record) are a necessity, the source of competitive differentiation will shift to systems
of engagementthe emerging, next-generation IT applications and infrastructure adapted
from the consumer space. Moore portends a shift from the automation of first-level task workers
at the edge of the enterprise to the empowerment of mid-level workers to communicate and
collaborate across business boundaries, global time zones, and language and cultural barriers.
Global research and advisory group IDC Manufacturing Insights states in Predictions 2012:
Manufacturing: Success in the Intelligent Economy that success in the intelligent economy will
be achieved through engaged organizations, with advantages accruing to companies that can
master complexity, deal with talent issues through self-organizing global teams, and respond to
the market through financial flexibility and organizational fluidity.4
1 In his blog titled Edge

Perspectives with John
Hagel, the author suggests
that institutional innovation,
unlike traditional product
and process innovation,
focuses on redefining roles
and relationships among
institutions to generate and
sustain richer knowledge
flows across institutional
boundaries.
http://tinyurl.com/43hqz5l
2 John Hagel III, John Seely
Brown, and Lang Davison.
The 2009 Shift Index: Measuring the forces of longterm change. Deloittes
Center for the Edge, 2009.
http://tinyurl.com/ybjwp9v
3 John Hagel III, John Seely
Brown, and Lang Davison
(Deloitte Development LLC).
The Power of Pull: How
Small Moves, Smartly Made,
Can Set Big Things in Motion. New York, N.Y.: Basic
Books, 2010.
4 IDC Manufacturing
Insights. Predictions 2012:
Manufacturing: Success in
the Intelligent Economy.
Web Conference, December
8, 2011.
Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture
2/11/13 11:38 AM
We will now examine the participants of the big shift and their influence on the manufacturing
enterprise.
Manufacturers
need to balance
the expectations
of autonomy
against corporate
compliance,
security, and
intellectual
property
protection.
Individuals are always on and always connected, demanding the best experiences from
their devices and services whether at home or at work. As consumers, their buying habits
have been transformed by the information at their fingertips. Individuals are used to selfservice and leveraging both the Internet and their social communities. They can easily switch
loyalties. Manufacturers need new ways to engage with individuals through the web, to sense
their interests, and to understand what they are saying about the manufacturers products.
These insights need to fuel better product designs, enable compelling experiences, and
improve marketing efforts. As workers, individuals expect to bring their personal devices into
the workplace. The lines between home life and work life are blurring. Manufacturers need to
balance the expectations of autonomy against corporate compliance, security, and intellectual
property protection.
Communities and social networks are where customers spend their time learning about products and sharing their experiences. Word of mouth now can be broadcast to millions of people instantly, and perceptionswhether right or wrongare created. Manufacturers need to
understand how to monitor, attract, and retain customers through these channels.
Workplaces are transforming as multiple generations of workers, with varying levels of technological competencies and expectations, coexist. While an older generation prefers an individual
workstyle, the younger Millennials are inherently collaborative and multitasking, adept at social
networking, and perpetually connected. Enterprises need to provide new collaborative capabilities and flexible workstyles while fostering a cultural shift.
Organizations simply need to become more dynamic and agile to compete in a fast-changing
globalized world. Timely and relevant insights from across all of their business processes, in addition to those from non-traditional sources of information such as internal and external social
networks, will enable employees to transcend functional silos, capitalize on opportunities, and
respond to threats.
Value network orchestration is becoming critical in an increasingly flat world. Opportunities
and business conditions are continually changing in todays fast-paced global environment.
Ecosystems of enterprises need to work cooperatively to bring high-quality products to market
faster. Manufacturing enterprises need greater visibility into and awareness of their specific role
in distributed networks to participate profitably and strategically.
Most manufacturing firms are grappling with the complexities of these issues, and the influence
they have on business strategy and technology investments. To understand the context behind
a reference architecture framework, we will briefly examine the challenges facing the business-IT
environment of manufacturers today and assess their needs going forward.
1.2 Challenges in the business-IT environment
Given a world that is undergoing significant macroeconomic and technological shifts, manufacturers
find themselves battling increasing complexityin products, processes, competition, the value
chain, the evolving IT landscape, and ever-changing consumer behavior. Manufacturers have
made substantial investments in their business-IT systems, and yet they struggle to achieve the
agility required to keep up with the constant pace of change. This is largely because these systems
are unconnected, do not take into account unstructured data and processes, do not easily lend
2/11/13 11:38 AM
themselves to integrated business analysis, and are difficult to maintain and use. The digitization
of the economy, ubiquitous access to information, big data, social networking, social media,
cloud computing, and instant communications are transforming consumer and societal behavior,
attitudes, and expectations. These factors are exposing a gap between the established paradigms
of existing business systems and the transformation necessary to move forward.
Over the last two to three decades, significant progress has been made in the automation of key
business functions and processes across finance and accounting, product design, production
planning, supply chain management (SCM), sales, marketing, distribution, and customer
relationships. As processes became codified and automated, it became possible to automate
processes across all of these functions, thereby eliminating redundant and manual work, cutting
down inventory stocks, improving cycle times, and raising product quality and service levels. This
evolution was made possible through advances in technology (such as client/server computing)
and by enterprise software applications that provide off-the-shelf tools and capabilities dedicated
to specific business activities (such as CAD/CAM/CAE for product design; ERP for finance and
human resources management; SCM for production, supply, and vendor management; and CRM
for sales and customer service).
A side effect to this legacycommon to this dayis that key enterprise data remains trapped
in these isolated systems of record. It is scattered across multiple data stores, often in far-flung
business units, and accessible only to people who are skilled in the use of these applications
and toolstypically a narrow subset of the enterprises information workers. This landscape
developed at a time when power was concentrated with the manufacturers that controlled what
to produce, in what amounts, and where it would be distributed.
Going forward,
enterprises need
to reexamine
their ongoing
contribution
in the creation
of new and
differentiated
value in light of
the changing
global market
and the
technological
forces at play.
The rise of big box chains, however, shifted the locus of power to retailers. They were able
to aggregate demand and, consequently, exercise greater pricing leverage with suppliers
(manufacturers). This ability squeezed manufacturers efficiencies, business process integration,
standardization, and costs. But it also drove a wave of innovation. It resulted in greater supply
chain efficiencies and facilitated the distribution of manufacturing to lower cost regions. Product
design expanded beyond dedicated tools to include collaboration as R&D decentralized to serve
new markets. Processes grew to span design, engineering, documentation, customer needs
management, and product portfolio management.
Despite past advances, the changes now playing out require a radical shift in thinking from the
industrialization of processes to a different competitive realityone based on rapid, scalable
learning and agile collaborative processes across the enterprise, including its far-flung units and
its broader, more global ecosystem. The traditional focus on complex enterprise applications and
systems delivered huge gains in process efficiency and productivity. But, going forward, enterprises
need to reexamine their ongoing contribution in the creation of new and differentiated value in
light of the changing global market and the technological forces at play. Although they are still of
primary importance in supporting the enterprise, traditional systems may not adequately meet
the demands of the new reality, as we will discuss shortly.
Here are some of the challenges:
Existing enterprise applications, processes, and data are functionally isolated (as previously
described), difficult to use other than by experts, and hard to change due to their complexity.
As a result, people are not aware of bottlenecks and the downstream consequences of
decisions, nor can they easily collaborate with workers who are outside the narrow scope of
their functional area.
2/11/13 11:38 AM
The majority of employees are not experts or licensed users of LoB applications. In addition,
extracting insights across fragmented data sources is difficult and time-consuming. This limits
employees productivity and participation in business processes, making it difficult to gain
broad and deep visibility into performance and to correlate symptoms with far-removed causes.
Traditional business intelligence tools (mostly to generate reports, dashboards, and scorecards)
deliver views into past performance, are limited to a few users due to their complexity, and
require significant IT support and associated cycle times for changes.
With the
proliferation of
new consumer
devices CIOs and
IT departments
face the
challenge of
dealing with the
consumerization
of IT and the
demand from
employees to
support their
own personal
devices.
Unstructured processes that are knowledge-rich and people-intensive are typically executed
independently of structured data and business processes. Because of disparate systems and
applications, people often resort to manual extraction of data from spreadsheets and to
communicating via voice mail or email to resolve issues. The result is time-consuming loops
and lengthy resolution cycles. Shared knowledge is hard to capture and manage, which limits
learning and reuse.
Business-IT systems were primarily designed for individual and intra-organization processes.
Those companies with the ability to scale have integrated processes with their Tier 1 partners
and suppliers. In general, most systems neither extend nor integrate processes and data across
the growing and increasingly fragmented partner and supplier ecosystem. Architectures in place
today are designed for structured intra-enterprise processes. They fall short in collaborative
work, so processes do not cross enterprise boundaries into global value chains, nor do they
manage the increasing flow of unstructured information spawned by new devices, social media,
and web-based communication.
With the proliferation of new consumer devicessmartphones, tablets, e-readers, ultrabooks,
and so onCIOs and IT departments face the challenge of dealing with the consumerization
of IT and the demand from employees to support their own personal devices (also referred
to as bring your own deviceBYOD). Managing devices, providing security, and ensuring a
consistent experience across multiple form factors are significant challenges that need to be
overcome in a cost-effective way.
IT organizations are forced to spend money on maintaining expensive legacy applications
and making costly incremental modifications, the result of which is bypassed opportunities for
transformative change. Furthermore, the wall between home life and work life, with respect
to technology, is rapidly disintegrating. Employees expect their favorite deviceslaptops,
smartphones, and tabletsto just work, complicating matters for enterprise IT.
The status quo will not carry manufacturers through the transformations taking place. We will
now examine how manufacturers can better understand the gap they need to bridge.
1.2.1 Emerging needs for manufacturers
In the big shift currently underway, success is less about growth through greater efficiencies and
cost reduction (although those goals will never cease to be important). The pace of business is
accelerating, value chain complexity is increasing, and product life cycles continue to shorten.
Consumers are far more informed about products, brands, prices, and company practices; far
more connected with each other through social networks and communities; and less likely to be
loyal for long. Enterprise value chains not only connect suppliers and manufacturers but extend
the reach of both to the end customer through new social business channels. And in many
instances they can leverage connectivity to continue the customer relationship in the after-sale
life cycle of products as assets become increasingly smart and connected.
10
2/11/13 11:38 AM
The world of enterprise software and tools is no longer isolated from the world of consumer
technology. This is increasingly true as Millennials enter the workforce with different expectations than
previous generations. The rise of smartphones, gaming systems, online search, digital advertising,
social networks, and pervasive communications is transforming not only the way enterprises work
but how they sense, interact, and engage with their employees, customers, and partners.
Given the macroeconomic forces at playfalling barriers and increasing competition
manufacturing success means harnessing knowledge flows across teams, departments, and
extended enterprise stakeholders. The goal is to rapidly capitalize on opportunities while
continuously innovating to develop new growth platforms and business models, aided by
technology infrastructure. Agility, innovation, and the engagement and passion of talented
people are the new norms in this always-on, always-connected, hyper-competitive, fast-paced
environment. Broad, secure access to cross-enterprise information, timely and relevant insights
for all roles in the enterprise, and collaboration and communications technologies are the new
foundations for tomorrows success.
1.3 Why a Microsoft reference architecture framework?
Our history as a key player in shaping the evolving technology landscapefrom the personal
computer to client/server computing, enterprise data centers, mobile devices, online services,
and, now, public clouds and private cloudsmeans Microsoft, with our global consumer and
enterprise footprint, has a deep investment in advancing this foundational infrastructure. With
business and technology now deeply intertwined, technology either disrupts business or provides
essential support to business objectives. Both Microsoft enterprise customers and our network
of partners are increasingly seeking guidance on the impact our technology investments have
on business strategy and design, with topics ranging from information-worker productivity to
collaboration, knowledge management, business intelligence, human machine interaction (HMI),
the consumerization of IT, smart connected devices, and value chain transformation. Many of
these functions and technologies are among the needs manufacturers must meet as they move
toward the new reality we have previously described.
Broad, secure
access to
cross-enterprise
information,
timely and
relevant insights
for all roles in
the enterprise,
and collaboration and
communications
technologies are
the new
foundations
for tomorrows
success.
In response to the request for guidance, we have developed the reference architecture framework
for discrete manufacturing (called the DIRA framework) described in this report. We have
established a set of foundational capabilities (or solution pillars) that address key business needs
for discrete manufacturers as they shift toward an agile, knowledge-intensive organizational
structure and become increasingly aware of and connected to their external customer, partner,
and supplier ecosystems. We describe the Microsoft software components and technologies that
anchor these pillars and form the foundation for architecting solutions that deliver on the value
proposition of each pillar.
Within the broader context of the macroeconomic environment and the forces affecting enterprise
strategies in discrete manufacturing, every organization is seeking to innovate in products and
services, to run global supply chain and manufacturing operations efficiently and with high
quality, and to engage customers profitably through effective sales and marketing channels. With
emerging technologies such as cloud computing, social media, big data analytics, and powerful
consumer-centric devices in the workplace, traditional business processes in these key business
areas are likely to undergo significant transformation. Enterprises can benefit from guidance on
how to frame a discussion of the relevance and impact these developments will have on their key
business imperatives (see Figure 1, on page 12).
11
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 1: The DIRA framework establishes a set of six foundational pillars that underpin
the shift to systems of engagement
In terms of using the framework for a given manufacturing business initiative, each pillar offers a
set of guiding principles. These principles help you evaluate and select the appropriate technology
building blocks as a foundation for the high-impact solutions that will meet the business objectives
of your initiatives. The key benefit of this approach is focusing and simplifying the analysis of a
business problem by testing requirements against a few value-centric principles that then lead to
the choice of the appropriate technology components.
1.3.1 DIRAa bridge between emerging business

needs and technology
Microsoft has a central stake in this transformation. Our assets and investments span the breadth
of consumer and enterprise domains. Our products and technologies serve a variety of audiences
(consumers, casual users, business users, information workers, and enterprise IT professionals)
across a diversity of platforms (desktops, mobile devices, servers, and clouds). Our enterprise
customers and network partners can benefit from a framework that helps them move beyond
the constraints of todays environments. This framework leads to progress on key business
initiatives and priorities by leveraging technology advances with short payback times and
minimal disruptions. The DIRA framework helps manage complexity and effect transformation
by synthesizing business challenges, industry trends, and technology trends into six businessenhancing principles (the pillars) that provide a way to analyze and develop solutions for
enterprise business initiatives. Here are the pillars:
Many tasks and activities are often time-consuming or hard to perform with existing devices, form factors, fragmented data, and applications in a digitized and ubiquitously connected
world. Natural user interfaces enable new levels of simplicity, intuitiveness, and modes of interaction with human-computer interfaces through natural, or familiar, user experiences such
as touch, voice, and gestures across a variety of devices and form factors that encompass all of
our digital assets, regardless of location. People embrace ease-of-use, simplicity, and intuitivenesswhen technology gets out of the way and they can focus on the tasks at hand.
12
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Most workers are not expert users of specialized LoB applications and analysis tools, which limits
their potential to participate in critical business processes, gain insights, and make good decisions. Role-based productivity and insights simplifies access to enterprise and LoB systems
by providing personalized access to timely and relevant information and expertiseanytime,
anywherethereby enabling all employees to participate more effectively in business processes and to transform insights into action at every decision point.
Existing enterprise processes that are based on systems of record lack tools for people to track
information flows and connect with experts to take advantage of the knowledge capital within
the enterprise and its ecosystem. Social businessand social mediawhen brought into
the policy-constrained environment of the enterprise, helps foster connections and informal
networks of internal and external stakeholders that help people and teams tap into tacit and
explicit knowledge flows.
With complex value chains and globally distributed partners, assets, facilities, and talent pools,
manufacturers are challenged to coordinate activities and to maintain visibility across their internal and external processes. Dynamic business network capabilities enable them to respond
flexibly and rapidly across the connected value chaina necessity as manufacturing transforms
from the mass-production push model to a customer-empowered pull model and as the
industrys business imperative shifts to sensing customer needs and delivering both innovative
products and services faster.
With two billion Internet users and more than 50 billion Internet-connected devices (also
known as the Internet of things) expected by the end of the decade, this connectivity provides new opportunities for manufacturers. Smart connected devices, enabled through
software and connectivity to the cloud, promise to deliver new customer experiences and new
business opportunities as we enter an era where computational smarts pervade all types of
assets and equipment.
Social business
and social
mediawhen
brought into
the policyconstrained
environment of
the enterprise,
helps foster
connections
and informal
networks
of internal
and external
stakeholders.
These capabilities depend on advances in virtualization, identity and federation, security, storage, networking, global availability, development tools, and broad interoperability. The secure,
scalable, and adaptive infrastructure pillar provides a flexible, manageable, and cost-effective foundation, along with management tools, that spans software and hardware stacks across
mobile devices, desktops, data centers, private clouds, and public clouds.
These six pillars are applicable to departmental, enterprise-wide, and cross-enterprise scenarios
that cover the breadth of the increasingly connected multi-enterprise value chain. Each pillar
embodies a set of reusable solution building blocks. Those technology components help
manufacturers realize the business value each pillar supports. Given a business scenario, these
building blocks can be assembled across the pillars and integrated with existing enterprise assets
to achieve a specific business goal. Assembling and deploying components as needed yields a
solution in less time than traditional approaches and enables a more dynamic and adaptive
manufacturing enterprise.
Consider these scenarios: In collaborative product design, the natural user interfaces pillar
builds better user experiences. In the design collaboration process, the role-based productivity
and insights pillar helps users access graphical 3D and other part information relevant to their
roles. Tools within the social business pillar facilitate collaboration, relevant information delivery,
historical discussions, and subject-matter expert identification. The dynamic business networks
pillar coordinates design processes across suppliers and partners.
13
2/11/13 11:38 AM
1.4 Role of the framework within the partner network
Microsoft understands that no single company can meet the breadth of any given enterprise
customers needs; we have always relied on an extensive partner network to bring innovative
solutions to market. As such, the reference architecture framework must provide a consistent
value proposition for both customers and partners, so they can leverage and add their own
distinctive know-how and capabilities.
A 2007 Economist Intelligence Unit survey5 of senior executives points out the benefits of global
innovation networks in achieving greater levels of innovation, cost savings, access to specialist
skills and knowledge, faster time to market, and access to local markets. The DIRA framework aims
to better meet customer needs by sharing Microsoft strategies and broad technology solutions
with our partner network that delivers specialized industry know-how and LoB solutions. The
framework offers guidance on the value proposition of Microsoft technologies and how they align
with industry trends and challenges without constraining the ways in which these technologies
can be integrated into innovative partner products and solutions.
Several examples of innovative partner solutions are presented in this report, demonstrating the
valuable industry solutions that have already been created using DIRA. The framework also is
intended to serve as an idea beacon6 to broadly facilitate innovation within the network, thereby
continually reinforcing mutual learning about the needs of tomorrows markets, and to rapidly
and flexibly respond to market and customer pull.
1.5 Scope of the reference architecture framework
We have used the word architecture knowing there is no accepted universal definition of that
term as it applies to software (see A Note on Enterprise Architecture Frameworks). Nevertheless,
there is a striking convergence around the objectives of enterprise architectureshelping
organizations manage complexity, find better ways to use technology to support business goals,
and reduce the time and costs of building complex systems.
A note on enterprise architecture frameworks
Although the term enterprise architecture is used extensively, no universally accepted

definition exists. However, the discipline is crucial in managing complexity and reducing
time-to-value as software becomes increasingly interwoven with both business and the
daily work lives and home lives of people everywhere.
Enterprise architecture frameworks serve as important vehicles to classify, organize, and
structure knowledge repositories and their associated knowledge maintenance processes.
They serve to divide a complex system into interrelated, manageable, and comprehensible
perspectives. The information captured in various viewpoints then can be analyzed for
specific purposes, providing insights into the operation of the system as a whole. Good
enterprise architectures, and their associated frameworks, derive their value from the agility and continuous operational value they provide the enterprise over time.
5 Paul Tyrrell. Sharing the

idea: The emergence of global
innovation networks. Economist Intelligence Unit, 2007.
6 Research & Technology
Executive Council. Profit from
the Innovation Network: How
to Get Others to Get You
the Best Ideas. Corporate
Executive Board, March 2009.
14
Several well-known frameworks exist. The white paper titled Comparison of the Top Four
Enterprise Architecture Methodologies, by ObjectWatch CTO Roger Sessions, offers a
good overview and comparison of the Zachman Framework for Enterprise Architecture,
The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF), the Federal Enterprise Architecture
(FEA), and the Gartner/Meta Methodology.
For more information, go to: http://tinyurl.com/3evkw46
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 2 shows a practical and commonly used architectural layering scheme that is analogous
to the architectural segments of the Federal Enterprise Architecture.7 The DIRA frameworks
aim is to provide the industry and its enterprise and business architects with scoping guidance,
solution component selection, and solution best practices. Once these selections are made, the
components can be mapped and incorporated into the lower architectural layers for deeper
technical and design specification.
Figure 2: Architecture levels, audiences, and objectives

This report is intended to offer pragmatic guidance at a business level that influences organizational
structure, internal business processes, cross-enterprise business processes, and user roles, among
others. At a technical level, the guidance provided involves use cases, object models, data
models, interaction diagrams, and so onbut these are beyond the scope of this report. The
framework offers input and guidance on the construction of an enterprise architecture, but DIRA
itself is a level removed from specific business scenarios associated with a particular companys
enterprise landscape. As an industry framework, DIRA is informed by the macroeconomic trends
and business issues of primary concern to enterprises in the discrete manufacturing industry, such
as automotive, high tech, industrial equipment, and aerospace. Microsoft has taken this approach
as a balance between industry-specific needs for greater relevance and generic business solution
and technology guidance for broader applicability across the business process spectrum.
Like any enterprise architecture framework, DIRA is a guide. Any framework will need to be adapted
to the needs of an organization based on its business objectives, current business structure and
IT landscape, and a definition of the desired business state. CIOs and enterprise architects need
to accommodate the broader enterprise context and business environment when applying a
framework and developing an implementation blueprint. Among the considerations are:
Understanding the external and internal business drivers that induce change.
Understanding the goals and objectives of the business that represent an initiatives outcomes.
Evaluating the existing frameworks, applications, platforms, and technologies that are best
suited to deliver capabilities for meeting business goals and objectives.
Developing a business and architecture blueprint that incorporates the appropriate capabilities
and solution building blocks, integrates with existing systems and processes, and specifies the
business transformation (changed business models, business processes, and so on).
Implementing and validating the approach through proofs of concept, pilots, and incremental
rollouts.
7 Wikipedia. Federal enterprise
architecture definition. http://
tinyurl.com/3og3njm
15
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 3 shows how DIRA can be applied to customer initiatives when you are evaluating the
capabilities needed to meet business requirements and selecting the appropriate solution
components. The framework also provides guidance for collaboration between Microsoft and
our partner networks, so final solutions deliver the highest value and performance to customers
with the minimum of effort and cost.
A note on terminology
The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF) defines a building block as a (potentially
reusable) component of business, IT, or architectural capability that can be combined with
other building blocks to deliver architectures and solutions.
Architecture building blocks (ABBs) typically describe the required capability and shape
the specification of solution building blocks (SBBs). An enterprises customer service capability, for example, may be supported by many SBBssuch as processes, data, and
application software.
SBBs are the components used to implement a required capability. For example, a network is a building block described through complementary artifacts and then used to
realize solutions for the enterprise.
For more information, go to: http://www.togaf.org/
Figure 3: DIRA framework facilitates best customer value delivered between platform
and applications
16
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Chapter 2: Transformation of
manufacturing value chains
2.1 Trends shaping manufacturing
The world is clearly changing againthis time with the locus of power shifting to consumers while
growth sources shift to emerging markets, uncertainty reigns in financial markets and geopolitical
regions, and the Internet further eliminates barriers to size and distance. During the recession,
companies focused on short-term performance goals, such as cost cutting, sales growth, and
market-share growth. But this approach only temporarily masked the underlying shifts relentlessly
transforming the global business environment. Now that virtually every business is a player on the
global stagewhether the company recognizes that fact or notit is important for business and
IT leaders to specifically understand how global forces affect their businesses.
2.1.1 Advances in digital infrastructure
The continued exponential price/performance improvements in computing power, data storage,

and bandwidth are driving the adoption of digital infrastructure and accompanying Internet
services at a rate that is two to five times faster than previous infrastructures, such as those used
in electricity and telephone networks, according to Hagel, Brown, and Davison in The 2009 Shift
Index: Measuring the forces of long-term change.8
This trend, presently manifesting in the emergence of cloud computing and services, is fundamentally
transforming businesses and society as empowered consumers adapt the way they consume
media, information, and services; research and buy products; interact with one another through
social media; and function in the workplace. The media and entertainment industries provide a
vivid example of the disruptive power of technology: Consumers can now buy music by the song,
in an instant, and at a time and in the place of their choosing. Any company, regardless of size or
location, now has access to powerful data center capabilities that previously were within the reach
only of corporations with well-staffed data centers. Companies can lease capacity elastically, for
intermittent or periodically compute-intensive workloads such as design simulation and modeling,
thereby avoiding the overhead of an upfront capital expense. The rapid provisioning and scale-up
capability provided by the cloud is certain to transform the business landscape, particularly in those
regions where data center infrastructure is poor but more bandwidth becomes available.
The rapid provisioning and

scale-up capability provided
by the cloud is
certain to transform the business landscape,
particularly in
those regions
where data center infrastructure
is poor but more
bandwidth becomes available.
Cloud Computing. The transformation from software to connected services enabled by cloud
computing is fueling innovation in products and business models in every industry. Take, for
example, M.G. Bryan Equipment Co., a manufacturer of heavy industrial equipment such as
fracking machines used in oil and gas exploration. M.G. Bryan has developed services9 to remotely
monitor equipment status in real time through the cloud; to track maintenance alerts; and to
ensure consumables, spare parts, and maintenance activities help maximize asset uptimeall of
which results in dramatically improved customer ROI. We see the cloud playing a transformative
role in enabling connected vehicles, smart grids, and smart communities; in collaborative networks
that spur design innovation and operational integration; in enabling broad access to sophisticated
simulation and analysis tools; and in a multitude of other scenarios within manufacturing.
These changes are likely to have deep implications on companies value chains. They will be able
to not only distribute but integrate business activities across borders as supply chains stretch
globally for both goods and services. Functions such as product design and manufacturing can
be more easily located in different geographies, based on the need for global market reach,
common platforms, and localization. As the ability to sense customer needs sharpens through
social and digital listening channels, the corresponding demand for quick responses through crossChapter 2: Transformation of Manufacturing Value Chains
8 John Hagel III, John Seely Brown,

and Lang Davison. The 2009
Shift Index: Measuring the forces
of long-term change. Deloittes
Center for the Edge, 2009.
http://tinyurl.com/43hqz5l
9 Rockwell Automation Oil & Gas.
M.G. Bryan Pioneers First-of-itsKind, Cloud Computing Asset Performance Management. June 10,
2012. http://tinyurl.com/c5qse3y
17
2/11/13 11:38 AM
functional and ecosystem coordination will increase, too. As a result, companies must be able to
quickly establish collaborative data and process hubs across their adaptive business networks. Early
evidence indicates that as companies embark on pilots and new initiatives as learning projects, they
are quickly embracing the opportunities and adapting their business models so they can recognize
the competitive advantages to be gained.
The ascendance
of data in the
overall scheme
of enterprise
architecture is a
noteworthy shift
and should not
be understated.
Big Data. Accompanying the drop in storage costs and the explosion in volume, variety, and sources
of data that are of interest to the enterprise is the quest to derive insights from those vast troves of
data. And that quest has only just begun. Among the huge benefits are understanding customer needs
better, targeting the right audiences with the right products, improving product designs through
usage data, and predicting service needs. According to a McKinsey Global Institute report titled Big
Data: The next frontier for innovation, competition, and productivity, manufacturing stores more
data than any other sectorclose to 2 exabytes of new data were stored in 2010.10 Data emanates
from a multitude of sourcesincluding instrumented production machinery (process control), supply
chain management systems, and systems that monitor the performance of products already in use,
among others. Together with integration into social networks, cloud-based applications, sensors, and
connected devices, the amount of data is set to grow for the foreseeable future. Extracting value from
all this data will require advancements in storage, processing, integration, analytics, and visualization
techniques, along with changes in governance, management, security, and access.
The manufacturing industry historically has been a productivity leader. It has gained from early
and intensive use of data, and the industry now stands poised to drive productivity gains while
leveraging these developments. Although the industry is still in the early days of building out the
techniques and systems for broad enterprise adoption, we can discern key areas of development
that will play in the big data landscape. Among them:
Analytics and algorithmic techniques, which are emerging from a range of domains. These
include computer science, mathematics, statistics, and machine learning that are aimed at
better customer analysis and market analysis; product improvement through multiple feedback
channels, including products themselves; predictive services to avoid failure and downtime; and
energy demand and supply balancing through smart grids, smart communities for sustainable
urban development, and so on.
Data integration across a variety of sources (both within and external to the enterprise) and across
a variety of data types (including structured and unstructured), together with the accompanying
challenges of security, access, and governance.
Visualization and self-exploration capabilities, which are ultimately critical in enabling people to
consume and interact with data, collaborate, and communicate to improve business performance and
decision-making. Incorporation into tools such as Microsoft Excel, along with the corresponding
online web apps, will bring big data capabilities into the everyday activities of any worker.
Tools and systems, which help enterprises cost-effectively deploy, integrate, manage, and govern
the various components that make up the solution. Many exciting developments are originating
in the open-source community (for example, Hadoop and its associated family of tools), but
much effort and specialization are presently required for broad enterprise adoption.
10 McKinsey Global Institute.

Big Data: The next frontier
for innovation, competition,
and productivity, June 2011.
18
Much of this development is underway and cataloged in the McKinsey Global Institute report, in
addition to numerous publications, on big data. The ascendance of data in the overall scheme of
enterprise architecture is a noteworthy shift and should not be understated. Business processes
have been largely executed by deploying applications where data is schematized and modeled to
serve application requirements. Tasks, activities, and workflows were executed through the surface
area of the application interfaces. In the emerging data-centric world, we will see applications
operating on the dataregardless of its origins, location, or structureas the value to the business
shifts away from repeatable automated tasks and to extracting insights from vast data pools and
then operationalizing decisions in response to these signals.
Chapter 2: Transformation of Manufacturing Value Chains
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Even as enterprises learn to harness the potential of big data, the ability of people to find one another,
connect, share, and collaborate in the context of data, applications, and processes is fundamental to
transforming into an engaged organization. It used to be that manufacturers could forecast demand
and then supply their products through distribution channels without too much concern for the
direct relationship with their customers or individual consumers. This approach is no longer sufficient,
because change comes swiftly and consumers now control the conversation through social media and
their online communities. And they can instantly transform the perception of a product or service. It is
increasingly critical for manufacturers to monitor social media dialogues and engage consumers in this
channel, turning it into a positive asseta customer-centric tool rather than a threat. Manufacturers
are increasingly developing strategies around digital marketing, leveraging social media and social
networking to attract, learn from, and interactively engage with their customers.
Social Business. In parallel to the need for integration with social networks, the social enterprise
is beginning to take shape as social networking principles are incorporated into every business
processthrough collaboration, activity feeds, historical search across discussion threads, instantly
locating and communicating with experts, and community formation. Consistent with the thesis that
thriving in the knowledge economy depends on the flow of knowledge to capitalize on opportunities
and to improve performance, social business techniques are emerging as a critical enabler to tap
deeply into the collective skills and capabilities within and across the extended enterprise.
As familiar productivity applications such as Microsoft Office 365 with SharePoint Online
and Lync Online (online communications and meetings) become ubiquitously available through
public clouds, a new wave of business productivity will sweep through manufacturing value
networks and ecosystems. The connectivity, collaboration, social networking, and visibility
enabled through hosted applications will help far-flung suppliers and manufacturers connect
with their larger partners by quickly and easily setting up shared workspaces populated with basic
transaction and operational data and quickly resolving issues through hosted communications.
Similarly, innovation and product design processes can leverage communities and crowdsourcing techniques to generate new ideas, improve product features and capabilities, and
expand collaborative networks to include stakeholders from engineering, manufacturing, supply
chain, and sales and service.
As mobile and
smart devices
with powerful
embedded
processors and
communications
capabilities
become
pervasive across
the consumer
and industrial
landscape,
manufacturers
can increasingly
offer new valueadded services
across the
operational life
cycle of devices.
Mobility. As mobile and smart devices with powerful embedded processors and communications
capabilities become pervasive across the consumer and industrial landscape, manufacturers can
increasingly offer new value-added services across the operational life cycle of devices. This is
playing out in the entertainment industry as digital marketplaces and mobile apps bring innovative
on-demand applications into the hands of consumers. The market for tablets and smartphones is
expanding to include the broader working population in both developing markets and emerging
markets. The model of services delivered through the cloud across a variety of devices will drive
new ways of working and new process efficiencies. Field engineers, for example, can securely access
specifications and design content on devices of their own choosing, communicate in real time with
experts regardless of location, search entire corporate and external knowledge repositories, access
historical asset performance, and receive assistance from remote, cloud-based algorithm-rich agents.
In industrial contexts, the field of telematics is experiencing a surge of interest. The success of Ford
Motor Companys SYNC has enabled both faster sales of SYNC-equipped cars and a platform for the
delivery of new services and applications for drivers, passengers, and mobile workers. Almost every
manufacturer of assets such as industrial equipment, construction equipment, medical devices, jet
engines, cars, and trucks is looking into value-added services, including preventive maintenance,
remote diagnostics, and service support. These services are enabled through real-time information
from device sensors and through analytics capabilities that process the vast streams of available
information and then translate it into value.
19
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 4 depicts the expanding network of an increasingly borderless high-tech value chain as
products proliferate and markets become increasingly global. The network can leverage Internetbased digital infrastructurecombining cloud, social, big data, and new devicesto connect supply
chain participants across multiple tiers, in addition to extending the companys reach at the other
end to consumers and other businesses through direct device connectivity, social networks, and
other channels. This is a profound change, as customers and consumers become active participants
in the value chain. All types of smart connected products, including televisions, gaming devices,
and cars, will be equipped to enable the integration of both customers and suppliers, thereby
providing many opportunities for new services, product innovations, and business models.
Technological advances may directly foster disruptive business change, as previously discussed.
At the same time, macroeconomic forces such as the drive toward sustainability, emerging market
countries, and changing demographics reinforce the technological forces or support advances in
digital infrastructure. Either way, technology is deeply ingrained into the fabric of business.
Figure 4: Increasingly global and integrated value chainsrequiring extended reach

and connectivity to consumers and businesses
2.1.2 Power shift to consumers
With the advent of the Internet era, ecommerce, search, digital advertising, and social networking,
consumers are both more informed than ever before about the products they buy and more
engaged with each other through social communities. As a result, consumers are powerful, active
participants in the value network. Although this creates new challenges for manufacturers in terms
of managing the customer dialogue, they need to embrace these digital trends and consumer
communities and to engage customers in meaningful ways in order to drive success for their
brands. As connected devices become the primary means through which manufacturers deliver
information and services about their products, possibilities will emerge to creatively engage
customers over the entire lifecycle of product ownership. Among them are innovative value-added
services as a source of differentiation.
2.1.3 Connected experiences
As the worlds of entertainment, media, gaming, computing, and communications go digital, they are
being combined in stunning ways to create exciting new products, services, and business opportunities.
Consumers demand to remain connected to information, entertainment, and people, whether they are
at work, at home, or on the go, and to do so through any device of their choosing.
20
2/11/13 11:38 AM
This convergence has had deep implications for business. In media, digitization has replaced print
in many areas, and consumers use the Internet to find what they are interested in rather than
waiting for information to be pushed to them. Smartphones substitute for laptops, and other
tablets are the preferred tools for consuming media and entertainment. In the automotive industry,
for example, cars now are connected devices where infotainment and location-based services can
be delivered on-demand. In fact, a variety of physical products have enough processing power
and connectivity to make them intelligent actors in the environments in which they are used:
smart meters report energy consumption in real time; medical devices upload electronic medical
records; and industrial equipment predicts impending problems by sending alerts for service and
maintenance.
This trend is spawning new business models around device platforms. Among them are app
stores, where entire ecosystems evolve to deliver countless apps for convenience, fun, education,
entertainment, and business. Microsoft has launched the Intelligent Systems initiative that
enables intelligent devices, connectivity to the cloud, big data analytics to extract new insights, and
integration with business applications for customer service, collaboration, and social tools.
2.1.4 Globalization and emerging economies
Emerging market countries, together with their rising middle classes, are creating a shift in economic
power. More cars were sold in China in 2010 than in the United States, and India has the highest
growth rate for mobile phones. Estimates show that 70 percent of world growth over the next few
years will come from emerging markets, with China and India accounting for 40 percent of that
growth.11 Manufacturers need global scale to compete, but they must be able to execute locally.
They also must be agile to respond to changing needs in widely differing markets worldwide.
In high-tech manufacturing, where product life cycles are increasingly short and time to market
is critical to success, it is all about the flexibility of global supply chains and the ability to rapidly
partner within that network to capitalize quickly on opportunities.
A variety of
physical products
have enough
processing power
and connectivity
to make them
intelligent
actors in the
environments
in which they
are used.
The high-growth automotive markets in emerging market countries and the specific characteristics
of those markets, such as urban density, are important factors in automakers product designs and
manufacturing strategies. Automakers in these geographies are planning to introduce emissionfree vehicles based on battery or fuel-cell technologies, and they are experimenting with flexible
business models such as charge-by-the-minute schemes (Daimlers car2go). At the same time,
product and design innovations developed by the local R&D units of automakers in emerging
market countries are increasingly finding their way into developed markets. This phenomenon is
often referred to as reverse innovation. Manufacturers need to better connect to global markets,
establish R&D centers in local markets, tap local talent, and collaborate strongly across a global
network of partners to harvest knowledge quickly and to translate ideas and opportunities into
compelling products and services.
2.1.5 Changing demographics
For the first time in history, the workforce spans multiple generations, with a spectrum of experience,
expectations, and tools they use in the workplace. Millennials are digital natives; they are comfortable
with multitasking and an always-on, always-connected world. These younger workers demand the
latest high-tech capabilities and a seamless link between their lifestyle and their workstyle. Baby
Boomers, however, typically struggle with the notions of social networking and tweeting, and they
often resist technological change. From a geographic perspective, the workforce in developed
countries is aging, while people in their 20s comprise the broadest segment of the workforce in
India. This distinction has corresponding implications in consumer markets, too.
11 Ernst & Young. Tracking

global trends: How six key
developments are shaping
the business world. 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3jlzmh6
21
2/11/13 11:38 AM
As the
boundaries of
the enterprise
stretch across
geographies,
the ability to
communicate
through
conferencing
and other
communications
tools is
increasingly
important
in making
decisions
quickly and
economically.
12 Neal Elliott, Maggie

Molina, and Dan Trombley.
A Defining Framework for
Intelligent Efficiency. American Council for an Energy
Efficient Economy (ACEEE).
June 5, 2012.
http://tinyurl.com/cg3scc6
13 car2go Austin: An
Original Idea.
http://tinyurl.com/3bj9pgb
14 NERA Economic Consulting, commissioned by
Manufacturers Alliance for
Productivity and Innovation.
Macroeconomic Impacts
of Federal Regulation of
the Manufacturing Sector.
August 21, 2012.
http://tinyurl.com/awmjybu
22
To deal with these issues, it is vital to find a balance between importing consumer technologies
into the policy-constrained environment of the workplace and gradually adopting the benefits
of consumer-driven innovations into enterprise tools and processes. Ease of use and powerful
graphical user experiences are requirements, because every worker needs to assimilate more
information and glean insights from data more quickly. Collaboration, communication, knowledge
capture, enterprise search, and locating experts are increasingly important capabilities in facilitating
the growth and expectations of younger workers while securing the engagement of experienced
people. And as the boundaries of the enterprise stretch across geographies, the ability to
communicate through conferencing and other communications tools is increasingly important in
making decisions quickly and economically.
2.1.6 Sustainability
The rapid growth in global demand is fueling rising costs in commodities and materials. It also is
adversely impacting the environment and peoples quality of life. In some countries, such as Japan,
public policies are incentivizing the development of smart communitiesinterconnections across
water, power, and utilities; smart meters; cars, road and traffic infrastructure; industrial systems;
and consumers. An American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) report titled A
Defining Framework for Intelligent Efficiency says if the United States took advantage of currently
available information and communications technologies that enable system efficiencies, it could
reduce energy use by about 12 percent to 22 percent and realize tens or hundreds of billions of
dollars in energy savings and productivity gains.12 High-tech and electronics manufacturers need
to develop products and services that are environmentally friendly while simultaneously reducing
emissions and energy consumption in manufacturing and distribution processes. Product designers
need systems and capabilities to access environmental data for sourced products and components,
to factor energy costs into the manufacturing process, and to design for reuse and recycling.
In the automotive industry, high oil and gas prices, urban air pollution, traffic jams, and growing
consumer sensitivity to ecological impact are playing into the product portfolio plans of manufacturers.
Many OEMs are broadening their portfolios to include electric vehicles (EVs), plug-in hybrids, and fuel
cell-based vehicles. And many are innovating with new business models to meet the needs of flexible
21st Century mobility. For example, Daimler now offers a flexible, charge-by-the-minute fleet of cars
through its car2go13 subsidiary. In almost all instances, connectivity and telematics play a large role
in enabling these innovationswhether it is to find a nearby car and enjoy the convenience of being
billed automatically or to counter the range anxiety of EVs (the concern over the distance such
vehicles can cover with a given charge in given climate conditions).
From an information systems perspective, capturing energy consumption data for analysis;
optimizing processes by factoring in energy as a constrained resource; integrating equipment
schedules with smart grid pricing signals; and controlling, maintaining, and managing assets for
efficient performance can be supported through applications, information management, and
business intelligence capabilities.
2.1.7 Complex regulations
A recent research study on the impact of federal regulations on manufacturers, commissioned by MAPI
(and prepared by NERA Economic Consulting)14, confirms that since 1998 the cost of manufacturingrelated rules has grown far more rapidly than manufacturing itself: Manufacturing regulations grew
an average of 7.6 percent a year in that time span, compared with average growth of 0.4 percent for
the sectors output. Environmental regulations are the key source of impact on the manufacturing
sectors. The rising cost of complying with more regulations significantly impacts the production costs
in energy-intensive sectors such as automotive and industrial manufacturing. Additionally, regulations
span safety (OSHA), quality (cGMP), emissions, hazardous waste, and so on.
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Manufacturers can address these issues through better visibility and data access into operating
processes and conditions, workflow automation, documentation control, search and discovery,
energy efficiency and process optimization, and material reuse, among others.
2.2 Themes supporting performance across boundaries
Various mature and emerging technical capabilities are critical to supporting businesses
as they respond to macroeconomic forces and drive new initiatives. Managing the flow of
information across business functions and providing the right people with access to the
right information in the right context are key to enabling collaboration, especially when
organizations expand into new markets in emerging countries or leverage local talent for R&D
or manufacturing operations. Locating functions across geographies requires collaboration
and communications technologies for coordination, sharing best practices, reusing assets, and
cost reduction. Providing quick and easy access to information through search and reporting
across the enterprise helps develop sustainable products by enabling designers to find the
appropriate carbon footprint and emissions information and the necessary sources of the
right components from suppliers. Such access also improves manufacturing processes from
an energy consumption standpoint. Reporting and business insight provide detailed analytics
associated with business performance, whether directed at applying sustainable (energyefficient) processes, assessing opportunities in emerging markets, or providing remote
diagnostics service on field equipment.
The explosion
of smart devices
with ubiquitous
connectivity is
enabling new
applications on
the device and
in the cloud.
The explosion of smart devices with ubiquitous connectivity is enabling new applications on the
device and in the cloud. With device convergence, streaming data from connected devices (such
as cars, medical equipment, industrial machines, and smart meters) can be communicated to the
massive cloud-enabled data stores for analysis and new functions (such as predictive maintenance,
energy management, and a wide variety of other applications).
And finally, given technologys reach in emerging market countries through mobile and other
devices, both ease of use and new natural, or familiar, ways of interacting with computers
will stimulate innovative applications. Technology is a critical enabler for new business function
capabilitiesranging from product design to engineering, supply chain, manufacturing operations
and sales, marketing, and serviceto address the previously described macroeconomic forces.
As discussed in Chapter 1, the Microsoft DIRA framework defines six pillars and their associated
principles that address key capabilities for manufacturers as they evolve to function in a more
connected and knowledge-intensive world. You can analyze any solution to a business initiative
by applying these pillars and selecting the components that provide the best fit and value for
the business. Figure 5, on page 24, shows the map of each pillar and its supporting themes.
Solutions represent a combination of capabilities between the appropriate pillars and the core LoB
applications or custom-built applications. In principle, the six themes are applicable to business
processes within and across any particular functional domainfrom innovation and product
design, supply chain, and operations to sales, marketing, and services.
This chapter introduces each of the pillars, with a brief description of the underlying Microsoft
technology components. Chapter 3 goes into technical details for each of the technology
components, and Chapter 4 briefly discusses how solutions can be combined to leverage a set of
products and tools. The Appendix highlights several of the top Microsoft partner solutions that are
built around these concepts.
23
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 5: The DIRA framework provides manufacturers guidance in deploying

technological capabilities to develop and enhance business solutions
2.2.1 Natural user experiences
An explosion of devices such as laptops, netbooks, smartphones, tablets, and surface computers is
making information of all typesstreaming video and music, books, maps, 3D graphics, business data,
video conferencing, and so onmore accessible than ever before. But this also is overloading our
cognitive abilities to efficiently sort through and interact with the increasing volumes of information.
Advances in natural user interfaces are bringing new levels of simplicity, intuitiveness, and modes
of interaction to human-computer interfaces. From touch and gestures to speech and augmented
reality, the modes through which people interact with systems can be adapted in new ways that are
best suited to their tasks and environment. Microsoft is betting on a future where computers are
embedded in just about everything, where our digital lives are even more connected, and where
our methods of interacting with machines get more intuitive.15
From a business challenge perspective, complexity and information overload tend to reduce worker
productivity, distract focus from the task at hand, and make it difficult to spot important insights within
mundane data. Also, a younger generation of workers expects new ways of interacting with computers,
having grown up in a world of sophisticated interactive games, graphics, media, and social networking.
15 Todd Bishop. How

Microsoft is piecing together
the ultimate display. (video)
Puget Sound Business Journal, February 22, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/6gls3ec
24
Microsoft Silverlight enables the creation of engaging, intuitive, and stunning user interfaces
for business users and consumers. It is a powerful development platform for creating rich media
applications and business applications for the web, the desktop, and mobile devices. Figure 6, on
page 25, shows a traditional spreadsheet that a sophisticated number-crunching Excel user would
be totally comfortable with. But for casual and business users looking to glance quickly through
the data, Figure 7, on page 25, shows the same data rendered in a Silverlight control in a browser.
This view yields a completely different user experience. For casual and business users, creative and
appealing interfaces make tasks fun, intuitive, and engaginga key requirement for companies
that need their workers to be passionate and fully engaged in this hyper-competitive environment.
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 6: Traditional spreadsheet
Figure 7: Spreadsheet rendered with Silverlight on webpage

Several key features make Silverlight particularly attractive for business use, among them are Deep
Zoom and PivotViewer. Deep Zoom is the fastest, smoothest zooming technology on the web;
it gives users the highest resolution images and frame rates with the lowest load times. These
capabilities enable complex information, such as 3D engineering data or finite element analysis
models, to be viewed in a fluid, organic way on any device while preserving every granular detail.
With Deep Zoom, thousands of items of data can be displayed, which enables innovative navigation
of large data sets. PivotViewer makes it easy to interact with massive amounts of data in ways that
are powerful, informative, and fun (see Figure 8, on page 26). By visualizing thousands of related
items at once, users can see trends and patterns that would be hidden when looking at one item
at a time, such as with inventory distributions or production performance.
25
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Figure 8: Item data collection (left) and detail item view (right) with PivotViewer and
Deep Zoom
In addition to compelling data displays, a variety of interesting human-computer interaction modes
are going mainstream. Touch-enabled devices such as smartphones and tablets with gesture
touch are already widely used. The Microsoft PixelSense platform (see Figure 9) is changing the
way people interact with information and with each other. The technology features LCD panels that
can see without using cameras, in addition to recognizing fingers, hands, and other objects placed
on the screen.
With the Samsung SUR40
surface table featuring
PixelSense, a number of
partners in a variety of
industries have developed
imaginative solutions that
bring people together
and help them experience
things in a new way. For
Figure 9: Samsung SUR40 with Microsoft PixelSense can be
example, it is possible to
used as a table, on a wall, or embedded in other fixtures
envision a manufacturing
scenario in which workers
interact with and collaborate on displayed product designs, production plans, and supply chain
plans. Or a scenario in which physical parts placed on the display are automatically recognized and
associated design, manufacturing, or maintenance information is retrieved.
Voice recognition and speech technologies also are more pervasive in devices such as phones
(Microsoft Windows Phone 7), cars (Fords SYNC, Toyotas Entune, Hyundais Blue Link systems),
and gaming systems (Microsoft Kinect). Voice is an effective way to enhance user interfaces in
conjunction with other gesture inputs, like motion or touch. On Windows Phone 7 devices, users
can search on Microsoft Bing or other open apps with Microsoft Tellme speech technologies.
On Kinect, users can control the interface and media playback through a microphone. In Fords
SYNC-enabled cars, users can control media playback, make calls, and conduct local searches.
Kinect for Xbox 360 delivers a breakthrough in natural user experiences by eliminating the controller
entirely; users can control the system through body motion (gestures) and voice. Kinects software
and camera interprets 3D scene information from a continuously projected, infrared structured light
that provides full-body 3D motion capture, facial recognition, and voice-recognition capabilities. The
26
2/11/13 11:38 AM
platform has caught the imagination of the developer community, and unforeseen applications are
likely to pop up over time. Imagine a scenario in which a drivers behavior is monitored in his or her
vehicle, with a Kinect vision sensor used to analyze eyelid motion and head movements to determine
whether that driver is drowsy and in need of an alert or warning.
2.2.2 Role-based productivity and insights
One of the persistent barriers to people productivity and business productivity for the last
several decades is the fragmentation of enterprise data across functional and departmental silos.
A McKinsey report on productivity suggests that at many large multinationals nearly half of all
interactions between knowledge workers do not create the intended value, because people have
to hunt for information, do not know where to find what they need, or get caught in the maws of
inefficient bureaucracies.16 The evolution of enterprise tools and applications is such that product
design data and part data are managed by CAD/CAM/CAE/PLM systems; financial data (accounts,
general ledger), payroll, and human resources by ERP systems; sales and customer data by CRM
systems; and production and operations data by manufacturing execution systems (MES). Suppliers,
contracts, parts, and materials data associated with supply chain management is either part of ERP
or, sometimes, its own category.
Despite the benefits of these systems of record to each of these functions, enterprise business
processes have been forced into the fragmented models defined by these large, complex
applications. People have to be trained experts to use these complex systems, the results of which
are narrow pockets of expertise, a general lack of access by the broader worker population to
business data, and the inability of workers to effectively contribute and participate in improving
business processes due to lack of sufficient context. People trained in a particular LoB application
find it difficult to access data in unfamiliar systems. This situation compounds the problems
enterprises face as they seek greater agility and responsiveness, because data cannot be easily
aggregated and analyzed to generate insights so people can take effective and coherent action.
One of the
persistent barriers to people
productivity
and business
productivity for
the last several
decades is the
fragmentation
of enterprise
data across
functional and
departmental
silos.
Given the intensifying competition and the pace of change previously discussed, this is an
unsustainable situation for any enterprise.
For enterprises that are solving this problem, the broad collaboration and business intelligence
platform offered in SharePoint is a central strategy. Three capabilities help organizations address
these issues:
Providing broad access to authorized users of enterprise information across multiple applications
and data stores through a user-friendly role-based portal and making it easy to find relevant
information.
Giving all authorized users self-service analysis and reporting capabilities against consolidated
enterprise data.
Enabling workflows and composite services, together with social collaboration tools, so new
processes can bridge the gaps between fragmented systems, thereby enabling greater cohesion
and fluidity across the enterprise.
Broad enterprise information access
The SharePoint platform enables broad access to enterprise information by integrating with various
LoB applications and data stores. Serving as a portal configured to the users role, information
is tailored to the users needs. This reduces overload and minimizes context switches across
disparate applications with simple, easy-to-use interfaces and familiar tools such as spreadsheets,
dashboards, scorecards, and other graphical controls. Many enterprise applications now expose
interfaces through SharePoint web parts, which can be embedded into a role-centric webpage.
16 McKinsey Quarterly.
The Productivity Imperative,
June 2010.
27
2/11/13 11:38 AM
Information is accessed through a desktop, browser, or phone. It can be taken offline for viewing
and making changes, with the information automatically synchronizing with the server when the
user reconnects to the corporate network. SharePoint also integrates Search capabilities, which
make it easy for users to quickly find relevant information in the context of their activity. This is a
powerful productivity enhancer, considering the fragmented nature of data stores and the everincreasing amount of digital content scattered around the enterprise.
Increasingly, SharePoint is becoming a platform for business processes that helps bridge the
gap between end users and the back-end transactional applications. It extends the reach and
capabilities of applications beyond the expert power users, thereby enabling broader participation
and engagement of people within and across functional areas. Consider Duet Enterprisea joint
product between SAP and Microsoftwhich provides the infrastructure and building blocks to
integrate SAP applications and SharePoint capabilities. This integration enables the delivery of new
composite applications that, in turn, provide simplified access to SAP data and applications to more
users across the enterprise. Figure 20, on page 48, shows a sample SharePoint webpage with data
from SAPs sales module tailored to a sales representatives role. A large ecosystem of partners is
actively working with Microsoft to integrate their deep application and functional capabilities with
the people-centric collaboration capabilities in SharePoint to drive better user engagement, higher
productivity, and better decisions.
Figure 10: Cloud computing, unified communications, big data, social computing,
and connected devices are transforming systems of record to dynamic systems of
engagement across business networks
Timely insights for better decisions
The deep integration between the SharePoint collaboration platform and Microsoft business
intelligence tools, such as Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services, Excel Services, and Power View,
enables all workers to potentially monitor business performance, receive alerts to problems, and
drill down into root-cause analysis. The elastic cloud computing capabilities of the Windows Azure
platform further extend the power of analytics to extremely large datasets. Microsoft has adopted
the popular open-source Apache Hadoop framework for big data analytic processing, making it
available on the Windows Azure cloud platform and the Windows Server platform. Through a
strategic partnership with Hortonworks, the companies are working on bringing enterprise-class
capabilitiesincluding security, manageability, development, and visualization toolsthat facilitate
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quick Hadoop deployments at low cost. This powerful competitive capability, when integrated with
self-service exploration and visualization tools, empowers all workers to make better decisions and
rapidly respond to change. As manufacturers well understand, providing the right information to
the right people at the right time is critical in detecting problems early and avoiding downtime, or
worse. Two powerful characteristics distinguish the approach Microsoft takes:
The platform enables business intelligence capabilities to all workers in the enterprise through
familiar tools (Excel, PowerPivot for Excel, Excel Services, Microsoft Visio Services, and Power
View), thereby empowering every authorized individual to engage with and improve the
business. Regardless of whether it is their desktop or any other device, workers get the enterprise
information they need to make quick decisionsto collaborate, decide, and act in real time.
The business intelligence capability is integrated with SharePoint, which facilitates team
collaboration and sharing (Power View, Reporting Services, Excel Services), assisted by web-based
Forms and workflow, thereby enabling people to collaborate in the context of the environment
tailored to their role. The customizable scorecards and dashboards mean all usersdepending
on their enterprise rolesee only the information they need to make quick decisions while
remaining aligned with organizational goals. Social networking features enable broad community
collaboration on the analysis and reports through comments and microblogs, engaging experts
to speed up resolution, and adding to the enterprise knowledge base.
This focus on ease of use, access for all, self-service reporting and analysis, and collaboration
enables the fluid flow of ideas, knowledge, and learning that is critical to competing effectively, as
discussed in the previous sections of this report.
Figure 11: The end-to-end approach to business intelligence that Microsoft uses
centers on people with self-service capabilities and spans structured, unstructured,
and streaming data types from anywhere
People, information, and process integration
Although enterprise applications provide the basis for transactional processes and structured
processes, the majority of knowledge work is improvised, collaborative, and often disconnected
from the structured processes. Tools such as Unified Communications (voice, messaging, instant
messaging, presence, web conferencing) and Search (information, people, skills) provide the
basis for impromptu and unstructured processes. Activity feeds, tracking sites and documents,
microblogs, and threaded discussionsall enabled through social networking featuresfurther
enhance the knowledge-worker productivity experience.
29
2/11/13 11:38 AM
From an information perspective, sources that aid analysis are no longer limited to those within
the enterprise. The Windows Azure Marketplace provides unparalleled opportunities for discovery
and data enrichment through access to a wide world of data sources from government agencies,
syndicated sources, and private providers. Raw enterprise data can be enriched with smart analytical
tools for insights that otherwise might not be possible. For example, combining store sales data
with publicly available socio-economic census data can enable new segmentation models for
targeted promotions.
When integrated with the SharePoint platform, these tools extend the context of structured data and
processes so people and teamsregardless of their locationcan find each other and collaborate
in context to instantly resolve issues. For example, a maintenance technician can instantly share
asset performance data (or even a video) with an expert located in a different region, capture
the diagnostic process, and save the digital artifacts in a repository after appropriately tagging
the information (see Figure 12). This activity results in the creation of new knowledge that can be
searched and retrieved at will, thereby enabling others to take advantage of the experience. The
result is far more fluid and widespread knowledge flows that aid broader organizational learning
through shared insights, along with additional knowledge repositories that are amenable to search
and on-demand use.
The SharePoint platform also provides Forms for task-related data entry. Forms can be associated
with workflow to enable greater automation and productivity, and the data can be integrated into
LoB systems.
Figure 12: Role-based (maintenance) SharePoint page with integrated Unified

Communications and business intelligence scorecard
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
2.2.3 Social business
With more than 800 million users on Facebook, it is no surprise that every company is interested in
how its business will be influenced by and can benefit from this phenomenon. Flickr, Foursquare,
LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, and Microsoft Windows Live are all in the social networking mix,
where consumers increasingly spend more of their time learning about, discussing, and sharing
experiences about everyday products and services. This is a pioneering channel today, and
companies are in the early phases of exploring and learning how to take advantage of the new
digital marketing and communications tools now available.
Dell, a pioneer in direct selling to customers, is no stranger to social media, having been actively
engaged in it since 2005. The company states that in 2010 its frontline teams monitored 22,000
daily social media conversations that mentioned Dell.17 Recognizing the pull-based economy, Dells
goal is to deeply embed social technologies across the company. According to Adam Brown, Dells
Executive Director, Social Media, Global Marketing, the company is on a journey to realizing Dell
as a social business (emphasis added).
Although social technologies originated in the consumer space, they now impact every facet of
a companys business. Social business enables digital marketing to reach and engage customers,
manage the brand experience, and improve customer engagement through better customer
service, shopping experiences, and commerce. Customers familiar with microblogs such as Twitter
often prefer this channel to interact with customer service when they have questions about
products and services. For example, Southwest Airlines tweets to alert customers about delays and
Best Buy responds to questions and complaints via Twitter. The improved experience relative to the
automated call center can be a differentiator. Social businesses become better businesses through
customer insights and collaboration across the enterprise to develop better products and services.
Social businesses
become better
businesses
through
customer
insights and
collaboration
across the
enterprise to
develop better
products and
services.
Digital customer engagement
So how do marketers reach and attract more customers (on both the consumer level and the
business level), seize new business opportunities to drive growth, and retain customers through
improved experiences?
Reaching potential customers means delivering dynamic and targeted content across multiple
channels that include company websites, social networks, and other advertising sites. SharePoint
Server 2010 for Internet Sites provides a complete infrastructure for authoring web content, so
users can create an online presence with rich media (wikis, blogs, podcasts) and easily publish
content primarily through self-service capabilities. Together with FAST Search Server 2010 for
Internet Sites, companies can create user profiles based on past purchases or webpage views and
empower websites to automatically learn how users think and react to content. The result is content
that can be tailored and personalized to users. Companies can launch coordinated, interactive
marketing and advertising campaigns through the Microsoft Advertising Platform to outlets such
as Facebook and Digg, among others.
Companies can retain customers by delivering rich experiences across web and mobile channels.
They can engage consumers through community websites, blogs, and wikis, in addition to providing
instant access to rich media such as videos, music, maps, social networks, and online promotions.
Through rich and engaging location-based applications, companies can drive customers from the
web to their stores. And they can enrich search engine optimization (SEO) through comprehensive
content tagging. The tools previously mentioned, along with Microsoft online communityenablement assets such as Windows Live, its big data analytics platform, and user experience
capabilities such as Silverlight for rich Internet applications (RIAs), offer companies a complete
marketing platform to deliver these capabilities. Cloud computing is facilitating deployment and
17 Fred Sandsmark. From

Social Media to Social
Commerce. Journal of the
Microsoft Global High Tech
Summit, 2011.
31
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experimentation with these techniques while also providing critical infrastructure to integrate
these consumer-facing processes into their enterprise systems. For instance, the Windows Azure
platform facilitates integration with social networking sites as venues for marketing campaigns
while collecting leads and integrating them with on-premises or cloud-based CRM systems for
sales follow up.
Competitive
advantage will
increasingly
depend on
the ability of
companies to
profit from flows
of knowledge
rather than
stocks of
knowledge
created by the
continuously
changing world.
As previously mentioned, the scope of social technologies does not end with the consumer. Rather,
it feeds insights back into the enterprise to enable better product designs, collaboration on ideas
(crowd-sourcing), smoother product distribution across the channel, improved marketing forecasts
and messaging, and better and more proactive customer service. Big data has its origins in the
analysis of clickstreams from e-commerce sites. Analytics, meanwhile, is becoming an integral part
of digital marketing and social engagement, aided by developments such as the Hadoop platform
for high-scale parallel processing of large volumes of unstructured data. With increasing usage of
mobile devices, location-based services, mobile payments, and other web-centric activities, there
is enormous potential for enterprises in harvesting the insights embedded in the vast volumes
of associated data to improve products and services, serve customer needs better, and improve
interactive customer conversations.
Enterprise collaboration and knowledge sharing
As the big shift forecasts, competitive advantage will increasingly depend on the ability of companies
to profit from flows of knowledge rather than stocks of knowledge created by the continuously
changing world. Enterprises also are realizing that collaboration, knowledge sharing, and broad
access to structured data and processes (LoB applications) are critical investments that enable
the organization to keep up with the pace of change the environment demands. Learning from
experiences in the consumer space, social networking and collaboration technologies provide the
foundation for maximizing productivity, fostering innovation, and securing the full engagement
and passion of employees.
Collaboration challenges todays manufacturers due to the isolated nature of functional LoB
applications, where much of their structured data resides. The ad hoc unstructured work the
majority of the workforce engages in occurs away from the context of structured business processes.
Furthermore, the quality of direct people-to-people interaction is weakened due to the lack of
sufficient insights and data availability.
A classic situation is one in which the business functions and roles in the upper half of the
manufacturing organization have some level of access to PLM data while a substantial part of
the organization, workers who would benefit from access to that data, does not. Functions such
as design, engineering, product portfolio management, and testing/simulation are likely to have
access to sophisticated CAD/CAM/CAE/PDM tools. But downstream functions such as sourcing
and procurement, SCM, manufacturing process engineering, maintenance and support, sales, and
marketing are unlikely to be able to access the information they need to perform effectively. The
result is long cycle times and rework loops, because work progresses linearly and problems are
detected much later and require lengthy change management cycles. More importantly, critical
knowledge flows fail to occur, because people in upstream design are unable to tap into the
broad knowledge assets or to connect with downstream experts in manufacturing, supply chain, or
customer serviceand vice versa.
A corporate social network builds business communities that cut across departments and
geographies. Within these communities, people with common interests can find and learn about
each other more quickly. People also can see where others are located, whether they are available,
and how best to reach them. Through shared sites and knowledge repositories, people can
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find relevant information quickly and share ideas more readily, and organizations can capture
knowledge through community interactions. These abilities also empower people through greater
engagement, because they know how to find others, learn from them, and share ideas with them.
Organizations benefit, because they channel their energies more effectively into problem solving
and raise the aggregate level of performance.
The Microsoft SharePoint platform provides several social computing and collaboration capabilities
that address these issues, including:
Communities: With their newer emerging social technologies, such as wikis, tags, and personal
profiles, communities are amenable to search for quick access.
Aggregated interaction: Although people have the freedom to work together in a multitude
of ways, SharePoints aggregation of these interactions means they are centrally managed. As
a result, information from these communities increases the knowledge, resources, and overall
intellectual property of the organization.
The scale and nature of B2B communities may vary from small to large. In addition, people can
participate in multiple disparate communities, reflecting their interests and expertise. NewsGator, a
Microsoft partner that delivers enterprise social capabilities atop SharePoint, offers Social Sites that
let manufacturers not only create social profiles and collaborate within communities but also access
and contribute to the knowledge base from anywhere in the world via mobile devices. This spurs
ideas and innovation to facilitate timely decision-making, filters and routes relevant information in
activity streams to each individual, recognizes top contributors to business processes and product
improvement, and utilizes microblogging and video streaming to propagate learning and best
practices throughout the organization.
The emergence
of cloud
computing,
along with
platform as a
service (PaaS)
and software
as a service
(SaaS), will
transform the
manufacturing
landscape over
the next decade.
At Microsoft, the internal Microsoft IT Academy team implemented a social-media-based video

podcasting portal. It uses SharePoint and successfully applies user-generated content, along
with the principles of consumer social media, to improve knowledge sharing and learning within
the company. Use of the Academy portal throughout Microsoft has contributed to a decrease
in the number of instructor-led onsite training sessions. In fact, many Academy events have
virtually replaced on-location training. The Academy portal also enables Microsoft executives and
product groups to broadcast top-down messages while simultaneously encouraging peer-topeer knowledge sharing across all disciplines. As a result, Microsoft has substantially decreased
or eliminated costs throughout the company. The timeliness and relevance of the knowledge and
insights gained in this way help Microsoft maintain our overall business and technical agility in
a rapidly evolving and highly competitive market. A flatter, nonhierarchical way of distributing
content throughout the company enabled these improvements.
2.2.4 Dynamic business networks
Value chains will continue to grow in complexity and scale as manufacturers expand into emerging
market countries to tap local talent and new growth opportunities. How can companies ensure
smoothly functioning operations in far-flung locations? How can they reconfigure rapidly to form
new partnerships and ventures to take advantage of market shifts? How can they protect their
intellectual property while diversifying their R&D base? How can they collaborate more effectively
with suppliers in regions that do not have an adequate enterprise infrastructure? How can they
engage and interact with customers through the Internet and social media channels?
The emergence of cloud computing, along with platform as a service (PaaS) and software as a
service (SaaS), will transform the manufacturing landscape over the next decade, thereby enabling
flexibility and collaboration across the different tiers of the manufacturing value chain.
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
Multi-enterprise business networks
Enterprise applications in use today were fundamentally designed to serve business processes within
a single enterprise. Some ERP and SCM systems can extend their scope to include Tier 1 suppliers,
but only for critical processes and with rigid, complex integration. Over the past several years, the
trend has been to simplify and consolidate the supplier base, with a focus on lean operations.
Consequently, most enterprises today are not set up to adequately deal with the growing size and
complexity of their supply chains as the locus of growth shifts to emerging market countries that
have relatively poor infrastructure.
As security
concerns and
intellectual
property
protection issues
are addressed,
functions such
as product
design, asset
life-cycle
management,
maintenance,
and services
all become
candidates for
cloud-based
extension and
collaboration
across borders.
Traditional enterprise systems will not be able to cope with the increased requirements on
coordination and information flow to the far reaches of the supply chain and the distribution chain.
But with the emergence of cloud-based productivity applications such as Microsoft Office 365
(Office Online, SharePoint Online, Lync Online) and cloud-based platforms such as Windows Azure
and Microsoft SQL Azure, the door is opening to a new generation of applications, processes,
and business models that promise to connect people and enterprises in ways that were not feasible
before. With Microsoft Office 365, any companyno matter its size or locationcan set up a
collaboration workspace in minutes, thereby enabling cost-effective communications (Lync Online)
and collaboration (SharePoint Online) with any partner, customer, or supplier. The Windows Azure
PaaS platform enables rapid application provisioning and deployment on-demand to integrate
data flows, acquire analytics capabilities, and integrate their on-premises applications to build the
flexible inter-organizational processes needed by the dynamic business environment.
Much of the communications between todays enterprise value chain participants is manual
or based on fax and email. Compare the flow of information and visibility within an enterprise
to that of inter-enterprise networks and the contrast is stark. How many times have you heard
about a suppliers quality problems only after a major manufacturer is hit with a huge recall?
With the ability to connect to even the smallest suppliers and to share basic information related
to production, quality, schedules, changes, and so on, not only will the risk decline but the overall
speed and efficiency of the entire network will improve. Many B2B companies already operate with
subscription-based business models. In areas such as logistics, transportation, and supply chain,
these companies are demonstrating early use of cloud-based applications.
This build out will take time, as any paradigm shift does. Forward-looking enterprising companies
such as GCommerce Inc.18 are demonstrating how cloud-based models are transforming
entire industriesin this case, the automotive aftermarket industry (see Figure 30, on page 65). By
consolidating available inventory across auto-parts suppliers and offering new levels of parts
visibility to distributors, GCommerce is transforming the costly and inefficient special-order process
that accounts for 8 percent of lost revenue within this $300 billion industry.
As security concerns and intellectual property protection issues are addressed, functions such as
product design, asset life-cycle management, maintenance, and services all become candidates for
cloud-based extension and collaboration across borders.
Connected value networkcustomer to enterprise
18 GCommerce.
http://tinyurl.com/3g4ncfl
34
An important but often overlooked capability of the Internet and cloud services is the increasing level
of touch and engagement that manufacturers can establish with their end customers or consumers.
Data collected from various channels, such as digital marketing, self-service websites, search patterns,
and, above all, smart connected devices that can gather sensor information and relay data back to
the manufacturer (assuming privacy issues are addressed), gives manufacturers an unprecedented
opportunity to analyze information from these sources, make inferences about their products, and
offer tailored and value-added services to their customers. In a hyper-connected information-rich
2/11/13 11:39 AM
world, a broad range of manufacturers can leverage data mining and analytics, together with the
clouds economies of scale, to tune offerings, prices, and products to better suit the personalized
needs of customers. Social and big data technologies are fundamental foundations that will transform
the relationships between manufacturers and their end customers.
Few companies have the breadth and reach of assets on both the consumer side and the enterprise
side of the value chain to connect such information flows. Through consumer assets (such as Bing,
Windows Phone 7, Microsoft Windows Embedded, Windows Live, and Microsoft Advertising) and
through enterprise assets (such as Windows Azure, SQL Azure, Windows Server, Microsoft SQL
Server, Internet Information Services (IIS) for web hosting, and SharePoint Sites) Microsoft and
our partner network can connect customer intelligence with enterprise processes in marketing,
distribution, and design. In an era where power resides with the consumer, the importance of
linking customers and the enterprise cannot be understated.
2.2.5 Smart connected devices
Exponential improvements in the price and performance of computing resources are enabling
powerful, energy-efficient multi-core processors to become pervasive in all types of discrete
products, such as cars, medical devices, smart meters, industrial equipment, and jet engines. The
combination of improvements in connectivity and bandwidth availability and the development of
cloud computing has resulted in revolutionary consumer and business opportunities that promise
to solve complex problems. Among the scenarios are smart grid energy management, telematics
for vehicles, condition-based predictive equipment maintenance, new service-based business
models, and other, as yet unforeseen, innovations.
In an era
where power
resides with
the consumer,
the importance
of linking
customers and
the enterprise
cannot be
understated.
These developments are ushering in an era of smart services and new business models. For
example, sensors in a car can provide real-time information about tire air pressure, engine operating
performance, fluid levels, eco-performance, and so on. The challenge, to date, has been the limited
ability to collect, process, aggregate, and analyze this information. But with the ability to gather
sensor data locally and then to store and analyze it in real time, it is possible to provide predictive
services such as detecting an impending bearing failure through vibration analysis and proposing
a corrective action before that failure actually occurs. As connectivity improves, the possibilities
are exponentially broader. A dealer, for example, when properly authorized to periodically access
streaming data from a vehicle, can offer drivers advice on the severity of a problem and propose a
corresponding action plan. Scenarios like this only scratch the surface.
The success of Ford SYNC, for example, shows that the car is becoming almost an accessory
to a telematics-enabled device. As consumers connect smartphones and bring their digital
entertainment with them into the car, in-vehicle devices become platforms to deliver increasingly
valuable servicestraffic and mapping information, voice-enabled email, location-based services
such as finding a restaurant, voice-enabled search, and safety services such as emergency call and
location of the nearest medical center.
As more devices in various operational contexts become smart and connected, manufacturers
will be able to deliver an entirely new set of services that are specific to both the application of a
product and the use of that productfor example, remote diagnostics and maintenance services
in industrial equipment and construction equipment. Big data technologies including cloud
computing, data mining, and analytics will speed up these developments, as the economics
become more viable and companies find innovative applications that take advantage of these
new capabilities.
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
Shift to Intelligent Systems
The combination of network connectivitycoupled with anytime, anywhere access to executable

data and big data analyticsis transforming embedded systems into something much more
tangible and beneficial to enterprises: Intelligent Systems. An Intelligent System enables data to
flow across an enterprise infrastructure, spanning the devices where valuable data is gathered from
equipment and workers, to the back-end systems and processes where that data can be translated
into insights and actions. With the broad set of platform capabilities spanning embedded devices,
networking and communications, real-time streaming data analysis, cloud, big data, self-service
analysis tools, and enterprise manageability, Microsoft and our solution partners are poised to
accelerate the shift to Intelligent Systems to deliver exciting capabilities to manufacturing enterprises
across any and all operations along the value chain.
Figure 13: Ubiquitous network connectivity of devices, intelligent embedded systems,

cloud computing, and big data are converging to drive a step change in global
manufacturing operations
Throughout the steps in an Intelligent System, data has an increased impact. Intelligent devices
capture data and enable informed decision-making at the point of impact. Information flows to
the enterprises back-end systems where it is processed, integrated with business workflows, and
analyzed. Data is translated into new insights that can be used to create value and improve processes
such as customer service, equipment maintenance, predictive analysis for failure, risk management,
and many others. Overall, the enterprise benefits from the creation of intelligence that can be used
to drive business impact. Chapter 3 outlines the technical attributes of an Intelligent System.
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
Figure 14: An Intelligent System enables data to flow across an enterprise infrastructure,
spanning devices where valuable data is gathered, to the back-end systems and
applications where that data can be translated into insights and actions
Smart device platform and management
Microsoft offers an array of embedded platform capabilities through its Windows Embedded family of
products to maximize smart connected device functionality. Windows Embedded Compact provides
the necessary performance, features, and development tools for rugged real-time requirements. A
variety of common industrial controllers are based on Windows Embedded Compact. For industrial
PCs, machine tools, and other equipment in this area, the Windows Embedded platform offers
a customizable operating system based on the familiar Windows development environment. In
addition, the broad ecosystem of Microsoft partners offers applications and support for standards
such as OPC-UA and Web Services on Devices.
Built-in networking capabilities enable Windows Embedded devices to easily connect with other
industrial devices, servers, and services. A key Windows Embedded feature that is central to IT
operations is remote management of devices through system management tools. This capability
is important in highly automated plants that have many distributed systems where manageability,
security, and updates are critical considerations.
Connectivity and online services
When connected to the Windows Azure platform (the Microsoft cloud computing PaaS offering),
smart devices enable many of the innovative functions previously described. For example, Windows
Embedded Automotive 7 is a version of Windows Embedded adapted for in-vehicle use. When
used with the Microsoft .NET framework, common development tools can deliver both onboard
applications and cloud-based applications to the vehicle. These applications interact with data,
location, and other information such as calendar schedules and planned activities.
The move toward such connected services is already well underway in the automotive industry.
Toyota, for instance, in early 2011 announced its Entune service, which offers Bing maps and voiceenabled search. And in April 2011, Microsoft and Toyota announced19 a strategic partnership to
build a global platform for Toyotas next-generation telematics services using the Windows Azure
platform. Daimler is expanding its car2go service, which is based on an innovative business model
that enables urban dwellers to use any car in the fleet on a charge-by-the-minute model, so people
no longer need to own a car. OEMs are experimenting with various innovative business models that
take advantage of vehicle connectivity and health status, integration with dealer services, life-cycle
management, and loyalty enhancement through the direct connection with the vehicle, driver, and
owner. The Windows Embedded and cloud platforms open up application development for third
parties, such as insurance companies offering pay-as-you-drive (PAYD) pricing based on location
and driver performance.
19 Microsoft. Microsoft and
Toyota Announce Strategic
Partnership on
Next-Generation Telematics.
Press release, April 6, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3coq7ce
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
In the industrial equipment space, connecting equipment to the cloud enables granular monitoring
and predictive maintenance to avoid costly downtime, in addition to offering opportunities for
higher levels of customer service through the additional visibility and to reducing the carrying
costs associated with spare parts inventory and logistics. For instance, M.G. Bryan is using cloud
computing for remote asset management20 of high-tech fracturing equipment. Designed and
integrated with Rockwell Automation, M.G. Bryans new equipment control and information system
leverages the Windows Azure cloud-computing platform to help provide secure remote access
to real-time information, automated maintenance alerts, and service and parts delivery requests.
Real-time analytics
Analytics and
data-mining
technologies
hold the key to
comprehending
these vast
volumes of
data, ultimately
enabling
manufacturers
to offer new
services and new
business models.
Product manufacturers may gain the most value from analytics, which enables them to take
advantage of the vast streams of sensor-based data that smart connected devices provide. Analytics
aggregate that data in a private cloud infrastructure or a public cloud infrastructure. This data then
can be targeted for localized use, or it may be used for complete visibility into all of the devices in
a manufacturing operationpotentially across the world. Analytics and data-mining technologies
hold the key to comprehending these vast volumes of data, ultimately enabling manufacturers to
offer new services and new business models.
Microsoft offers powerful analytics capabilities through the SQL Server and SQL Azure data
platforms. Microsoft StreamInsight, a complex event processing engine, can process data
streams at the embedded systems level or within the cloud. The Windows Embedded platforms,
along with analytics, are catalyzing this era of pervasive, smart connected devices.
2.2.6 Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure
Manufacturers face many complexities when it comes to infrastructure. Factories and plant
environments, in addition to critical functions such as R&D and product design, have grown outside
the scope of central IT operations. In this chapter, we focus on the enterprise data centers the IT
function manages. In Chapter 3, we go into detail on the various challenges related to control
systems in the factory and then provide prescriptive guidance to address those unique challenges.
Realizing the full potential of the capabilities previously described depends on the quality and
maturity of the underlying technology foundation. Although cloud computing garners a lot of
media attention, we are under no illusion that the traditional enterprise data center will diminish
in purpose anytime soon. In fact, the traditional principles of IT managementlowering costs and
delivering more value to the businesswill continue to apply in the growing hybrid environment.
Microsoft and our partner network help manufacturing enterprises plan short-range and longrange scalable investments in their IT environments and move to a better level of organizational
maturity that is ultimately more cost-efficient, flexible, and agile.
To support this goal, Microsoft has developed a model we call Core Infrastructure Optimization
(Core IO). This is a maturity model with four levels of increasing optimization: basic, standardized,
rationalized, and dynamic. The Core IO model not only helps enterprises understand where their
organization stands today but guides them toward increasing levels of optimization through a
graduated set of short-term and long-term best practices.
Basic
20 Microsoft. M.G. Bryan
Pioneers First-of-Its-Kind
Cloud Computing Asset
Performance Management
System. Press release, June
12, 2012.
http://tinyurl.com/cpvfgd9
38
A basic level of optimization is characterized by manual, localized processes with minimal

central control:
IT governance is negligible, because policies for security and compliance are nonexistent or
inconsistently enforced.
The overall health of applications and services is unknown, due to a lack of tools and resources.
2/11/13 11:39 AM
There is no vehicle for sharing accumulated knowledge across IT.

The environment is difficult for IT to control and has high costs for both desktop management
and server management. IT is often reactive to security threats.
Software deployments, security updates, and services are provided in a high-touch, high-cost
manner.
Standardized
At a standardized level of optimization, controls are introduced through standards and policies to
manage desktops, mobile devices, and servers:
A unified directory service is used to manage resources, security policies, and network access.
Organizations recognize the value of basic standards and policies, but these are not yet
implemented across the infrastructure.
Generally, all software deployments, software updates, and desktop services are provided in a
medium-touch manner.
Inventories of hardware and software assets are maintained through a reasonable process, and
license use is managed to an extent.
Security is improved with a locked-down perimeter, though internal security may still require
improvements.
Rationalized
At a rationalized level of optimization, the costs associated with managing desktops and servers are
at their lowest, and processes and policies have been optimized:
Security is proactive, and response to threats is rapid and controlled.
The use of zero-touch deployment helps minimize cost, reduce the time to deployment, and
decrease technical challenges.
The process for managing desktops is very low touch, and the number of images is minimal.
There is an accurate inventory of hardware and software, and companies purchase only the
necessary licenses and computers.
Security measures involve strict policies and control, from desktops to servers to the firewall to
the extranet.
When an
organization
achieves a
dynamic level
of optimization,
the IT
infrastructure
becomes a
strategic enabler
to help the
business stay
ahead of the
competition.
Dynamic
When an organization achieves a dynamic level of optimization, the IT infrastructure becomes a

strategic enabler to help the business stay ahead of the competition:
Costs are fully controlled. Users, information, desktops, and servers are integrated.
Mobile users have nearly on-site levels of service and capabilities.
Processes are fully automated and often incorporated into the technology itself, so IT is aligned
and managed based on business needs.
Additional investments in technology yield specific, rapid, and measurable business benefits.
Companies use self-provisioning software and quarantine-like systems to automate software
update management and compliance with established security policies.
An infrastructure subjected to this model can be considered to be composed of the following five
capabilities, which IT needs to manage:
Identity and access management: involves the administration of people and asset identities;
access to resources from mobile employees, customers, and partners outside the firewall; and
solutions that should be implemented to manage and protect identity data such as synchronization,
password management, and user provisioning.
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
Desktop, device, and server management: covers the management of desktops, mobile
devices, and serversincluding planning and deployment for patches, operating systems, and
applications across the network. It also provides guidance on how to leverage virtualization and
branch-office technologies to improve IT infrastructure.
Security and networking: involves protection for information and communications, including
safeguards against unauthorized access. At the same time, security and networking focuses on
solutions to protect the IT infrastructure from denial attacks and viruses while preserving access to
corporate resources.
The businessready security
approach
Microsoft takes
recognizes that
companies
should be able
to achieve their
business goals
while managing
risk and, at
the same time,
providing the
right people
with the
access to the
information they
need to get their
job done.
Data protection and recovery: covers the processes and tools that IT can use to back up,
store, and restore information and applications. As information stores proliferate, organizations are
under increasing pressure to protect that information and provide cost-effective and time-efficient
recovery when required.
IT and security process: provides guidance on how to cost-effectively design, develop, operate,
and support solutions, based on industry best practices, while achieving high reliability, availability,
and security. Though robust technology is necessary to meet an organizations demands for reliable,
available, and highly secure IT services, technology alone is not sufficient. Excellent processes and
trained staff with clear roles and responsibilities also are required.
Microsoft offers three core infrastructure solutions, each of which is made up of products, tools,
and technologies that are designed to optimize the desktop and the data center and to enable
business-ready security.
An optimized desktop describes a state in which an organization has attained the right balance in
its desktop infrastructureempowering employees with the flexibility they need to be productive
while providing IT with the necessary level of control, manageability, and security.
An optimized data center has a more efficient and agile core infrastructure. It requires comprehensive
manageability across physical systems and virtual systems, from desktop to data center; multiple
platforms; and identity and security solutions. It provides protection everywhere, through, for
example, Microsoft Forefront security solutions. An optimized data center also enables access
anywhere, so users can access data and services in the office, at a customer site, at home, or on
the go.
The business-ready security approach Microsoft takes recognizes that companies should be able to
achieve their business goals while managing risk and, at the same time, providing the right people
with the access to the information they need to get their job done.
Core infrastructure technologies from Microsoft include Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2,
Hyper-V, Forefront Identity and Access, and System Center 2012.
As previously mentioned, Chapter 3 goes into more detail on these various technologies and
specifically addresses the need for discrete manufacturers to secure and manage factory and
control environments.
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
2.3 Journey to high-performance solutions
As enterprises seek to improve their adaptability to external change, they are looking to strategic
vendors such as Microsoft and our partner network to help them navigate the journey. Microsoft
has invested heavily in many of the technologies and products that support the pillars described
in this chapter. Working with our partners, Microsoft meets these needs and delivers the highest
performing solutions that customers can start leveraging today.
Figure 15: The Microsoft solution stack underpins the DIRA framework across the
consumer and enterprise domains, with choices of on-premises, private cloud, and
public cloud deployments
Figure 15 depicts the mapping between the DIRA pillars and the range of platform components
spanning the breadth of consumer, on-premises, and cloud capabilities that enable the solutions
we have discussed. Several world-class solutions from our partners, covering the value chain
from design through operations, sales, and service, are described in the Appendix. We detail how
innovation, product design collaboration, and enterprise manufacturing intelligence, among other
advantages, are being achieved through the incorporation of these capabilities.
As some of the customer case studies reveal, companies are realizing tangible business,
productivity, and competitive benefits through these solutions and many of the principles and
concepts discussed in this chapter.
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Chapter 3: Solution building blocks and

technology frameworks
3.1 A common collaborative engineering scenario
The goal of any technology deployment is to serve and improve the business. In this section,
we look at some examples of how new information-sharing technologies can do just that.
Consider a hypothetical engineering change management scenarioone that occurs daily in
practically every manufacturing environment. By contrasting the status quo business processes
typical in most firms today with what is possible given new technologies, the business impact
becomes a little clearer.
To address the challenges of passenger safety, the dealer
channel group in Contoso Ltd. studies the warranty data of
each vehicle line it has produced. Its early warning system flags
recurring warranty issues for further study. In this scenario, seat
failures are identified as a recurring problem and are verified by
both physical testing and digital prototype analysis. The design
teams at Contoso and its seat supplier use engineering-focused
collaborative product development tools to quickly identify,
analyze, simulate, and diagnose this equipment failure. With
these tools, Contoso is able to make faster decisions that are of
higher quality, thereby reducing project costs and eliminating
future warranty issues.
Follow the steps the company takes in Figure 16.
Step 1: problem detection
Previous process challenges: Defect detection cycles are long,
because most vehicles can be checked only when they come in
for service. Despite these checks, scanned vehicle data is not easily
integrated into data-mining systems to catch recurring problems.
Remediation: Onboard analytics and telematics systems with

remote diagnostics facilitate early problem detection and automatic
dealer or OEM alerts.
Figure 16: Example engineering change

management scenario
Steps 2 and 3: recurring problem identified and warranty alert

notification created
Previous process challenges: Warranty-related data for vehicle
lines is scattered across distributed dealer and corporate systems.
Analysis is done manually, with data consolidated on spreadsheets.
Alerts are communicated through email. Locating experts in
manufacturing and engineering, and then determining fault and
resolution, takes several iterative emails and phone calls.
Remediation: Data warehousing (possibly in a cloud) enables cleansing and aggregation of

data. Graphical dashboards display warnings, and simple self-service analysis tools provide rapid
exploration of the seat problems root cause. Easy-to-use forms mean data-entry personnel can
issue alerts that are sent via workflow to a portal or collaboration site for manufacturing and
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Chapter 3: Solution Building Blocks and Technology Frameworks
2/11/13 11:39 AM
engineering personnel to determine the fault and the resolution. The dealer group searches and
finds experts in interior problems. It holds an instant, three-way, online collaboration session
reviewing data via web conferencingthat ends with engineering owning the problem-resolution
responsibility. Engineering then attempts to identify the problem through various high-speed
simulation runs with elastic compute capacity obtained through the cloud. Failing to re-create
the problem, engineering requests a crash test using the environmental variables described in the
warranty alert notification.
Step 4: vehicle physical crash test
A test engineer conducts a vehicle crash test matching the reported circumstances. During the
test, the passenger seat leaps forward and collides with the dashboard. This failure matches those
observed in real-life crashes. A video of the test is captured, and the test engineer uses audio to
record observations.
Previous process challenges: Video and audio files, along with strain gauge and accelerometer
readings, are stored in different applications. Test engineers need to export readings from these
applications into Excel spreadsheets for emailing as part of the failure notification to the engineers
design division at corporate HQ. The video needs to be uploaded to a file server for access.
Without the appropriate tools, finding this information for later reuse or training will be difficult, if
not impossible.
Remediation: The test engineers role-based SharePoint page shows strain gauge and accelerometer
readings integrated with Excel Services, which creates a single shared repository. Video files can be
stored on a file share, with a SharePoint list holding the metadata, including a link to the original file.
Test engineers fill out a failure notification form from the site, which is routed through workflow to
engineers in the design division. Any authorized user can retrieve tagged video and audio files using
SharePoint or FAST Search across the file metadata, which enables a useful knowledge repository.
Steps 5 and 6: problem analysis and new design collaboration
The companys engineering supervisor reviews the test failure notification, initiates an engineering
change notification, and assigns it to the responsible engineer. The design team does not include a
seat expert, so the engineer needs to collaborate with the companys seat supplier, which is located
elsewhere. Together they determine the cause of failure: the seat latch spring is too weak. The
supplier then performs digital analysis of alternative latch designs. Based on information exchanged
in design reviews, such as manufacturing process changes, part supply, and item cost, the team
selects one latch for further study.
Previous process challenges: The engineering supervisor needs to access data from multiple
systemsthe failure notification data, the CAD and PDM data, and test simulation resultsto
initiate the engineering change notification. For the engineer, sharing information with the remote
seat supplier is cumbersome and time consuming without instant web conferencing and a 3D data
viewing capability. The engineer also has to ask specialists in the ERP/procurement and supply chain
systems for cost and part availability data, which is typically communicated via Excel spreadsheets.
Remediation: A tailored portal for the engineering supervisor can provide a single workspace
from which all of the data (failure notification, CAD 3D design, PDM, and PLM) can be accessed
with rich 3D detail using Silverlight graphics capabilities. Unified Communications provides instant
messaging and presence information that can be used to contact engineers on staff, who then
can review the data online and assign an engineer to the project. Project plans also can be easily
created for planning and resource allocation with Microsoft Project Server, which is integrated
in SharePoint.
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The engineer uses the same collaboration tools to instantly communicate with the remote supplier,
sharing rich 3D data using Lync web conferencing and accessing a secure, shared data repository
in SharePoint. Because the engineer has a role-based portal and a SharePoint Server that uses
Business Connectivity Services to integrate with ERP and SCM, cost and item availability are instantly
accessed on the webpage without logging into other systems.
Step 7: Contoso engineer initiates approval of new design
The engineer seeks management approval of the corrected seat design.
Simplicity in
accessing and
analyzing vast
amounts of data
not only raises
productivity but
helps people
spot problems
and issues
more easily and
reliably with
warranty data
analysis.
Previous process challenges: Although the engineer has access to PLM tools, managerssome of
whom may be offsitemay not have access to the same tools. Consequently, approval is cumbersome
and involves lengthy cycles, because information has to be assembled and communicated.
Remediation: Engineering data management and collaborative product development tools that are
integrated with SharePoint provide access to common data repositories, so everyone is working
off the same information. Managers who are offsite can use SharePoint Workspace to access
information even if they are not online, because the Workspace caches data on their local device.
Any approval forms or changes will be synchronized once they go online.
Step 8: retest new design
The corrected seat design undergoes numerous cloud-based HPC crash-test simulations, another
physical crash test, and then passes the safety criteria. The test engineer approves the new design.
All of the design documents are checked into the release vault, ready for manufacturing.
Previous process challenges: Tacit knowledge involved in collaborative unstructured processes

cannot be captured and institutionalized. Other people in the organization with similar roles are
unaware of the participants in this project and cannot tap into the experiences gained in this case.
Remediation: Social computing enables engineers and others to connect with peers and reach out
to their network (in a form of crowd-sourcing) to gain insights and tap into expertise and skills at
any time. Captured digital contentsuch as video, audio, and other collateralcan be tagged,
rated, and ranked by others, so the best content can be found in searches. Blogs enable experts to
comment on their experiences and provide helpful ideas and information. Others can subscribe to
these entries and follow activity feeds. These methods lead to better decisions, faster learning, and
quicker time to solution.
Although the scenario previously described centers on an automotive engineering change process
(and a simplified flow for descriptive purposes), it is replayed daily in any discrete manufacturing
environment (industrial equipment, high-tech electronics, aerospace components, and others) and
across a variety of functions (marketing campaigns, procurement, distribution, and so on). Figure
17, outlines the process flow and highlights some of the key business benefits realized through
various technology enablers.
Here is how the pillars facilitate the new, faster interactions with all of the players in this scenario.

Natural user experiencessimple and powerful user interfaces for new design collaboration:
Simplicity in accessing and analyzing vast amounts of data not only raises productivity but helps
people spot problems and issues more easily and reliably with warranty data analysis.
High-performance graphics capabilities on devices and browsers enable rich 3D visuals with
deep-zoom and multi-touch capabilities. More people across the enterprise can easily share,
interpret, and interact with business-critical data on any device, anywhere.
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Figure 17: Process flow diagram showing impromptu and unstructured flows integrated
with structured data and processes
Role-based productivity and insightsfamiliar tools, context-rich portals, and business
intelligence for new design collaboration, warranty data analysis, review, and approval:
Access to business data in a simplified and consolidated portal, across multiple applications and
LoB systems, dramatically improves productivity. Iteration cycles to acquire needed information
are eliminated. All people have personalized access to the data they need, in the context of
their activities. The complexities of applications are masked from them, so they can do what
they do best with the tools they know.
Familiar tools for analysis (such as Excel), together with portals that display dashboards and
scorecards, make it simple to extend to everyone in the organization business intelligence that
is aligned to organizational performance goals. Self-service tools for reporting and the ability
to collaborate on analytic data through Excel Services makes it easy to collaborate with experts
and maintain a consistent unified view at all times.
Dynamic value networksinter-enterprise collaboration for solution review:
Any significant business process transparently crosses enterprise boundaries as suppliers and
partners become increasingly integrated into information flows. Security, intellectual property
protection, and systems integration costs are typical barriers to these flows. Improvements
on all of these fronts, together with cloud services such as Microsoft Office 365 and SaaS
applications, enable quicker provisioning, lower costs, and greater agility across value networks.
Social businesssocial computing and collaboration for warranty data analysis and new design approval:
Experts in one or more subject areas, such as root-cause analysis or problem identification, are
quickly identified within the ecosystem and then engaged in effective impromptu collaboration.
These experts are able to share the full context of the problem. Other stakeholders can track
documents, sites, and peer discussions to stay informed, learn from, or contribute to the
process. With powerful search tools, enterprise-wide knowledge repositories can be searched
to identify the most relevant information and expertise so solutions can be arrived at quickly.
Smart connected devicesfor problem detection/telematics:
With power firmly in the hands of customers (end users or other businesses), real-time feedback
via various customer-touch channels improves design and reduces risk in the form of recalls or
expensive repairs. Whether through smart products or digital marketing and advertising, the
bridge between customers and enterprise processes becomes increasingly strategic in sensing
and responding to the market.
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Security, intellectual property protection, and dynamic infrastructure:

None of the capabilities previously described would be possible without a robust, secure
foundation at all levelsphysical, hardware, and software. With the increasing use of mobile
devices, manageability and security are critical requirements. Data protection through rights
management ensures intellectual property protection. Dynamic computing capacity and
provisioning, for burst computing needs such as crash simulation or model analysis, can be
supported through private clouds or public clouds.
3.2 Putting it all together
Given that organizations need to become more agile and responsive to the market, IT groups are
feeling the pressure to deliver greater business value in shorter cycle times and with fewer iterations
versus long, complex projects with diminishing competitive differentiation. As previously described,
the six DIRA pillars enable organizations to extract more value from their legacy systems, achieve
greater levels of collaboration and knowledge flows across their business processes, and guide
their network of partners to deliver high-value business solutions. This section offers guidance
on the various solution building blocks associated with these pillars and their themes and then
describes technical overviews of how they fit within enterprise architectures to support new and
transformational business processes.
3.2.1 Simple, functional, and easy-to-use business

applications
Users of business applications expect rich, functional, well-performing interfaces that are easy to use
and, increasingly, fun to use. With the rich capabilities of Silverlights user interface or HTML5 and
the associated tools provided by Microsoft Visual Studio and Microsoft Expression, developers
can rapidly build compelling user experiences and then deliver and deploy them on the web (see
Figure 18).
Figure 18: Business application user interfaces with Silverlight (courtesy of PTC Corp.)
A few of the key features that make Silverlight a compelling technology for business applications
include:
Windows Communication Foundation Rich Internet Application (WCF RIA) Services. Together
with Visual Studio 2010, WCF RIA provides a unified model for client-side and server-side
development. This model makes a traditionally difficult job for developers much easier (see
Figure 19.
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Rich set of controls. Silverlight provides a rich library of over 60 controls, complemented by
open-source and vendor-control packs. The rich functionality of Silverlight Toolkit, in addition to
its data-bound controls and charting controls, makes it much easier to display data attractively.
This capability is particularly useful for dashboard controls and viewing large sets of business
intelligence data.
Out-of-browser experiences. Silverlights out-of-browser feature enables users to continue
working while they are disconnected from the network. Applications can synchronize users
changes back to the server the next time they connect. Out-of-browser applications also
can run as trusted applications with more privileges, so local resources can be accessed.
For example, applications can interact with Microsoft Office applications such as Excel and
Microsoft Outlook and access the local file system and other facilities, which is not possible
with web applications.
Security. WCF RIA Services supports both Windows integration authentication and Forms
authentication. With Windows authentication, users can authenticate with their regular
Microsoft Active Directory domain accounts, thus providing a single sign-on experience.
With Forms authentication, users authenticate with custom user names and passwords that they
maintain in a separate user storemost often a SQL Server database.
Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF). Business applications need to evolve as businesses
change and requirements for new functionality emerge. MEF provides a way to assemble
applications from extensions and then to dynamically add extensions to those applications over
time. This capability enables third parties to extend applications once they are deployed.
Figure 19: Rich Internet application architecture with Silverlight
3.2.2 Simplified, familiar, role-based productivity

and insights
SharePoint Server, together with associated capabilities including content management, social,
search, Unified Communications, business intelligence, LoB access, and integration with Microsoft
Office tools, represents the foundation Microsoft has built for collaboration and self-service business
intelligence. The platform enables rapid configuration and tailored experiences for the roles of all
users in the extended enterprise. These capabilities reduce complexity, improve collaboration and
knowledge flows, and enable quicker insights and better decisions throughout the business. It does
not matter whether those decisions are made on an individual, team, or organization-wide scale.
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This pillar defines three main capabilities:

Broad access to enterprise information. SharePoint provides access to authorized
enterprise information across multiple business applications and data sources via user-friendly
role-based portals and familiar Microsoft Office tools.
Timely insights for better decisions. Consolidated enterprise data stored on a secure,
scalable data warehouse gives all authorized users self-service analysis and reporting capabilities
through simple, familiar tools.
People, process, and information integration. SharePoint enables the integration of people
with contextually relevant structured and unstructured information, workflows, and composite
services, so new processes can bridge the gaps between people, teams, and disconnected systems
to deliver greater cohesion and fluidity across the spectrum of enterprise business processes.
Figure 20: Duet Enterprise architecture and sample sales rep screenshot
For instance, Duet Enterprise is a joint product between SAP and Microsoft. The product provides
the infrastructure and building blocks to integrate SAP applications and SharePoint capabilities,
thereby enabling the delivery of new composite applications that provide simplified access to SAP
data and applications to more users across enterprises than was previously possible.
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Figure 20 shows a sample SharePoint webpage with data from SAPs sales module tailored to a
sales representatives role.
Broad enterprise information access
In the engineering change management example previously described in this chapter and
illustrated in Figure 16 on page 42, the different role-playing members involved in a business
process all need access to data from multiple systems, such as CAD/PLM, engineering, ERP/
production, supply chain, or manufacturing. Their view, however, can be constrained. Because
they are experts, they are authorized as users of only one or two systems, at most, and are, as a
result, unable to view information seamlessly across the business and in the context their job role
requires. The complexity of these tools, particularly for most people in manufacturing operations,
may lead to problems with data capture and accuracy that often can produce serious downstream
issues. Finding information at the point of need also is challenging, because that data is scattered
across stores and applications throughout the enterprise, without an easy way to search for and
quickly find it. Furthermore, people in functions such as maintenance, manufacturing operations,
or sales are increasingly more mobile across the workforce and frequently need to access and work
on information offline.
SharePoint Server 2010 offers several capabilities that are central in addressing these issues.
Figure 21: Microsoft SharePoint 2010business platform for the extended enterprise
Business Connectivity Services (BCS)
BCS enables the design and construction of solutions that extend SharePoints collaboration capabilities
and the Microsoft Office user experience to include external business data and the processes associated
with that data. A set of services and features, BCS provides a way to connect SharePoint solutions to
sources of external datasuch as ERP, PLM, CRM, SCM, and MES, among othersusing a variety
of connectors. SharePoint is increasingly becoming a platform for developing contextual role-based
experiences across LoB applications through BCS out-of-box features, services, and tools that
streamline the development of solutions with deep integration of external data and services.
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In SharePoint Server 2010, broad connectivity is provided through the SQL connector to access a SQL
Server database and Web Services using the WCF connector. When these tools are not sufficient,
custom connectors can be built for specific enterprise business applications. The Microsoft .NET
Assembly Connector is different from the other connectors, in that it targets a specific deployed
instance of a system or an application. It is useful for aggregating data from multiple sources into a
single external content type (ECT), which is not possible with the other connectors. (More details on
BCS can be found in the Business Connectivity Services Overview21 Microsoft provides.)
BCS includes security features for authenticating users, so they can access external systems and
configure permissions on data from external systems (see Figure 22). The model is highly flexible
and can accommodate a range of security methods from within supported Microsoft Office 2010
applications and from the web browser.
SharePoint Search
SharePoint Search aims to dramatically improve role-based productivity by quickly bringing the
right knowledge assets to any user, in context and spanning a plethora of sourcesincluding
SharePoint sites, desktop, mobile, email, enterprise applications, and webpages, along with
personnel, expertise, and business intelligence assets such as spreadsheets and reports. SharePoint
Server 2010 Enterprise Search delivers many of these capabilities22, while FAST Search Server 2010
for SharePoint extends them to deliver contextually relevant results based on the role, job, or
interests of the user, in addition to providing advanced linguistics and a platform for customized
search applications and discovery for business intelligence assets.
SharePoint Search ensures that
content from multiple enterprise
repositories and systems can be
searched both independently and
from within the context of business
applications. Users do not need to
know where the data is before
they start searching. Search
also provides accurate ranking
for relevant results, so they are
immediately visible and useful.
As competitive intensity puts a
premium on knowledge flows,
search solutions help identify
relevant people and expertise
within the organization. Users can
search for the names of people
in their organization to obtain
contact information and check
Figure 22: Business Connectivity Services (BCS) Architecture
their availability. They can express
interest in topics or functional
areas of the business and find experts who regularly contribute or otherwise provide thought
leadership. SharePoint Search can automatically build user profiles from their individual interactions
21 Microsoft. Business
with business systems, email, and searched-content repositories.
Connectivity Services Overview, September 2, 2010.
http://tinyurl.com/3kwhz4w
22 Microsoft. Microsoft
SharePoint Server 2010
Enterprise Search Evaluation
Guide, 2010.
http://tinyurl.com/3qkgce3
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As a search platform, SharePoint Server 2010 includes a connector framework that enables the
crawler to index files, metadata, and other types of data from various content repositories. In
addition, it provides an indexing engine that efficiently stores the crawled data in index files.
SharePoint Server 2010 also provides query servers, query-object models, and user interfaces
for performing searches on the indexed data. The platform provides powerful relevance-ranking
features that are designed to deliver relevant results for searches over enterprise content and data.
FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint
Although SharePoint Server 2010 provides broad and powerful search capabilities, FAST Search
Server for SharePoint 2010 also scales far more extensivelyinto billions of itemsand offers other
unique capabilities. One function is contextual search, whereby search results can be personalized
based on role, job, function, or other user requirements. FAST Search Server associates document
promotions, document demotions, site promotions, and site demotions with user contexts,
thereby enabling a tailored experience. This means, for example, that a designer in R&D could
promote documents related to patents, drawings, specifications, requirements, and so on, while
a maintenance worker could add value to the enterprise by promoting operating procedures,
regulatory requirements, and vendor maintenance bulletins.
User Interface and
Query Object
Models
Query
SQL Server
Query Engine
Index File
Propagation
Indexing Engine
Index File
Crawler
Connector
Connector
Connector
Connector
Connector
Content
Sources
SharePoint
Web Sites
Shared
Folders
External
Websites
Custom
Databases
Other
Systems
Figure 23: Logical search architectureMicrosoft SharePoint 2010

Another important FAST Search Server capability is that of deep search refinement of query
results. This is particularly important when search results are very large and the user is searching
for a particular bit of institutional knowledge, akin to the needle in a haystack. SharePoint Server
2010 is based on shallow refinement, in which users apply additional targeted filters to manage the
properties returned in the first 50 results by the original query. In contrast, deep refinement is based
on the aggregation of managed properties across the entire result set, which brings out results that
otherwise would be buried deep in the results list.
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SharePoint Workspace 2010
SharePoint Workspace 2010 is the improved replacement for Microsoft Groove 2007. SharePoint
Workspace is a client application that provides fast, anytime, interactive access to document libraries
and lists on SharePoint Server 2010. It enables real-time synchronization of desktop content with
SharePoint documents and lists. By using SharePoint Workspace, information workers can easily
synchronize online and offline content with a designated SharePoint site or collaborate with external
partners and offsite team members through shared workspaces. This ability is extremely convenient
for designers, engineers, technical writers, maintenance personnel, service personnel, and sales
and marketing people, helping them be productive or collaborate with others even when offline.
By using
SharePoint
Workspace,
information
workers can
easily synchronize online and
offline content
with a
designated
SharePoint site
or collaborate
with external
partners and
offsite team
members
through shared
workspaces.
SharePoint Workspaces provide bi-directional synchronization of library and list content between
a SharePoint site and a workspace on an individual client computer. Because data from external
applications such as ERP, CRM, SCM, PLM, and MES is imported through Business Connectivity
Services into SharePoint lists, mobile workers can access and update enterprise application data
when they are offline. The updated documents are automatically synchronized with SharePoint
document libraries and lists when the user reconnects.
Timely insights for better decisions
Detecting problems quickly, receiving timely alerts, and making well-informed decisions
collaboratively are critical to the business operations of manufacturing enterprises. These abilities
often save millions in avoided downtime, quality related issues or, worse, catastrophic failures. In
the example process previously described in this chapter, the dealer group received real-time
telematics data from operational vehicles alerting them to a potential fault in the seat latch that failed
in customer car crashes. Early intervention, root-cause analysis through self-service connections,
collaboration with the OEM, and remediation across the supply network in consultation with experts
and external partners help correct potentially deadly problems and manage risk. These steps also
may protect the brand from damage. The goal is to prevent the former from happening and the
latter from proliferating, should an incident occur.
How can companies achieve a high level of customer protection while safeguarding their brands
reputation given the challenges of data fragmentation, disconnected business processes, difficulty
with end-user tools, and the need for IT control? Through broad access to business intelligence
services enabled by SQL Server 2008 R2, SharePoint Server 2010, and Excel 2010 with Power Pivot.
The industry-leading business intelligence capabilities Microsoft offers focus on three priorities:
Facilitating end-user agility and empowering anyone in the organization through self-service
business intelligence.
Providing best-in-class tools and technologies for connectivity; extract, transform, and load,
(ETL); and online analytical processing (OLAP) across any and all enterprise data sources.
Enabling IT to monitor, manage, and control the business intelligence environment makes IT
the guardian of customers and the protector of a business reputation.
Figure 25 shows the powerful, flexible, and easy-to-use components of the Microsoft business
intelligence stack that empowers every user in the manufacturing enterprise to be insightful and
contribute to improving the business.
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Figure 24: Broad access to enterprise data in SharePoint and Microsoft Office through
Business Connectivity Services
Figure 25: Microsoft business intelligence: enabling broad access to all workers through
familiar tools
Microsoft business intelligence consists of a set of products that provide complete, end-to-end
business intelligence capabilities in three areas.
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2/11/13 11:39 AM
Data infrastructure and business intelligence platform
Microsoft business intelligence works with a comprehensive variety of heterogeneous enterprise

data sources: structured, unstructured, internal, and external. It provides highly scalable enterprise
information management (EIM) and business intelligence platform services, such as analysis,
reporting, integration, and master data services.
The big data solution Microsoft

offers unleashes
business insights
to drive smarter
decisions from
structured data,
semistructured
data, and unstructured data.
Reporting and analysis services are particularly important for team business intelligence scenarios
and personal business intelligence scenarios. With reporting services, an organization can
encapsulate enterprise information systems through report-based data feeds. This capability means
Excel users can more easily import the data into their self-service business intelligence applications
and always remain current with enterprise data.
New with SQL Server 2008 R2, analysis services (when installed as a service in SharePoint 2010)
support a new mode called Microsoft Vertipaq, which permits PowerPivot workbooks to run inmemory in a SharePoint 2010 farm, thereby processing billions of rows of data in seconds.
And in the cloud, SQL Azure and business intelligence capabilities Microsoft offers for public clouds
and private clouds are developing into powerful data platforms for mashing up, analyzing, and
crunching massive datasets (big data) that are increasingly vital to organizations in understanding
customers, optimizing the supply chain, and coping with energy and resource constraints.
The big data solution Microsoft offers unleashes business insights to drive smarter decisions from
structured data, semistructured data, and unstructured data. Unlike other offerings, it enables
insights to every worker through integration with familiar Microsoft tools, such as Excel, PowerPivot,
and Power View, on any device through apps or the browser. In addition, it enables customers to
discover new insights by connecting to publicly available data and services from Azure Marketplace
and social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Microsoft big data offers an enterprise-ready
Hadoop distribution through integration with key Microsoft components, including Active Directory
and System Center, and an open platform with full compatibility with Apache Hadoop APIs.
Sharing and collaboration
The SharePoint Server 2010 application platform enables users to find the information they need
across unstructured information (such as blogs, wikis, presentations, and documents) and structured
information (such as reports, spreadsheets, and analytical systems). FAST Search for SharePoint
2010 can crawl Excel workbooks and reporting services reports with improved results, descriptions,
thumbnails, and refiners to sort through results efficiently. This puts powerful discovery tools in the
hands of users, so they can search enterprise business intelligence assets and navigate to the data
behind the scenes quickly and easily.
Excel Services is a SharePoint Server 2010 shared service that provides server-side calculation and
browser-based rendering of Excel workbooks. The server-side model means users can reuse the
logic and content of their Excel workbooks in the browser while easily managing the authorizations
and permissions for intellectual property protection. It also helps maintain a single server-side
version of the workbook and, thus, a single version of the truth.
Visio 2010 and Visio Services let users connect diagrams to data from multiple sources, including
Excel, Microsoft Access, SQL Server, and SharePoint Lists. With these tools, users can publish datadriven diagrams to Visio Services on SharePoint Server, in addition to viewing and refreshing datadriven diagrams in a browser. Visio often is used to depict diagrams of manufacturing processes.
Data overlaid on Visio diagrams helps put information in context, making it more meaningful than
a complex engineering drawing to a wider variety of information consumers. Data-driven diagrams
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help identify trends and exceptions at a glance and provide a more contextual user experience in
some manufacturing scenarios.
Microsoft PerformancePoint Services provide easy-to-use tools for building dashboards,
scorecards, and key performance indexes (KPIs). PerformancePoint Services can help people across
the organization make informed business decisions that align with company-wide objectives and
strategy. The dashboard is a point of entry for drill-down analyses that support business agility
and alignment across the organization. With these services, all users can monitor and analyze
performance relevant to their roles, thereby extracting greater insights from consolidated data.
End-user agility
Excel is the most widely used data-analysis tool. With Excel 2010, Microsoft has added a variety
of business intelligence features, such as sparklines and slicers, which make it easier for users to
gain insight into and work with large amounts of analytical data. Sparklines are small, cell-sized
graphics used to show trends in a series of values by using line, column, or win/loss charts. They
help viewers using Excel see into single-cell information-dense graphics, thereby greatly increasing
reader comprehension of the data. Slicers make it easier to filter and interpret data. They float
above the grid and behave like report filters, so users can hook them to PivotTables, PivotCharts,
or Cube functions to create interactive reports or dashboards.
The SQL Server PowerPivot for Excel add-in gives power users the ability to model and analyze
very large amounts of data and work with that data inside Excel workbooks. Users can quickly
combine data from multiple sources, including corporate databases, worksheets, reports, and data
feeds, and then interactively explore, calculate, and summarize that data using PivotTables, slicers,
and other Excel features. Because of the in-memory implementation, the response time is fast,
whether users are working with hundreds of rows or hundreds of millions of rows. With Excel
Services in SharePoint Server 2010, users can make reports and analyses available on a SharePoint
site for sharing and collaboration with other people in the organization. This capability boosts the
productivity of project teams and business units, because analysis and detailed business insights are
accessible at any time, in any location, on any device.
PerformancePoint
Services can help
people across
the organization
make informed
business decisions
that align with
company-wide
objectives and
strategy.
In the end, unless people can work easily with the business intelligence tools and leverage the power
of analysis in intuitive and even fun ways, the return on all of the investments and the impact to the
business will be suboptimal. Power View is an end-user-focused tool that provides an interactive data
exploration, visualization, and presentation experience that ships in Reporting services in SQL Server
2012. Users can easily create and interact with views of data from data models based on PowerPivot
workbooks or tabular models deployed to SQL Server 2012 Analysis Services (SSAS) instances.
Power View is a browser-based Silverlight application that launches from SharePoint Server 2010.
In summary, the producers of team business intelligence solutions and personal business
intelligence solutions primarily work with PowerPivot for Excel 2010 and Report Builder 3.0 to
create workbook applications and online reports. Both tools integrate seamlessly with SharePoint
2010, so stakeholders can securely share and collaborate. Business usersravenous consumers of
insightsprimarily work with Microsoft Internet Explorer, or any other supported web browser,
to view shared applications and reports that are rendered directly on the server. With these
products, it is not necessary to download PowerPivot workbooks for analysis. Business insight is
now readily available wherever and whenever a user needs it, on any browser-capable device. It is
becoming easier for business users to get accurate answers quickly, to ask even more questions, to
drill down into details, and to discover new information lurking in databases. In short, all users are
now empowered to ask new questions and to obtain new answers that may be one of the keys to
competitive differentiation in our changing world.
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Figure 26: SharePoint 2010 Business Intelligence Services
People, process, and information integration
In most organizations, the worlds of structured processes and unstructured processes have
remained separate and unassociated with each other, even though the bulk of knowledge-work
in most companies isby many definitionsunstructured. But by integrating SharePoint as a
business collaboration platform, together with enterprise LoB applications such as SAP, the Oracle
eBusiness Suite (which includes Siebel CRM), and others, knowledge-work now can be captured,
contextualized, and associated with structured business data. Overall, this improves the ability of all
workers to search and obtain information that is highly relevant and within the context of their work.
They can find experts quickly and as needed, determine their availability, and quickly communicate
with them in rich ways, including audio conferencing, video conferencing, and sharing applications
and desktops. And through easy-to-use Forms capabilities, workers can expand the range of
automated workflows beyond those contained in islands of disparate enterprise applications.
Unified communications
Instant messaging (IM) and presence help people find and communicate with one another more
efficiently and effectively than they could with any previously deployed communications technology.
IM provides a platform that records conversation history and supports public IM connectivity
through public IM networks, including MSN/Windows Live, Yahoo!, and AOL. Presence establishes
and displays a users personal availability and willingness to communicate through common states
such as available or busy. This rich presence information enables other users to immediately
make effective communication choices.
Lync Server
Microsoft Lync Server includes support for IM conferencing, audio conferencing, web conferencing,
video conferencing, and application sharingfor both scheduled and impromptu meetings.
All of these meeting types are supported with a single client. Lync Server also supports dial-in
conferencing, so users of public switched telephone network (PSTN) phones can participate in the
audio portion of conferences.
Conferences can seamlessly change and grow in real time. For example, a single conference
related to troubleshooting a maintenance issue might start as just instant messages between a
few users but then escalate to an audio conference with desktop sharing and a larger audience of
stakeholders quite quickly, easily, and without interrupting the original conversation flow. Enterprise
Voice is voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) offering within Lync Server 2010. It delivers a voice
option to enhance or replace traditional private branch exchange (PBX) systems and is integrated
with rich presence, IM, collaboration, and meetings.
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Given the increase in value chain complexity and the need to connect dispersed ecosystem participants,
organizations can provide full Lync Server functionality for users who are currently outside their
organizations firewalls by deploying Edge servers. Remote users can connect to conferences by using
a personal computer with Lync 2010 installed, their phone, or a web interface. Deploying Edge servers
enables organizations to federate with partners and suppliers. Such inter-organizational relationships
enable users to put federated users on their contacts lists, exchange presence information and instant
messages with these users, and invite them to audio calls, video calls, and conferences.
Lync Server integrates with other productivity tools. Meeting tools are integrated into Outlook
2010, thereby enabling organizers to schedule a meeting or start an impromptu conference with a
single click and making it just as easy for attendees to join. Presence information is integrated into
both Outlook 2010 and SharePoint 2010.
Exchange Unified Messaging (UM) provides several integration features. Users can see if they have
new voice mail within Lync 2010. They can click a play button in the Outlook message to hear the
audio voice mail or view a transcript of the voice mail in the notification message.
In summary, Unified Communications capabilities are dramatically shrinking distance and saving
time by enabling anyone in an organization to quickly engage people in innovation or problem
resolution and to become effective participants in sharing their skills in a collaborative endeavor
regardless of location, time, or device.
Electronic forms
Enterprise business processes today suffer from some important deficiencies related to capturing
structured information from users:
Data-entry forms are typically customized to enterprise applications and lack standardization
across the span of business processes.
Data accuracy is inconsistent and data standards implementation is difficult, because common
forms cannot be centrally authored or managed.
Business processes often require data entry that spans multiple applications, and there is no
common way to achieve cross-functional capabilities.
The costs to businesses of these antiquated data capture methods are significant, due to loss
of data quality, incomplete data, or simply the inability to capture key events and data across
operational processes.
Unified Communications
capabilities
are dramatically shrinking
distance and
saving time by
enabling anyone
in an organization to quickly
engage people
in innovation or
problem resolution and to
become effective participants
in sharing their
skills in a collaborative endeavor
regardless of
location, time,
or device.
InfoPath and InfoPath Forms Services 2010
Microsoft InfoPath 2010 Forms Services, together with the InfoPath 2010 client, enables highquality data gathering and integration with business processes through workflow and composite
applications. Moreover, users who interact with these business processes can do so through a
browser and their choice of devicethat is, they do not need to have the InfoPath client installed
on their computer. This is particularly relevant in manufacturing, because many jobsincluding
shop floor, warehouse and distribution, sales, service, and maintenanceare not tied to a desktop
or a fixed device.
InfoPath 2010 achieves data quality and data integrity through custom data validation, which
guarantees that users cannot submit forms with invalid data; through customized layouts tailored
to the roles of users and simplified form data-entry processes; and through data connections
to various sources, such as web services and SharePoint Lists. Data from external systems, such
as enterprise applications, can be viewed, updated, and deleted through Business Connectivity
Services and external lists in SharePoint. All of this can be done without writing any code, although
advanced functionality can be developed with Visual Studio tools.
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Overall, the Forms Services capability helps organizations standardize data-entry forms, improve
the validity and integrity of data across business processes, and securely extend the reach of
business processes for data entry to anyone who has browser access on any device.
Workflow
Social business
enables companies to engage
customers,
connect people
to the best ideas
and information,
and collaborate within and
across the value
network.
SharePoint Server 2010 enables solution architects, designers, and administrators to improve
business processes through workflow. Fundamentally, a workflow consists of forms users need to
interact with the software and the logic that defines the workflows behavior. Workflows provide the
following benefits to speed up and improve business processes:
Automated interactions among the people who participate in a process to improve how that
process functions, increase its efficiency, and lower its error rate.
Easy collaboration on documents and easy project task management by putting documents
and items on a SharePoint site or in a site collection.
Increased organizational efficiency through shared, consistent business-process practices. This
enables the people who perform these tasks to concentrate on doing the work instead of
working on the processes.
Better, speedier decision-making through getting the appropriate information to the appropriate
people whenever they need it.
The workflow life cycle in SharePoint 2010 includes a tight integration between Visio, SharePoint
Designer, and Visual Studio 2010, making it much easier to model, implement, deploy, and manage
workflows. People who focus on modeling workflows find Visio to be a natural tool for describing
business processes. With Visio Services hosted in SharePoint Server 2010, the underlying data can
be bound to a variety of data sources, including workflow tracking information. Visio Services is
able to produce real-time visual diagrams of workflow steps and present them over a browser for
visualization and monitoringthereby extending the process view and status to any authorized
person anywhere.
3.2.3 Social business
Microsoft views the burgeoning worlds of social computing, enterprise collaboration, and digital
engagement of customers as working in conjunction to form social business systems. In a hyperconnected world, opportunities and threats can emerge anywhere, ideas and solutions need
to emerge quickly, and organizations need to respond with agility and coordinated execution.
Social business enables companies to engage customers, connect people to the best ideas and
information, and collaborate within and across the value network. SharePoint 2010 and FAST
Search Server 2010 for SharePoint provide a business collaboration platform for the enterprise and
the web. The Advertising Platform (Atlas and adCenter) offered by Microsoft enables companies
to reach a wide audience of customers while our business intelligence and analytics tools provide
insights on marketing and advertising campaigns.
Collaboration and knowledge sharing
SharePoint 2010 offers a wide range of collaboration and social computing tools that help people
work together the way they want towhether they are more comfortable doing asynchronous
collaboration through team sites and workspaces or broadcasting their status updates to their
colleague network. This diversity of tool sets also means people can collaborate anytime, anywhere,
regardless of whether they are connected to a corporate network or working from their PC, phone,
or browser.
SharePoint 2010 Communities platform helps people to collaboratively:
Create content and rich media, in addition to editing and contributing to other peoples content
through rating or commenting.
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Share ideas, content, networks, and resources with others in the organization.
N
etwork with others who share similar interests through dynamic status updates and activity
feeds.
Find the right people and information faster, thereby facilitating better decisions and greater
efficiency and productivity.
The SharePoint 2010 Communities solutions help to make a dispersed, chaotic, fragmented
organization into a seemingly much smaller, cohesive community of people who better understand
how they fit into the overall enterprise ecosystem.
Social business is already being incorporated into PLM solutionsPTCs Windchill SocialLink
enables community-driven product development and Siemens PLM Softwares TeamCenter brings
social networking to the entire PLM environmentboth are described later in this report. Product
design is inherently collaborative, with a strong bias toward idea exchange, people search, and
content creation. Similarly, supply chain solutions and MES are rapidly adopting social computing
as facilities become geographically dispersed, networks become increasingly complex, and
experienced people leave the workforce.
Finding and accessing skills and expertise
Working in an organization means interacting with other people and connecting with the people
who have specific skills and talents. FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint addresses this challenge
through search, and it connects this search to the social capabilities in SharePoint Server 2010 (see
Figure 32, on page 67).
Finding people: FAST Search provides an address-book-style name look-up experience that has
better name matching, including phonetic name matching. This capability makes it easier to find
people by name (with queries returning names that sound similar to what is typed in), title, and
organizational structure. Results also return all variations of common names, including nicknames
(for supported languages). In addition, people search results include real-time presence through
Microsoft Office Communications Server, so it is easy to immediately connect with people once
they are found through search.
The SharePoint
2010 Communities solutions
help to make
a dispersed,
chaotic, fragmented organization into a
seemingly much
smaller, cohesive
community of
people who better understand
how they fit
into the overall
enterprise
ecosystem.
Mining and discovering expertise: FAST Search infers expertise by automatically suggesting
topics mined from users Outlook inboxes and suggesting additions to their My Site expertise
profiles. (The My Site feature of SharePoint is a personal portal for users that serves as the hub of
their social network.) This makes it easy to populate My Site profiles. As a result, more people have
well-populated profiles and they benefit from this information in both search and communities.
Improving search based on social behavior: SharePoint sites have become gathering places
where people create, share, and interact with information. Incorporating social behavior provides
high-quality search results. The relevance ranking in people search takes social distance into
account. So, for example, a direct colleague will appear before someone who is three degrees
removed. FAST Search also supports social tagging of content, and this feedback can influence the
relevance of content in search results. Peoples day-to-day usage of information in FAST Search
and Microsoft Office can have a measurable impact on search relevance, thereby helping the
organization harness the collective wisdom of its people.
Digital customer engagement
The power shift to customers, whereby they can easily find product information, compare features
and prices, and engage with their social communities, is transforming how companies engage and
interact with them. The social business technologies Microsoft uses provide the foundation for
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digital marketing solutions that help organizations improve customer experiences, broaden their
customer base with greater reach, and retain existing customers through multiple media channels.
Microsoft provides tools to create engaging websites and advertising that reaches new customers
via online advertisers. These tools help companies deliver engaging experiences at every customer
touchpoint and, with analytics capabilities, help them derive insights from consumer behavior while
improving product designs, distribution, and marketing.
As demand for,
and supply of,
manufactured
goods grows
in emerging
countries,
sustainability
puts pressure
on energy and
resources, and
power continues
to shift to
customers.
Create adaptive websites: From easily adding functionality through many Windows Live products
(Virtual Earth, Instant Messenger, and others) to building websites that can be easily upgraded
and maintained with SharePoint, or building websites that can adapt and integrate with CRM and
e-commerce systems, Microsoft has a suite of options that help customers remain agile in adapting
to changing business needs while at the same time presenting a next-gen web experience.
Engage online communities: Microsoft can help customers reach existing communities through
advertising and sponsorships on Live Spaces, MSN, Facebook, Digg, and Xbox LIVE. Microsoft can
help build communities using SharePoint or Commerce Server for public communities or private
communities, in addition to helping measure the impact of marketing and advertising on these
communities through analytics and data-mining tools.
Create more consistent, relevant experiences across channels and touchpoints: From
interactive web experiences to on-the-go experiences (call centers, auto, mobile apps) to the living
room experience (Xbox LIVE, Media Center, Live Mesh) to work and store experiences (point of
sale (POS), kiosks), Microsoft can help businesses use software to create better, more consistent
experiences across multiple devices and locations.
Business intelligence and analytics: Microsoft helps marketing departments make sense of the
mountain of data from website ad clicks and other information gathered across the web. Through
SharePoint PerformancePoint Services, advertising and business data can be analyzed in real-time
dashboards to help determine ROI and take action based on factual insights. And with the Atlas
and adCenter tools, advertisers can quickly determine the effectiveness of both online and offline
advertising campaigns.
Reach the right audience with the right ROI: Atlas, Rapt, and adCenter help customers
maximize the efficiency of their advertising dollars, reach the right audience on their network and
off it, and execute more complex ad campaigns through programs such as BEET and Xbox LIVE.
3.2.4 Dynamic business networks
Just as role-based productivity promises to transform the agility of people and teams in the enterprise
through collaboration, communication, and insights, another set of emerging technologies is
poised to change the shape and flow of enterprise value chain processes at the global scale. Cloud
computing is bringing the scale of massive computing and storage power to every organization,
regardless of its size or location. This new model will transform how companies access business
applications, integrate processes across the value network, and engage interactively with customers.
As demand for, and supply of, manufactured goods grows in emerging countries, sustainability
puts pressure on energy and resources, and power continues to shift to customers. Success will
require manufacturers to be more agile and connected within their own enterprise. A more agile
organization will, in turn, find it easier to connect with and integrate new partners and customers in
a more responsive global value network and to develop abilities to sense and influence customer
pull around the world.
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Agile connected enterprise
It is well chronicled that the business processes of most large enterprises are trapped within
complex, disparate, and isolated enterprise applications. These legacy applications are too often
difficult, expensive, and risky to adapt to new economic realities. The convergence of structured
processes and unstructured processes that we have described in this report provides discrete
manufacturers a partial solution to this problem. But to optimize an organization for the agility
required in the new era, it also is necessary to integrate structured data and process flows across
isolated legacy applications.
These two capabilities are complimentary and mutually reinforcing: the better the integration
across functions, the more insights people can draw. Meanwhile, the greater the collaboration
and insights, the better the business process performance. For example, if customer orders are
taken in a CRM system, production is planned and scheduled in the ERP system and manufacturing
is coordinated and tracked in an MES, where it is necessary for data and events, changes, or
anomalies to be communicated bi-directionally and precisely through all of these systems with
some level of automation. And when issues do arise due to external or internal disruptions and
changes, people need to communicate and collaborate across these functions with the full context
of the data and information they need to respond quickly and effectively.
Figure 27: Maintenance portal showing Unified Communications and Forms for
part ordering
Microsoft middleware technologies enable those needed connections between systems, thereby
enabling enterprise agility. WCF, Windows Workflow, Windows Workflow Foundation, and Microsoft
BizTalk Server provide a robust, scalable enterprise platform from which complex processes can
be developed. These services also enable the development of composite applications and highly
scalable web applications. Composite applications are service-based applications consisting of
application logic that exposes service endpoints. They typically involve the composition of services
exposed by LoB applications, collaboration services, or other web services.
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Windows Server AppFabric is the platform technology that extends Windows Server and lets
developers build new service-based applications. Windows Server AppFabric has two parts:
AppFabric Caching Services, which speed up access to frequently accessed information such as
session data used by an ASP.NET application; and AppFabric Hosting Services, which make it easier
to run and manage services created with WCF. This is especially useful for WCF services built using
Windows Workflow Foundation.
Figure 28: BizTalk Server 2010 provides enterprise-wide integration to support

business processes
Although workflow is a great technology for coordinating activities within a homogeneous
environment, integrating processes across multiple applications requires several additional
capabilities, which BizTalk Server 2010 provides. The BizTalk engine consists of a messaging
component for communication with a range of software applications. Through adapters for
different types of communication, the engine supports a variety of protocols and data formats,
including web services and many others. It also lets developers create and run graphically defined
processes called orchestrations. Built on top of the engines messaging components, orchestrations
implement the logic that drives all or part of a business process. BizTalk includes:
A business rules engine.
A group hub to enable managing and monitoring orchestrations.
A single sign-on facility to map authentication between Windows and non-Windows systems.
A business activity monitoring capability, so users can monitor business process data and
statistics.
Without foundational integration of key business processes across the enterprise, the challenge
of extending a manufacturing enterprise into a dynamic global network is difficult. As the pace of
business change increases, enterprises increasingly need to connect their business processes to
external partners to shorten order-fulfillment cycle times and cut the costs of delays and errors
which is increasingly significant in a pull-based global economy.
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Multi-enterprise business processes
The macroeconomic shifts discussed in this report are influencing just about every business function
in the manufacturing enterprisefrom co-creating products or crowd-sourcing new product ideas
to managing increasingly fluid supply chain networks in a flat world.23 Volatile resource prices,
manufacturing through outsourced facilities, and marketing through interactive social media and
other digital channels all require greater connectivity, coordination, and collaboration. As global
infrastructure matures, running globally connected businesses via the cloud will become the new
norm. Any enterprise soon may be able to access world-class computing facilities and applications
without the capital outlays and complex rollouts that mark enterprise business applications.
On March 3, 2011, the White House announced the formation of a consortium of small manufacturing
enterprises (SMEs)dubbed the National Digital Engineering and Manufacturing Consortium
(NDEMC)tasked with spreading the adoption of advanced modeling and simulation software
within these companies. The central goal of this project is to bring access to HPC simulation and
modeling software into the supply chains of the major manufacturers. Large OEMs, even those
with their own supercomputers and advanced software, will benefit from this access, because they
are still dependent on the product quality and design innovation from their component suppliers.24
These trends and policy shifts are only likely to gather force over the coming years as cloud
computing disrupts the status quo of todays business processes and value chains.
Figure 29: Business process transformation enabled by the Windows Azure platform
The early phase of cloud computing has seen the growth of infrastructure as a service (IaaS). It has
been marked by the rapid cost-cutting opportunities inherent in virtualizing targeted applications
and moving them to either a private cloud or a public cloud. This approach produces great cost
savings in the short term. However, in the longer run, the platform as a service (PaaS) model will
be fundamentally transformative in rewiring the manufacturing nervous system. In the PaaS model,
business applications and processes can be fundamentally designed to take advantage of a global
computing fabric that enables any organization to integrate with a dynamic value network. Over
23 William K. Fung, Victor

K. Fung and Yoram (Jerry)
Wind. Competing in a Flat
World: Building Enterprises
for a Borderless World.
Upper Saddle River, N.J.:
Wharton School Publishing,
2007.
24 Michael Feldman. White
House Announces Project
to Spur HPC Adoption in
U.S. Manufacturing. HPCwire, March 3, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3fz3lq8
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time, this will reshape the landscape of todays relatively static manufacturing networks into global,
fluid, and hyper-connected enterprises that can respond as an integrated whole to take advantage
of market opportunities. This is not to argue that all business applications will move to the cloud.
Rather, we anticipate a hybrid world in which some applications and processes will remain in data
centers and private clouds while other processes will integrate with and extend into the global
network for reach and new capabilities yet to be realized.
Windows Azure platform
We anticipate
a hybrid world
in which some
applications
and processes
will remain in
data centers and
private clouds
while other
processes will integrate with and
extend into the
global network
for reach and
new capabilities
yet to be
realized.
Windows Azure is a flexible cloud computing platform that provides computing, storage,
connectivity, and marketplace functions without the need to invest in expensive infrastructure.
Customers only pay for what they use and scale up when they need capacity. Microsoft handles all
of the patches and maintenance for a secure virtual environment with over 99.9 percent uptime.
Windows Azure is a Windows environment for running applications and storing data on computers
in Microsoft data centers. The platform today has the following key parts:
Windows Azure Compute provides developers an Internet-scale hosting environment for
applications across global, geographically distributed data centers. Windows Azure services are
built from one or more roles: web role, worker role, and virtual machine (VM) role.
Web role (frontend): The Windows Azure web role is customized for web application programming,
as supported by IIS 7 and ASP.NET. Developers also can create applications using native code in
languages such as PHP and Java. Manufacturing companies can create powerful customer-facing
websites for B2C or B2B applications, for example.
Worker role (backend): A worker role is used for general-purpose background applications. A
worker role might run a high-performance simulation, for example, or handle video processing or
nearly anything else.
The automated service management capabilities of Windows Azure take care of load balancing
and failover, thereby reducing the cost of administering the application environment. They enable
developers to build applications that are continuously available in the face of upgrades or hardware
failures and to scale their applications up or down as needed.
SQL Azure Database is a highly available, scalable cloud database service built on
SQL Server technologies. With SQL Azure, developers do not have to install, set up, patch, or
manage any software. High availability and fault tolerance are built in, and no physical administration
is required. Additionally, because developers use the same familiar T-SQL-based relational model
and the same powerful development and management tools used for on-premises databases, they
can be productive on SQL Azure quickly.
SQL Azure Data Sync is a cloud-based data synchronization service built on Microsoft Sync
Framework technologies. It provides bi-directional data synchronization and data management
capabilities, enabling data to be easily shared between multiple SQL Azure databases and between
on-premises and SQL Azure databases.
Manufacturers can extend the reach of data assets and aggregate data sources in the cloud
to facilitate greater collaboration and data sharing between globalized R&D resources, supply
chain partners, manufacturing sites, remote workers, and field equipment. The multi-tenant data
capabilities enable new business models such as remote maintenance and training services for
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customers with Internet-enabled smart assets, in addition to new ecosystem configurations such
as N Tier supplier hubs for visibility and collaboration. And with emerging business intelligence
capabilities based on predictive models, manufacturers can respond quicker to market signals and
customer needs, among other benefits.
Windows Azure AppFabric provides a comprehensive cloud middleware platform for
developing, deploying, and managing applications on the Windows Azure platform. It delivers
additional developer productivity, adding in higher level PaaS capabilities on top of the familiar
Windows Azure application model. It also enables bridging existing applications to the cloud
through secure connectivity across network and geographic boundaries and by providing a
consistent development model for both Windows Azure and Windows Server.
Figure 30: Windows Azure AppFabric provides a comprehensive application

programming model for on-premises, hybrid, and cloud environments
Windows Azure AppFabric enables greater agility in responding to change by providing a
comprehensive cloud middleware platform that supports the entire IT life cycle. This begins with enabling
rapid development using building-block services; defining an end-to-end composite application
environment to ease deployment, management, and monitoring; and responding to ongoing change.
Its uniquely cloud-optimized application infrastructure (AppFabric Container) achieves the benefits
of cloud computing, such as scale out, availability, multi-tenancy, and sandboxing of application
components. In addition, with time, Microsoft will provide parity between AppFabric across on-premises
(Windows Server), cloud (Windows Azure), and appliance (Windows Azure Appliance), which will enable
developers to write applications in the same way and make a deployment decision whether they want to
deploy it on either one of these environments or in a hybrid model across these environments.
Figure 30 shows the AppFabric Service constituents for both the server and the cloud environments,
thereby providing a comprehensive application programming model for on-premises, hybrid, and
cloud environments.
Finally, Windows Azure AppFabric also bridges existing applications to the cloud through secure
connectivity to LoB systems across network and geographic boundaries and by enabling a
consistent development model for both Windows Azure and Windows Server.
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Windows Azure Marketplace is an online service for purchasing cloud-based data and applications.
DataMarket enables content providers to make premium, syndicated, commercial, and other data
available in the cloud and programmatically accessible through RESTful or OData requests.
The DataMarket section of Windows Azure Marketplace includes data, imagery, and real-time
web services from leading commercial data providers and authoritative public data sources.
Customers will have access to datasets such as demographic, environmental, financial, retail,
weather, and sports. DataMarket also includes visualizations and analytics to enable insight on top
of data. Manufacturing companies are using these capabilities in highly innovative mash-up style
applications such as tracking goods and transportation assets, market segmentation, demographics
overlays for visualization, and so on.
Figure 31: GCommerce B2B process and cloud extension for inventory consolidation
(courtesy of GCommerce Inc.)
The Applications section of the Windows Azure Marketplace will include listings of building block
components, training, services, and finished services/applications. These building blocks are
designed to be incorporated by other developers into their Windows Azure platform applications.
Other examples could include developer tools, administrative tools, components and plug-ins, and
service templates.
Early adopters are looking to deliver platforms and applications such as telematics services for
vehicles through App Market. This pattern can, of course, be extended into industrial equipment,
field assets, and various other mobile devices.
As forward-thinking companies develop innovative applications and business models, several
patterns of usage are emerging for the Windows Azure platform. For example, many automakers
are considering the cloud for telematics services that will help drivers of electric vehicles and plug-in
hybrid electric vehicles deal range anxiety. In the supply chain, distributors can view consolidated
inventory data across millions of parts from different manufacturers to improve order processing,
part availability, and fulfillment. The on-demand computing capabilities in Windows Azure mean
design and engineering groups can conduct modeling and simulation to explore what-if scenarios
in a fraction of the time and cost compared to conventional data centers.
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Figure 31 shows how one forward-looking company, GCommerce Inc., is transforming the specialorder process in the automotive aftermarket distribution supply chain. The GCommerce solution,
called Virtual Inventory Cloud (VIC), extends the on-premises B2B order processing solution and
consolidates supplier inventory data in SQL Azure. As a result, distributors can check for part
availability and inventory in a fraction of the time it would otherwise take. The business benefits are
fewer lost sales at the retail store, fewer returns due to incorrect part delivery, and reduced waste
across the distribution supply chain.
In summary, as business visionaries grasp the possibilities that cloud platforms enable, new
applications and business processes heretofore unimagined will likely transform the scope, scale,
and characteristics of global value networks.
Connected value networkcustomer to enterprise
One of the characteristics of Internet connectivity is that consumers are active participants
in relation to the products they buy, including their experiences across the life cycle of every
products use. With social networking, consumers can voice their views in blogs, wikis, feeds,
and other forms, and reach vast audiences instantly. Manufacturers obviously would be
interested in the sentiment of these conversations, obtaining feedback from the market and
relaying it back into the product design, marketing, and distribution functions. FAST Search
Server 2010 for Internet Sites enables sentiment analysis and can provide manufacturers with
insights into market and consumer behavior while ensuring compliance with consumer privacy
requirements. (This topic is discussed in greater detail in the Social business section, on page
58.) The point to remember is that the enterprise value chain has extended its conventional
boundary; companies that are able to sense customers interactions with products, and
respond by integrating those insights back into the enterprise, will have a significant edge in
the growing connected world.
Figure 32: People search result page

As the number of connected smart productscars, phones, Xboxesgrows, data on the use
and performance of these products is increasingly available. Even smart products not owned by
consumersutility meters, gasoline pumps, POS terminals, ATMs, electric charging stationshave
useful data that can be captured and relayed back to the enterprise. This trend is interesting in that
the information flow across the manufacturing value chain no longer ends with the transaction in
the conventional sense. Rather, it extends further toward the edge of the distribution chain and,
sometimes, into the products use. Convergence of computing and communications with physical
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products, therefore, enables manufacturers to gather vast amounts of data that is amenable to
analysis and feedback to functions such as R&D, marketing, distribution, and others. (This topic is
discussed in greater detail in the Smart connected devices section.)
3.2.5 Smart connected devices
Artemis, a European public/private undertaking for embedded systems, forecasts that within the
next five years, the share of embedded systems (revenue) is expected to increase substantially in
markets such as automotive (36 percent), industrial automation (22 percent), telecommunications
(37 percent), consumer electronics (41 percent), and health/medical equipment (33 percent). The
value added to the final product by embedded software is much higher than the cost of the
embedded device itself. Artemis also forecasts that there will be more than 16 billion embedded
devices by 2010 and over 40 billion by 2020.25
Microsoft believes that the proliferation of smart products will be a transformational force,
shaping manufacturers businesses and how they serve their customers. Developments in smart
connected devices are driving innovation in areas such as energy management, asset monitoring
and maintenance, vehicle telematics, and smarter infrastructure, among others, leading to what
we call Intelligent Systems. New business models are emerging as manufacturers realize they can
take advantage of the real-time nature of data from sensors, gathering and analyzing it to deliver
new value-added applications and services and integrating it with enterprise business applications
and process flows. The convergence of powerful computing platforms for embedded devices,
connectivity, and cloud computing are catalysts that are accelerating this trend.
Enterprise
Data Center
(Multi-Touch Displays)
High-Speed Industrial Network
Figure 33: Factory floor to cloud connectivitya proof of concept between Siemens
Industrial Automation, Intel, and Microsoft
25 Artemis. What is an
Embedded System?
http://tinyurl.com/3wect9r
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Intelligent Systems
Data is the new currency. As we have mentioned previously, we are transitioning from the era of
data held captive within applications to one of data platformswhere applications come to the
datathat deliver capabilities and insights no matter the data source or its location. An Intelligent
System enables data to flow across an enterprise infrastructure, spanning the devices where
valuable operational data is gathered from equipment and workers, to the back-end systems and
processes where that data can be translated into insights and actions. Components of an Intelligent
System include:
Intelligent devices that capture data and enable informed decisions at the point of impact.
Device connectivity to back-end systems and analytical tools that sit on-premises or in the cloud.
Information flows and integration into the companys back-end applications and processes,
where it is processed and analyzed.
Data that is translated into new insights so it can be used to improve processes, mitigate risk,
provide new levels of customer service, and improve product designs.
Figure 34: An Intelligent System enables data to flow across an enterprise infrastructure,
spanning devices where valuable data is gathered, to the back-end systems and
applications where that data can be translated into insights and actions
Six key technology attributes are essential to Intelligent Systems. These are:
Identity enables businesses to collect and deliver the right data in the right context to the right
person or device. An identity-driven Intelligent System has the promise of enabling key business
decisions based on an individual person or device, thereby leading to smarter interactions and
greater deployment effectiveness.
With advanced security tools, devices can be made more uniformand, therefore, more secure
with standardized tools and processes. Security was simpler when systems or devices were isolated
and had well-defined boundaries, so the number of entry points to a system could be tightly
controlled. In todays world, business value is found in more open and connected systems, which
makes security more difficult and costly.
In the past, connectivity meant one-way communication, whereby devices responsible for
capturing data sent that data to the back-end system. With advancements in Wi-Fi and mobile
communications, more devices support connectivity. As a result, two-way communication between
devices and back-end systems is more common. However, the cost of having all devices or sensors
connected all the time to the Intelligent System can be prohibitive. New innovations help provide
companies with the ability to control when and how these edge devices are connected to back-end
systems, which increases the ROI from these Intelligent Systems.
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The ability to manage and update devices and systems remotely is critical for controlling costs
and risk. More ubiquitous, two-way on-demand connectivity between smart devices and back-end
systems will give IT departments the ability to manage Intelligent Systems better. It will be possible
to update, manage, and reprogram devices, from any location, ensuring continuous safety and
security and enabling customization to a companys requirements or different user preferences.
Workers today expect the same easy-to-learn, intuitive user interfaces from the technology
systems used in business as they get from consumer devices. A familiar and natural user experience
can increase ease of use, reduce training time, and make employee and customer experiences
more enjoyable overall.
Workers today
expect the
same easy-tolearn, intuitive
user interfaces from the
technology
systems used
in business as
they get from
consumer
devices.
The basis of any Intelligent System is the analytics that drive insights from the data captured by
that system. As new data is created and captured within an Intelligent System, real-time analyses
can be performed to generate visibility and alerts into operations. Never before has so much data
been available for the enterprise and, together with the promise of big data, analytics can derive
new meaning and insights for manufacturers.
Microsoft offers a rich end-to-end set of platform capabilities and tools that power a variety of
embedded devices, enable connectivity and management of these devices, deliver online services,
and gather real-time streaming events for anomaly detection and aggregate analysis.
Smart device platform
The Windows Embedded family of operating systems powers thousands of embedded devices
from portable ultrasound machines to GPS devices and from ATMs to devices that power large
construction and industrial machinery. As a single platform from device to data center to the
cloud, Windows Embedded enables connectivity between devices and Windows-based enterprise
IT systems, in addition to facilitating the development of a variety of growing and innovative
applications. Windows Embedded developers have access to the latest Windows 7 for Embedded
Systems features, including Microsoft BitLocker encryption for data protection, advanced Windows
Touch technologies, and power management. All of these options make Windows Embedded a
highly attractive platform for industrial machinery and industrial PCs, HMIs, and controllers such as
programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and programmable automation controllers (PACs).
Windows Embedded Compact (formerly Windows CE) is a componentized, real-time operating
system used to create a wide range of devices with small footprints for the enterprise and consumers.
Windows Embedded Compact 7 helps developers create the next generation of devices with
attractive, intuitive user experiencesan important differentiator for equipment and control OEM
providers. It supports Silverlight, so users can create flexible, declarative user interfaces (such as for
multi-touch applications) with native code. It also supports Internet Explorer, is built on the same
core as Internet Explorer in Windows Phone 7, and includes support for Flash 10.1, panning and
zooming, multi-touch, and viewing bookmarks using thumbnails.
Windows Embedded Standard 7 delivers the power, familiarity, and reliability of the Windows 7
operating system in a componentized form, so developers can create advanced industrial and
consumer devices that run thousands of existing Windows applications and drivers. All Windows
Embedded products include the Microsoft .NET framework and work with the same development
environmentVisual Studio. Because of the broad availability of applications, expertise, and
technical support networks, the overall costs for customers are lowered.
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The Windows Embedded Automotive 7 (WEA7) platform is of particular interest to automotive

OEMs as the in-vehicle operating system for the head unit. Consumers are demanding on-thego access to multimedia content and productivity applications: they want in-vehicle infotainment
solutions that let them use their existing digital devices and formats, including mobile phones,
MP3 players, DVDs, and CDs. They want innovative, connected services for entertainment, driver
assistance (navigation and emergency calling), productivity (email, web browsing, and calendaring),
and communication (conferencing and calling)all seamlessly integrated, as if the vehicle were just
another node on their home and office networks. The popular Ford SYNC system demonstrated
to the industry that if consumers favored cars provide a rich infotainment experience, along with
safety and convenience, it will help sell these cars at about twice the pace of other models.26 WEA7
includes Silverlight for the user interface, speech engines, a variety of broad support packages
(BSPs), and a rich set of middleware services (including Bluetooth, phone modules, and radio and
media modules).
Online connectivity and services
The greatest excitement that pervades the industry has to do with the connectivity of devices to the
cloud or other enterprise data centers. That is where the transformative potential lies. Today, most
consumer and industrial products have a large number of sensors, but the data from these sensors
goes untapped. Adding connectivity means data can be processed and communicated to massive
stores on private cloud or public cloud platforms (Windows Azure and SQL Azure provide public
cloud computing capabilities through Microsoft global data centers). The data now can be subjected
to analysis and data mining to determine trends and anomalies and to deliver value-added services
over the network based on new insights. With the scale economies of cloud computing, it is feasible
to gather operational data from all types of globally deployed equipment. This data can serve as the
foundation for an entirely new set of services and business models for manufacturers.
With the scale

economies of
cloud computing, it is feasible
to gather operational data from
all types of globally deployed
equipment.
For example, a machine tool provider could offer remote diagnostics, maintenance, and training
services as part of the contract with its buyer (manufacturer), promising to lower downtime through
condition-based maintenance and to reduce the need for scheduled maintenance. Additionally, the
manufacturer could analyze sensor data to suggest improvements in quality, energy, or cost. This
analysis also offers manufacturers an opportunity to extend their customer relationship over the asset
life cycle and to develop deeper and more business-relevant connections. Figure 32, on page 67,
shows a proof of concept that ties together data from the factory floor to the data center to the cloud.
In the automotive space, there are many innovative new business models. Among them is the car2go
charge per usemodel from Daimler. Consumers use their cell phones or Internet connections to
find an available car near their location from a fleet of cars deployed in an urban area. They use a
smart card to access that car and provide charge information and then are billed for the time and
distance they use the car. Using this option, there is no need to own a car within a city.
Stimulating innovation and interest in various industries is the development of affordable and accessible
infrastructure that spans all of the elementsembedded systems, network connectivity, cloud platforms,
common development tools, and an array of online services such as Bing, Google, Yahoo!, Facebook,
and others. Although still in an early phase, a range of industries (including power companies and
other utilities with the smart grid, jet engine manufactures for maintenance and safety, and automotive
manufacturers with telematics for remote diagnostics and other services) is actively experimenting with
solutions based on this model. As a platform provider, Microsoft offers a substantial infrastructure base
to enable many of these scenarios on a global scalefrom the Embedded and mobile platforms to
the data centers and the cloud to the rich connectivity, secure access mechanisms, and marketplaces
such as the Windows Azure DataMarket. Microsoft also brings powerful consumer assets, including
Bing and Windows Live, and integration with social networks such as Facebook.
26 Ford Motor Company.

Ford SYNC Now in 3 Million
Vehicles; Customer Satisfaction, Use of Voice Control on
Rise. Press release, January
3, 2011.
http://tinyurl.com/3w9j7l3
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Real-time analytics
Following closely on the heels of online connectivity for smart devices is the enormous potential
around real-time analytics, at both the embedded device level and in the data center or in the cloud.
Microsoft StreamInsight is a powerful platform that enables the development of complex event
processing applications. Event streams from manufacturing applications or sensors in industrial
equipment can be fed into its high-throughput stream-processing architecture, thereby enabling
users to monitor data from multiple sources while examining it for meaningful patterns, trends, and
exceptions. This process means that data analysis and correlation happen incrementally, while the
data is in-flight (without first being stored), which yields very low latency (delay).
By analyzing event streams and triggering actions that are defined to performance thresholds,
users can respond to events in a timely waya critical need in several manufacturing processes.
StreamInsight also can generate predictive outcomes based on data mining of historical data.
Because it has a lightweight (that is, a relatively small memory footprint) architecture, StreamInsight
can be deployed in Embedded environments and in highly scaled out servers to process vast
streams of data. This capability enables interesting architectures, as previously described, such as
those that span Embedded systems, workstations, data centers, and the cloud. Analytics at each
level serves different purposes and, together, these options enable a variety of useful applications.
Figure 35 shows the StreamInsight Platform with sample event sources and targets.
The availability of platforms such as StreamInsight, in conjunction with access to common
development tools and frameworks such as Microsoft .NET and Visual Studio, is opening the
door for manufacturers to find more ways to use analytics to improve efficiencies. As previously
mentioned, predictive maintenance is a fast-growing area of analytics used to predict failures
before they create problems, thereby avoiding interruptions in production. In addition to lowering
downtime, this also maximizes the use of skilled maintenance people, who are scarce resources.
Figure 35: StreamInsight helps manufacturers leverage the power of real-time analytics
to manage assets, realize service chain efficiencies, and develop new business models
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Returning to the automotive example, there is great demand in the EV market to address the
range anxiety problemdoes the battery have sufficient charge to get the driver to a specified
destination? Battery characteristics vary depending on the technology, and discharge behavior can
vary based on time. Analytics software such as StreamInsight can provide the tools OEMs need to
address these issues. All are nascent areas of opportunity, and it is likely we will see more innovation
as applications that leverage Embedded systems emerge in conjunction with the cloud.
3.2.6 Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure
Given the challenging financial and threat environment in todays world, along with the increasing
pace of technology-driven change, we need a discrete manufacturing infrastructure that can be
successfully secured, scale economically to meet ongoing needs, and adapt as new requirements
and technologies become available.
Secure, discrete manufacturing infrastructure
From the earliest days of control system software, it has been acknowledged that control system
infrastructures need to be robust and reliable. Manufacturers spend much of their software
development resources on these very important issues for control system environments. The
problem we are confronting today is thatwith the requirements for increasing complexity, the
need for flexible and adaptable infrastructure, the use of off-the-shelf software platforms, and,
especially, the need to network and share informationour control systems are now interconnected
and more vulnerable than ever before. The interconnected nature of these systems also has made
them very vulnerable to manipulation and misuse. The fact that these systems have been designed
into larger, more complex systems that do not lend themselves to either rapid or even any type of
updating is another major issue in the difficult task of preventing attacks. That compels us to look
at the software developed for, and the architecture used for, this environment in a new way, so it
can be not only reliable and safely interconnected but secure.
Threat modeling your entire

infrastructure
is crucial to
identifying critical systems and
data flows and
to hardening
potential weak
points against
attack.
What are some of the key concepts for building more secure control system architectures?
Design, develop, and test the entire system securelyincluding the architecture, hardware, and
software.
Threat modeling your entire infrastructure is crucial to identifying critical systems and data flows
and to hardening potential weak points against attack. This step should include all possible
methods of data transfer, both electronic and physical (for example, USB devices).
Segment the various tiers, with appropriate security controls at each interconnection point. The
separation of control and safety interlock systems is especially important to improve security
and reliability.
Features and capabilities need to be engineered into the control system, such that even if a
vulnerability exists, the risk of it being exploited to gain privileged access is greatly reduced. This
can buy you time until a permanent mitigation can be developed; it also can help you manage
the schedule for security updates.
Practice safe software development overall, with special emphasis on security basics such as not
hard-coding user names and passwords into the application. Modern software development
processes, including the Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL), help guard against
issues like this.
All control systems should be tested and verified, especially against the threat models identified,
to be sure that they have successfully closed potential vulnerabilities and that mitigations are
successful against future potential threats.
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Build into the overall system the adaptability and flexibility to minimize security issues.
Acknowledge and engineer into the system the capability for software updates. This includes
upgrades to major new system architectures that may have greatly improved security built into
the platform. The inability to update systems even after mitigations to vulnerabilities have been
found and fixed remains one of the larger attack vectors for control systems.
Take advantage of a segmented architecture as a means to isolate critical portions of your
infrastructure in case of an attack.
Segmentation needs to include shared services, such as authentication and networking
infrastructure.

Systems need
to have robust
monitoring and
alerting capabilities so potential
threats can be
detected and
mitigated early.
Incorporate a facility to monitor and mitigate threats.

Systems need to have robust monitoring and alerting capabilities so potential threats can be
detected and mitigated early.
Use the audit facility built into most platforms to detect issues early and to perform forensic
analysis.
How do you build security into software and system designs? Microsoft has developed the SDL as
a security assurance process that focuses on software development. As a company-wide initiative
and a mandatory policy since 2004, the SDL has played a critical role in embedding security and
privacy in software and the very culture at Microsoft. Combining a holistic and practical approach,
the SDL aims to reduce the number and severity of vulnerabilities in software. It introduces security
and privacy throughout all phases of the development process.
The Microsoft SDL is based on three core conceptseducation, continuous process improvement,
and accountability. The ongoing education and training of technical job roles within a software
development group is critical. The appropriate investment in knowledge transfer helps organizations
appropriately react to changes in technology and the threat landscape. Because security risk
is not static, the SDL places heavy emphasis on understanding the cause and effect of security
vulnerabilities and requires regular evaluation of SDL processes and the introduction of changes
in response to new technology advancements or new threats. Data is collected to assess training
effectiveness, in-process metrics are used to confirm process compliance, and post-release metrics
help guide future changes. Finally, the SDL requires the archiving of all data necessary to service an
application in a crisis. When paired with detailed security response and communication plans, an
organization can provide concise and cogent guidance to all affected parties.
Microsoft has released the SDL process and its documentation under a Creative Commons license,
making this process freely available for organizations to use in their own software development
efforts, in addition to providing guidance and free software tools. If you are using a Microsoft
platform for your software development, you also are benefitting from the SDL work that already
has been done for the software used in the platform itself. As such, manufacturers can focus
on their own value-added products. New guidelinesfrom sources including the U.S. National
Institute of Standards and Technologyfor control systems, such as the emerging technology of
smart grid power distribution, emphasize many of the same core concepts for developing more
secure software. (This topic is discussed in the NIST publication NISTIR 7628 for smart grid security.)
Microsoft, and others, also uses many of the SDL concepts to look at infrastructure designs to
help improve overall system security. The concepts of multiple segmented zones, least privilege,
and developing security features designed to eliminate threats are all tied together. In the control
system space, the reference architecture from the International Society of Automationknown as
the ANSI/ISA-99 modelembodies many of these concepts. Control system designers are using
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this standard and the SDL processes today to further harden security while also preserving the
ability to accommodate interconnections, scalability, and adaptability to changing requirements.
More information about the Security Development Lifecycle created by Microsoft, including
guidance, free tools, and information on the SDL Pro partner network, can be found at:
http://www.microsoft.com/sdl.
Here are some other Microsoft products that provide additional security features relevant to
manufacturing control systems.
BitLocker
BitLocker Drive Encryption is a security feature in the Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008,
and Windows 7 operating systems that can provide protection for the operating system on your
computer and the data stored on the operating system volume. In Windows Server 2008, BitLocker
protection can be extended to volumes that are used for data storage, too.
BitLocker performs two functions:
It encrypts all data stored on the Windows operating system volume (and the configured
data volumes). This includes the Windows operating system, hibernation and paging files,
applications, and data used by applications.
It is configured by default to use a trusted platform module (TPM) to help ensure the integrity of
early startup components (those used in the earlier stages of the startup process). It also locks
any BitLocker-protected volumes, so they remain protected even if the computer is tampered
with when the operating system is not running.
Security
provides critical
threat detection,
outbreak response,
and system
remediation.
Forefront Identity Manager
Microsoft Forefront Identity Manager (FIM) 2010 provides an integrated and comprehensive
solution for managing the entire life cycle of user identities and their associated credentials. It
provides identity synchronization, certificate and password management, and user provisioning in
a single solution that works across Windows and other organizational systems. FIM provides the
following benefits:
It boosts efficiency by integrating with existing infrastructures to automate and centralize
identity life-cycle processes and tools.
It improves operational efficiency by gaining a single view of a user across multiple systems.
It seamlessly incorporates strong authentication tools with end-to-end life-cycle management
of smart cards and digital certificates.
It reduces integration and customization costs by providing a single foundation for all core
identity life-cycle management.
It improves security and compliance with the ability to enforce and track identities across the
enterprise.
Device security
Desktop management and security have traditionally existed as two separate disciplines, yet both
play a central role in keeping users safe and productive. Management ensures proper system
configuration, deploys patches against vulnerabilities, and delivers necessary security updates.
Security provides critical threat detection, outbreak response, and system remediation.
Forefront Endpoint Protection 2010 enables businesses to align management and security to
improve endpoint protection while greatly reducing operational costs. It builds on Microsoft
System Center Configuration Manager 2007 R2 and R3, which lets customers use their existing
client management infrastructure to deploy and manage endpoint protection. This shared
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infrastructure helps reduce ownership costs while providing improved visibility and control over
endpoint management and security. Benefits include:
Creating a single administrator experience for managing and securing endpoints.
Improving visibility for identifying and remediating potentially vulnerable endpoints.
Lowering ownership costs by using a single infrastructure for both endpoint management and
security.
Deploying to hundreds of thousands of endpoints using existing System Center Configuration
Manager agents.
Providing highly accurate detection of known and unknown threats.
Protecting against network-level attacks by managing Windows Firewall configurations.
NAP is an
extension
to IPsec and
primarily for
use with mobile
computing
devices. It helps
administrators
more effectively
protect network
assets by helping to enforce
compliance with
system health
requirements.
Network Access Protection
Network Access Protection (NAP) is a policy enforcement platform built into the Windows Vista,
Windows 7, and Windows Server 2008 operating systems.
NAP is an extension to Internet Protocol Security (IPsec) and primarily for use with mobile computing
devices. It helps administrators more effectively protect network assets by helping to enforce
compliance with system health requirements. IT administrators can create customized health
policies with NAP to validate computer security posture before allowing access or communication,
to automatically update compliant computers to enable ongoing compliance, and to optionally
confine noncompliant computers to a restricted network until they become compliant.
In terms of the manufacturing system ecosystem, this capability can be applied to help ensure that
newly connected devices conform to the appropriate policies or to restrict their access, thus adding
to the overall ecosystem security.
NAP includes an application programming interface (API) set for developers and vendors to create
complete solutions for health policy validation, network access limitation, and ongoing health
compliance. To validate access to a network based on system health, NAP provides the following
areas of functionality:
Health policy validation determines whether the computers are compliant with health policy
requirements.
Network access limitations restrict access for noncompliant computers.
Automatic remediation provides necessary updates, so a noncompliant computer can become
compliant.
Ongoing compliance automatically updates compliant computers, so they adhere to ongoing
changes in health policy requirements.
The IPsec protocol suite secures IP communications by authenticating and encrypting each IP
packet of a data stream. IPsec also includes protocols for establishing mutual authentication
between agents at the beginning of the session and negotiation of cryptographic keys to be
used during the session. It can be used to protect data flows between a pair of hosts (for
example, computer users or servers), between a pair of security gateways (for example, routers
or firewalls), or between a security gateway and a host. IPsec supports:

Network-level peer authentication.

Data origin authentication.

Data integrity.

Data confidentiality (encryption).

Replay protection.
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IPsec is integrated with Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS). Its policies can be assigned
through Group Policy, so IPsec settings can be configured at the domain, site, organizational unit,
or security group level.
Perimeter
Microsoft Forefront Threat Management Gateway (TMG) is an extensible platform that integrates
firewall and cache features and routes requests and responses between the Internet and client
computers. The firewall integration and cache features secure networks and improve their
performance. Forefront TMG also provides filtering to block access to specific sites and uses
network address translation (NAT) and other methods to enable secure access between an intranet
and the Internet.
Forefront TMG is an extensible platform that provides security, hardware redundancy, and load
balancing; efficient use of network resources through sophisticated caching mechanisms; and
administration tools. Its features are extensible by developers, and configuration tasks can be
automated. Forefront TMG runs on computers using Windows Server 2008, and it relies on the
features and functionality of that operating system. Forefront TMG includes several technologies:
Microsoft Firewall service.
A Web proxy.
Secure network address translation (SecureNAT).
Advanced caching capabilities, including RAM caching and use of the cache array routing
protocol (CARP).
Dynamic IP packet filtering.
Virtual private networking (VPN).
Alerting.
As your partner,
Microsoft is dedicated to helping you manage
risk with more
securely written applications
and platforms,
information,
guidance,
software tools,
management
software, and
cloud products.
As your partner, Microsoft is dedicated to helping you manage risk with more securely written
applications and platforms, information, guidance, software tools, management software, and
cloud products.Microsoft goes further by advocating for better security and aggressive thought
leadership in this area, in addition to returning our best practices to the ecosystem to help everyone
develop, deploy, and keep their IT infrastructure more secure.
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Chapter 4: Applying the reference

architecture framework
As we said at the beginning of this report, our key objective is to offer guidance to discrete
manufacturers on the routes to future success in the face of rapidly changing computing and
market environments. Our goal is to show how we at Microsoft, together with our partners,
proactively deliver the flexible tools and solutions necessary to support business initiatives and
to deliver on key imperatives such as greater innovation, improved operational performance, and
top-line growth. One of the primary challenges faced by IT in any manufacturing enterprise is that
of clearly delivering and deploying technologies that serve the needs of the business.
The DIRA
frameworks
role-based
productivity and
insights pillar
offers a number
of capabilities
that can
directly respond
to the issue
of collecting
information and
presenting it to
problem-solvers
in meaningful,
mind-opening
ways.
Business initiatives need to be transformed into solutions that deliver rapid business results,
are easy to use, leverage existing enterprise investments, and are cost-effective to implement
and deploy.
The framework described in Chapter 3 defined six key pillars (or themes) that, when appropriately
mapped against business requirements, yield these benefits in any solution being designed. The
pillars serve to bridge the gap between the business requirements and the technical components
identified as appropriate in serving those requirements. Microsoft partners are already delivering
solutions that align with many of the pillars and incorporate the solution building blocks (technical
components) previously detailed.
Lets return to the automotive engineering change management scenario we described in Chapter
3. Figure 36, shows the process map in the form of roles down the left-hand vertical columns and
activities in the process along the horizontal rows. To ensure that any technical solution meets the
needs of the business, it is crucial to first identify both the key issues that are important to the
business process and how those issues align with the business overall goals. Figure 36 also details a
set of sample business issues of concern to a hypothetical automotive company.
To ensure fast analysis of anomalies in vehicle performance and to reduce the chances of
prolonged corrective design iterations, ask: Do people have access to all of the information they
need at their fingertips? Information is typically distributed across engineering departments, dealer
service records, and supplier manufacturing reports. But an optimum solution also can rely on the
unstructured communications and tacit knowledge of experienced people both inside and outside
the company.
Here, the DIRA frameworks role-based productivity and insights pillar offers a number of
capabilities that can directly respond to the issue of collecting information and presenting it to
problem-solvers in meaningful, mind-opening ways. The technologies represented by this pillar
leverage integration with existing enterprise applications, LoB systems, and new data sources
such as social media.
Given the complexity of a manufacturers global supply network, ask: Can the company quickly find
the suppliers and expertise it needs to solve the problem? Does it have the necessary infrastructure
and tools to securely share information and collaborate within context to quickly develop solution
alternatives and proposals and to establish the specialized processes needed to execute rapidly?
The DIRA framework addresses these issues through the dynamic value networks pillar, which
focuses on multi-enterprise business processes across a far-flung network of suppliers.
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Is the company using state-of-the-art data collection technologies? Can it receive real-time data
from its products and analyze that data on the fly to detect anomalies and respond to problems
quickly? Remember that the price of delaying intervention when a problem arises can lead to huge
costs in recalls, legal exposure, and tarnished brand identity. Keeping in contact with the product not
only reduces corporate risks but presents a business opportunity for serving customers in new ways.
The smart connected devices pillar speaks to these trends and offers a rich set of foundational
technologies for building customized device communications solutions.
Figure 36: Process flow diagram for automotive engineering change management scenario
(refer to Chapter 3)
In summary, if the business initiatives and issues can be broken down into specific processes that
address the business, then those processes provide a backdrop through which you can examine
the best technology options for making that initiative happen or fixing a problem. As previously
discussed, the pillars offer guidance on the technical issues relevant to the business process and
point to the appropriate technology components to build the solution. Solution development
inherently requires a good understanding of technical issues and business processes. It also
thrives on give and take; businesses need people whose skills can cross business and technology
boundaries seamlessly.
The pillars in the Microsoft DIRA framework suggest solution components when the value
proposition of those pillars matches a business need. In the next steps, defining the specific
enterprise architecture solution helps solution developers choose components with confidence,
knowing that those components align with what needs to be done for the business.
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4.1 Applications and solutionsexamples

and best practices
In Chapter 3, we described a number of solution building blocks from Microsoft that support
the DIRA framework pillarsincluding Silverlight, SharePoint 2010, InfoPath Forms, and the KPI
templates of PerformancePoint, among othersthat can be used to construct or extend business
applications. This section, and the partner profiles in the Appendix that follows, features examples
of applications and solutions for the discrete manufacturing marketplace that Microsoft and some
of our top partners have developed in alignment with the DIRA framework.
4.1.1 Duet Enterprise: a foundation for role-based

productivity in SAP environments
Duet Enterprise, a software platform jointly developed by SAP and Microsoft, lets users work with
and extend SAP processes with SharePoint and Microsoft Office tools. With it, companies can
extract more value from their SAP and Microsoft investments. It combines the collaboration and
productivity supported by SharePoint and Microsoft Office with the business data and processing
functionality of SAP applications. Business users can create a unified, enterprise-wide view of the
data and tasks they need to increase productivity. As a platform, Duet Enterprise gives IT teams the
tools to more effectively serve the business and to support increased corporate agility.
By providing an industry-standard foundation, Duet Enterprise enables technical interoperability
between SAP applications and SharePoint. Add-on modules to both SharePoint and SAPs
NetWeaver software provide functionality. Figure 37 outlines the Duet Enterprise design. The
add-on for SharePoint enables connectivity to SAP applications. It also includes the integrated
security, authorization, and data models that let Duet Enterprise use SAP enterprise services within
SharePoint. The service consumption layer, which is an add-on module to SAPs NetWeaver,
enables streamlined access to SAP data models.
Figure 37: Duet Enterprise Architecture

As a foundation for interoperability, Duet Enterprise includes tools and business content to
accelerate the development of composite applications for SharePoint and SAP software. SAP tools
can be used to adapt and combine services, develop custom business logic, and modify existing
fields or add new ones. SharePoint Designer can be used to create external lists and document
libraries, in addition to designing views and forms. Visual Studio can be used to modify SharePoint
Designer solutions and create custom user experiences and data integrations. Duet Enterprise
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offers preconfigured business content, including SAP enterprise services and SharePoint external
lists and templates. It also provides a set of SharePoint user-interface templates. The business
content helps harmonize the user experience, thereby enabling quick solution composition,
because users can reuse existing content rather than starting development from scratch.
Duet Enterprises contextual workflow feature lets users address workflow approval requests that
are generated by SAP applications in their Outlook inbox or in their SharePoint task folder. With
this functionality, users can explore rich contextual information sources, approve requests using
email or a SharePoint task, and monitor and manage workflows as part of their SharePoint or
Microsoft Office tasks.
With Duet Enterprise sites, users can interact with selected content from SAP applications, such as
customer, quotation, or product information from the SAP ERP application. Duet Enterprise makes
this data available in SharePoint as a SharePoint site. The software filters any data presented in this
way based on user authorization and roles defined in the SAP software.
Duet Enterprise users can schedule reports or run them on an impromptu basis through
SharePoint. Users also can select reports from a catalog available in SharePoint and personalize
those reports using specific parameters. Reports requested in SharePoint are generated either by
SAPs NetWeaver Business Warehouse component or by SAP ERP.
With better
access to
information
throughout
the enterprise,
more people
can be active
participants
across the
business.
Finally, because Duet Enterprise interoperates with SharePoint, role-based productivity

implementations can augment SAP data and processes with those of other enterprise and LoB
applicationssuch as PLM, CRM, MES, and othersthereby yielding a powerful collaboration
bridge across the enterprise business. Specialized workflows can be easily and quickly defined,
and templates can be quickly customized to fit the changing needs of the business. With
better access to information throughout the enterprise, more people can be active participants
across the business.
4.1.2 Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012: familiar,

easy-to-use ERP for midsize and large manufacturers
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 is a comprehensive ERP solution for global organizations that
empowers people to work effectively, manage change, and compete globally. An integrated,
adaptable, business management solution in the Microsoft Dynamics line, AX 2012 streamlines
financial processes, customer relationship processes, and supply chain processes. Easy to use, it
works like and with familiar Microsoft software, easing adoption and reducing the risks inherent
with implementing a new solution. Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 can help companies run their
businesses across locations and countries by consolidating and standardizing processes, providing
visibility across an organization, and helping to simplify compliance.
Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 embodies many of the core principles of the DIRA frameworks
role-based productivity and insights pillar and the dynamic value networks pillar, thereby helping
customers become more agile and adaptable to changing business needs. It features more than
33 role centers that are tailored to organizational roles. These provide a central workspace
for users to start their work and organize their activities within the business application. The
information displayed in a role center, together with interactive Web Parts such as work lists,
simplifies access to data in the business application. This enables greater productivity and access
to data for decision-making.
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Figure 38: Microsoft Dynamics solution areas
4.2 Microsoft partner solutions
The Appendix following this chapter highlights several of the top Microsoft partners. These
companies are already delivering impactful solutions that align with the principles we discuss
in this report. Microsoft is deeply committed to working with our independent software vendor
(ISV) and solution integration (SI) partner communities as part of this initiative. Our goal is to
continue facilitating innovation broadly within the network, reinforcing mutual learning about
the needs of tomorrows markets and helping everyone involved respond rapidly and flexibly
to the needs of our joint customers.
4.3 Architecting solutions for change
The complexity of the changes taking place in the discrete manufacturing world, and in the wider
world of computing and communications technology, can be bewildering. Microsoft believes that a
simple, effective framework is needed to deal with changes in both of these worldsa framework
that accommodates legacy investments while remaining open to new possibilities in the future.
The model for manufacturing enterprise processes is shifting from large time-consuming projects
to shorter iterative cycles that have clear business value at the heart of each iteration. Much of
the manufacturing industry software is now moving into a self-service modeprovisioning a
team site for collaboration, building a role-based portal without development or IT involvement,
or performing complex analysis on large data sets through familiar and easy-to-use tools, among
other activities. Competitive differentiation and agility in discrete manufacturing will increasingly
come from software capabilities and solutions that leverage existing enterprise investments in
applications, data, and processes while putting more control in the hands of end users.
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To keep up with the demands of shortening time to solution and the need to quickly realize
business value, the pace of business software development, composition, and deployment also will
need to accelerate. Adaptive and lower cost software solutions will thrive in the new environment.
One typical approach to speeding solution development is designing templates and other layers of
software that capture the patterns of common business processes. Those templates and features
then can be customized and tailored into a customer-specific end solution. Certain capabilities
and technologies, particularly SharePoint as a collaboration platform, are becoming common in
the manufacturing world. This standardization provides a strong foundation on which to build
connectors, workflows, dashboards, and other reusable assets that can be quickly assembled,
customized, and deployed. The Appendix to this report contains case histories that demonstrate
this approach. These best practices and innovative solutions have been developed by some of the
key Microsoft industry partners.
Figure 39 illustrates a layered development approach for accelerating the design of business
solutions with improved functionality and lower total cost of ownership. Along the base of the
diagram are the foundational infrastructure components and applications that both exist today
and continue to grow and evolve to meet application needs. The infrastructure provides scale,
performance, and reach while lowering IT costs and facilitating innovation in the application space.
Above the infrastructure, and extending the reach of applications, Figure 39 shows a number
of components and accelerators. These provide greater application functionality, workflows, and
integration between structured and unstructured business processes.
Figure 39: Layered solution development facilitates faster deployments with better
total cost of ownership
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Duet Enterprise illustrates the ideas we have presented in this report. Out of the box, it is an
integrated platform between SAPs business processes and SharePoints reach and access. Many
applications can be built atop this platform in a consistent, standard way without worrying about
the plumbing that connects its various pieces. Software developers, together with business
architects, can design and build more functionally rich, reusable, industry-specific templates with
these components to help shorten time to value. Those components include predefined InfoPath
Forms, predefined KPI templates, SharePoint Web Parts, Business Connectivity Services connectors
for various common industry LoB applications, predefined Workflows, and so on. And finally, once
deployed, a number of self-service tools enable business users to modify the system to suit their
changing needs, thereby enabling flexibility and agility across the enterprise.
Microsoft
has the tools,
partners, and
solutions necessary to help
manufacturers
not just survive,
but thrive, in this
fast-changing
hyperconnected
environment.
Ultimately, simplicity, ease-of-use, and adaptability to changing business needs are all part of an
ongoing journeyone that Microsoft focuses on continuously.
4.4 Conclusion
You will undoubtedly encounter endless streams of messages about the world being flattened,
about glocalization, about the transformative power of new technologies, and about the need to
stay competitive through perpetual innovation. We have taken you on a journey that pragmatically
links the concerns at the forefront of manufacturing businesses with the enabling power of the vast
portfolio of Microsoft technologies and tools. Together with our partners innovations that harness
this potential, Microsoft believes the future has arrivedand it is vital to your competitive survival.
We have tried to outline the forces propelling the world into a new age. As we see it, the global
revolution in communications, economic liberalization, and growth, are placing unprecedented
strains on manufacturers. For those enterprises that came to maturity in an environment where
competition was local, where customers chased products, and where different corporate
departments wereat bestislands of automation, the strains are especially wrenching.
Manufacturers today are more likely to face a skilled, motivated competitor from the opposite side
of the planet than one from the other side of town. Complicating matters, a widely read blogger
who has a bad experience with a product can damage the worldwide reputation of that product
and its maker with a keystroke. And that same blogger will find offers for competing products from
other, more plugged-in manufacturers inside his or her in-box within hours.
And in the new age of productivity, manufacturers that have engineers who are not on a first-name
basis and sharing data with their marketers, factory managers, and designerswherever they may
be located around the worldare at a competitive disadvantage compared to competitors that
have embraced the productivity revolution. So they need to stay focused on imperatives that drive
sustainable advantageinnovate continuously, stay focused on operational performance, and
leverage new digital capabilities to drive growth through improved sales, marketing, and services.
We know that the challenges this new world presents to manufacturers can be daunting. But
Microsoft has the tools, partners, and solutions necessary to help manufacturers not just survive,
but thrive, in this fast-changing hyper-connected environment. And so we stand ready to shape
the world of manufacturingare you?
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GR O W TH
Transforming
manufacturing: driving
growth
Sales and marketing organizations are exploring new ways
to better engage with the connected customer. They want to
increase consumer interest in a world where those consumers
are deluged with offers from every organizationbig, small,
global, or localand convert that interest into leads that may
become sales. Sales and marketing also are experimenting with
new techniques to provide higher levels of customer service
through the real-time, connected, and interactive nature of the
web. The traditional retail model is uneconomic, and upfront
information services have become largely irrelevant. In
almost all markets, consumers now have more information in
their hands than there is available in the showroom, and they
prefer new web-centric tools to interact with customer service
as opposed to traditional call centers. The shopper journey has
become almost totally electronic, with the number and variety
of touchpoints for products growing exponentially. As todays
physical retail assets struggle to support the changing demand,
how are companies enriching their marketing, sales, and service
models with new technologies to address this demand?
The first strategy is digital marketing, using the power of being
connected to engage with customerscurrent and future
both online and in the store. By exploiting the potential of a
natural user interface to foster digital marketing, manufacturers
can enable rich, engaging showroom-like experiences online
or when people visit the showroom.
The second strategy is engagement in social media and

integrating this engagement into an effective advanced CRM
process. Social is here to stay, but there are many questions
about its role in marketing, sales, and service. Customers are
spending time on social networks and using microblogs such
as Twitter to post questions about products and services. The
service experience can be a differentiator when the responses
are immediate and relevant, compared with the long wait
times of call centers, and several companies are incorporating
tools and processes around social media. Organizations need
to engage and participate, but also balance, their investment
and use of social media with their more traditional (digital)
channels of communication. Within the enterprise, salespeople
can follow activity feeds and updates related to customer
accounts and engagements, enabling them to stay on top of
the process and respond to threats and opportunities quickly.
The third strategy is the use of cloud technology to lower the
cost of entry to new markets, to make sharing of information
easier, to support the creation and operation of dynamic
business networks, and to experiment with new services.
Whether coordinating a product launch, harvesting insights
through digital content on social media, or servicing customers
interactively, the cloud offers a level of flexibility and reach
through elastic compute and storage capabilities that were
heretofore unavailable.
Finally, connected deviceswhether consumer electronics,
automobiles, or industrial equipmentare driving a new
source of rich data. These new data sources are huge, creating
a demand for new storage and analytics solutions. These
solutions can process data in real time and analyze large
volumes to identify new insights and trends.
Partners working with Microsoft to deliver solutions that
leverage these and other DIRA concepts include NewsGator
and PROS.
2012.PartProsV3.indd 85
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NEWSGATOR
Partner Profile
Using social business solutions to empower

connected manufacturing organizations
NewsGators role in the Microsoft Discrete Manufacturing
Reference Architecture (DIRA)
Manufacturing is a highly distributed industry with
vendors, suppliers, plants, subsidiaries, and employees in
many countries. Being able to connect them, proactively
adapt to market needs, and collaborate in a central
portal regardless of location is the nexus of an agile and
adaptive industry.
By spanning the Microsoft stack and key DIRA pillars,

NewsGators social capabilities bridge technologies,
processes, and protocols in the strictly controlled world of
enterprise systems, making discrete manufacturers more
agile, adaptable, and able to compete. Heres how:
Crossing the Chasm author Geoffrey Moore describes in

his AIIM white paper titled Systems of Engagement and
the Future of Enterprise IT that although traditional IT
systems (which he calls systems of record) are a necessity, the source of competitive differentiation will shift to
systems of engagementthat is, adapting social applications from the consumer world for business purposes.
Perhaps the biggest drain on manufacturing productivity

is the fragmentation of enterprise data and knowledge
across departmental silos. In their quest to root out
inefficiencies and evolve business processes to improve
production, employees waste valuable time trying to
find the right information and the right expert. NewsGator makes it easy to quickly find relevant information
and expertise in the context of an employees role or
activity. Using profile and skills matching, smart filtering,
tagged information, industry-specific taxonomies, and
@targeting, employees have precisely the information
they need to do their jobs well and to bridge the gaps in
knowledge between other employees and departments.
DIRA is the Microsoft framework to bridge these worlds,

and NewsGatorthe leading enterprise social computing provider for Microsoftfits squarely into the framework. Using the DIRA principles together with NewsGator gives discrete manufacturers the ability to unify,
function, and compete in an increasingly social world.
Role-based productivity and insights
How NewsGator helps manufacturers

apply the DIRA framework
NewsGator integrates effortlessly into the Microsoft stack.

It takes advantage of existing capabilities while broadening
the depth of information sharing, learning, and business process management that becomes possible when
manufacturers deploy social throughout their operations.
NewsGator Social Sites lets manufacturers using Microsoft
technologies not only create social profiles and collaborate
within communities but also access and contribute to the
knowledge base from anywhere in the world via mobile
devices, spur ideas and innovation to facilitate timely decision-making, filter and route relevant information in activity
streams to each individual, recognize top contributors to
business processes and product improvement, and use
microblogging and video streaming to propagate learning
and best practices throughout the organization.
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Smart connected devices
Social business
Social business within the DIRA framework also

enables manufacturers to collaborate and share
knowledge in real time with partners and customers.
Direct customer engagement can capitalize on customer insights and experiences to improve products,
perception, and, ultimately, manage a global brand.
With NewsGator, information gathering happens in
real time with both experts and customers, taking
the guesswork out of understanding customer perceptions. Users can quickly discover what customers
are thinking and what they want, so the company
can develop relevant solutions faster. NewsGator accelerates ideation using social concepts like polling,
crowd-sourcing, and collective intelligence.
NewsGators Glassboard social mobile capability

helps manufacturers bridge internal conversations
and communications with partners, customers, and
other external stakeholders to maximize agility and
responsiveness within the enterprise.
Glassboard was designed from the ground up as a
private sharing social networking application with
strong security built in. It uses services based on
Windows Azure services to let users engage in private sharing with external stakeholders using mobile
devices. With the Glassboard integration for SharePoint, each conversation is kept within the group to
streamline solutions and maintain group goals.
Glassboard can be accessed by a wide range of native mobile clients, including iPhone, iPad, Android,
and Windows Phone 7, and through Office 365.
A common thread
Manufacturing remains a highly distributed industry, with vendors, suppliers, plants, subsidiaries, and
employees in many countries. Being able to connect them, proactively adapt to market needs, and
collaborate in a central portal regardless of location
is the nexus of an agile and adaptive industry. Using
the DIRA principles together with NewsGator gives
discrete manufacturers the ability to unify, function,
and compete in an increasingly social world.
Case study: IM Flash Technologies
Dynamic business networks
NewsGator enables manufacturers to create dynamic

business networks between partners or geographically distributed groups by opening new channels
of communications. It provides portal-based team
collaboration capabilities, such as wikis and microblogging, that enable spontaneous knowledge
sharing. Social Sites supports Microsoft Office 365
and Microsoft SharePoint Online, and is dedicated
to providing convenient cloud-based access for
collaboration with easily managed access for trusted
outside users.
IM Flash Technologies is an example of a discrete

manufacturer applying the social computing principles of DIRA using NewsGator Social Sites. The
Utah-based company is a joint venture of Micron
Technology and Intel formed to manufacture nonvolatile memory, specifically NAND Flash memory,
for use in consumer electronics, removable storage,
and handheld communication devices.
IM Flash Technologies uses SharePoint exclusively for
its intranet. To save costs, the company wanted to
use as much of its existing infrastructure for its social
computing platform as possible. Finding a solution
like Social Sites that fit perfectly with our SharePoint
model was a godsend, said Brian Hunter, the companys Corporate Communications Lead.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
NEWSGATORContinued
Hunter said the company had three strategic objectives for its NewsGator deployment: enhanced
employee engagement, improved access to experts,
and more fluid free-flow of ideas. But opening
up IM Flash Technologies to social computing was
initially a tough sell to the risk-averse management
team. In a market characterized by razor-thin profit
margins, the company was challenged by the need
to improve its speed and innovation in product development while maintaining strong protection for its
intellectual property. NewsGators tight integration
with Microsoft technologies and its security mechanisms allayed those anxieties.
With NewsGator, IM Flash Technologies is starting to

bring connected devices into the network to facilitate
a freer flow of information, collaboration, and access to expertise. Younger workers are accustomed
to using consumer-based social computing tools.
With Social Sites, we can offer similar tools designed
specifically for business purposes, while maintaining
tight security controls, Hunter said. Providing tools
in an environment that matches workers experiences
can be an important way to recruit and retain employees, and it helps ensure that business processes
happen through the companys business systems
instead of an external web source. Hunter said.
Role-based productivity was a key pillar the company wanted to address with NewsGator. IM Flash
Technologies has more than 1,600 employees
segmented into large groups of knowledge workers who require significant amounts of information
to do their jobs. But the companys hierarchical
structure can sometimes inhibit individual role
contribution. Role-based productivity is huge here.
Thats one reason why the NewsGator/SharePoint
platform is such an attractive solution. We are a
hierarchical organization by nature, and the transparency of social computing can run counter to our
very nature, Hunter said. We realized that being
more transparent and opening up new channels of
communication across the enterprise can help us
achieve those goals.
Perhaps the biggest improvement IM Flash Technologies sought with social computing was employee
engagement. Hunter said the company was strongly
influenced by studies that showed higher employee
satisfaction correlated directly with their ability to
communicate better and contribute more visibly to
company objectives. We learned that employees
like to be part of change management, he said..
They like collaborating directly with senior leaders.
They like to be involved in cross-functional communications. And job satisfaction ultimately benefits
the company not only in employee retention but in
improved product ideation and performance.
Support for smart connected devices was another

important issue IM Flash Technologies needed to
address with NewsGator. With intellectual property
protection a top concern, the company once had
strict access policies against the use of personal
mobile and computing devices in the enterprise. But
IM Flash Technologies realized it couldnt continue
to stand still in the face of fast-paced technological
changes and the changing generational needs of its
increasingly younger workforce.
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Conclusion
The Microsoft DIRA frameworkguided by six

themes that enhance innovation and productivity
helps discrete manufacturers select the right nextgeneration technologies to improve performance
and profitability and to create an adaptive, engaged,
and agile business. Social computing technologies
like NewsGator are key elements in this framework,
enhancing cross-functional and cross-organizational
collaboration, and enabling manufacturers to innovate new customer-focused products faster.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
PROS
Partner Profile
PROS + Microsoft deliver pricing and sales

effectiveness solutions from global service part
manufacturers big data
The worldwide service parts manufacturing industry
generates more than $1 trillion in annual revenue
worldwide. While the industry remains an industrial and
economic force, a series of trends have forced suppliers
to find ways to become leaner and more efficient.
Faced with pressure to cut supplier prices, higher costs
for critical raw materials, and increased competition,
suppliers have focused primarily on efforts to rationalize
capacity and production, and the results have had little
positive influence on manufacturers margins.
The most powerful profit

lever: pricing
The game has changed, and organizations are requiring

a new approach to business practicesincluding more
strategic use of the most powerful lever of all: pricing. But
maximizing the impact of pricing on business performance
is not without its own set of challenges. Accurate pricing
decisions must be made quickly, and many manufacturers
struggle with time-consuming manual processes of
gathering data, analyzing it, and reviewing market trends.
You can rise to this challenge by equipping your sales
teams with the appropriate tools to help manage the
process, enabling you to spend your time acting on big
data instead of gathering and analyzing it.
Imagine your sales force has the ability to improve its
win rate, leave less money on the table, and have a
more effective selling capacity. PROS and Microsoft
can make this vision a reality by giving your sales teams
access to critical information, including active sales
leads, pending work items, email, alerts, price approvals,
work documents, and the customer relationship
management pipeline, all from within familiar user
interfaces that have been tailored to their specific
business role and connected to market and company
data sources. With this solution, sales professionals
can initiate price and quote requests and receive a
scientifically generated price recommendation from
the PROS optimization engine, enabled by Microsofts
Discrete Industry Reference Architecture (DIRA)
Framework technologies.
Sales professionals gain further views into the rationale

for their recommended pricing through information
such as target prices, customers willingness to pay, last
price quoted, changes in costs of goods, and market
averages. Salespeople are able to collaborate among
the sales team and among the broader organization,
empowering them with both internal and external
expertise and knowledge in their negotiations. Armed
with this insight, they have valid and actionable data
to improve their confidence and make contract
negotiations less risky. In addition, sales professionals
can quickly generate price quotes and send them to
their customers using an automatically populated email
template. By leveraging the power of informed pricing,
coupled with familiar and easy-to-use tools, your sales
team is able to drive improved financial performance.
Harnessing the power and promise

of pricing
PROS, a Microsoft partner with gold and silver

competencies, is a world leader in prescriptive pricing
and revenue management software for companies in
the manufacturing, distribution, services, and travel
industries. Through advanced pricing science, PROS
helps businesses address their most critical pricing issues
and overcome problems that can result in lost revenues
and eroding margins. PROS gives customers far greater
confidence in their pricing strategies by providing
data-driven insights into transaction profitability and
forecasting demand.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PROs Continued
By utilizing PROS Pricing analysis software, customers

gain insight into pricing strategies, identify
detrimental pricing practices, optimize pricing
decisions, and improve business processes as well as
financial performance.
PROS and Microsoft are working together to provide
a tighter coupling of Microsofts DIRA Framework
technologies. The goal is to provide customers with
the powerful combination of the two companies key
strengths: Microsofts ubiquitous, easy-to-use, widely
adopted and supported productivity tools and PROS
scientific, dynamic, and feature-rich pricing functionality.
PROS and Microsoft recognize that the full potential of
a high-performance pricing solution can be more fully
realized when the power of advanced science-based
pricing is made as approachable as possible to all users.
About Microsofts DIRA foundation
Microsofts Discrete Industry Reference Architecture

(DIRA) provides a framework to help manufacturers
improve their agility, competitiveness, and profitability. It
currently includes six themes that address key business
needs for discrete manufacturers as they shift toward
a more connected, engaged, agile, knowledge-driven
organization. Microsoft technologies, such as SharePoint
and SQL Server, anchor these pillars, forming the
foundation of a secure, scalable, adaptive architecture.
The framework offers a set of guiding principles to help
manufacturers select the strategic technologies best suited
for their particular business objectives. This approach
enables discrete manufacturers to bridge business and
technology requirements with a few governing principles
that ultimately lead to a connected, engaged, dynamic
enterprise. Here are the pillars:
> Natural user experiences to simplify human-computer
interfaces through natural or intuitive inputs like touch,
voice, and gestures.
> Role-based productivity and insights to empower
authentic employee engagement across a distributed
enterprise as a venue for immediate and relevant
collaboration around processes and information to
faciliatate decision-making.
> Social business to create connections among
knowledgeable people and networks of experts to
optimize knowledge sharing and skill usage both
internally and externally.
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> Smart connected devices to enable real-time access

via mobile devices to perform real-time analytics and to
capitalize on business opportunities.
> Dynamic business networks to form quick and flexible
connections through the value chain to help manufacturers
leverage the benefits of an agile connected enterprise
across complex business and consumer networks, including
rapid response and innovation.
> Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure provides
a cost-effective foundation of software and hardware
across mobile devices, desktops, and data centers to
support a distributed organization.
Using technologies that span these six themes increases
efficiencies and boosts performance faster in a
contemporary agile manufacturing environment than do
traditional approaches.
The combined power of PROS

and DIRA
PROS and Microsoft understand that successful pricing

software needs to deliver meaningful business intelligence
to front-line sellers in real-time and to integrate with
your existing tools and business processes. For example,
PROS integration with Microsoft SharePoint facilitates
collaboration among sales teams and others across
the organization, enabling sellers to stay abreast of
activities and conversations with customers and other
stakeholders through social techniques, seeking advice and
collaborating within the context of their business.
Where PROS stood out relative to the competition
was in the flexibility of the solution and the speed
of implementation. Total cost of ownership was
another key driving factor. Sanjay Seth, Partner,
Carlisle & Company
2/11/13 11:44 AM
PROS and Microsoft are committed to helping companies

everywhere leverage their existing Microsoft DIRA
Framework to realize what pricing optimization can mean
for their profitability. Through this cooperation, the PROS
Pricing Solution Suite combines scientific, dynamic, and
feature-rich pricing functionality with the power of Microsoft
SQL Server 2012. The solution works seamlessly with
Microsoft Office, Microsoft SharePoint Server, and other
tools, such as Microsoft PowerPivot, to provide world-class
pricing capabilities to customers in a familiar context. By
deploying SQL Server 2012 Analysis Services in tabular
mode, PROS customers can pull data from multiple sources
and cache it in an in-memory columnstore index. The
xVelocity engine, which also includes data compression
algorithms, increases query speed and reduces or eliminates
the need for prebuilt aggregate solutions.
High user adoption rates
Using the integrated solution, businesses are able to

make more informed, less risky pricing decisions with
high user adoption and outstanding software cost/
performance ratios.
Summary
Recurring profits
With PROS software built on the Microsoft DIRA

Framework, companies are able to gain higher profits year
after year. Improved margin opportunities are embedded
into a companys systems, providing real, hard-dollar
margin and revenue improvements.
Smarter pricing decisions
The combination of PROS and the business intelligence

capabilities of SQL Server provide critical information to
drive better pricing decisions. Sales professionals gain
key insights, such as what other customers are paying for
products, what the products cost to manufacture, and
what are acceptableas well as idealprofit margins, to
give them greater confidence in selling. Through sciencebased pricing guidance, complemented by the simplicity
and ease-of-use of Microsofts DIRA solutions, PROS
empowers salespeople to close the best deals every time.
Reduced risks
Because PROS brings rigor and accountability to pricing,

our software provides governance that minimizes the risk
inherent in the complex pricing process. PROS provides a
single source where every price point can be documented
and supported.
PROS relies on familiar Microsoft interfaces with built-in

and custom web parts, which makes our solutions easy
to use and manage. These web parts can be displayed
based on the user role, so that users in specific groups or
business functions see information that is relevant to them.
Customers can continue to use familiar tools, such as
Microsoft Office and Excel, and interact with PROS pricing
capabilities, which are embedded into those tools.
Outstanding cost/performance ratios
In addition to reducing licensing costs, most PROS

customers gain better performance while using existing
server hardware. Based on the Microsoft DIRA Framework,
PROS meets the needs of enterprise customers while
reducing their total cost of ownership.
High-performing businesses recognize pricing capabilities

as one of the strongest profit-improvement levers. Placing
the most advanced pricing information within reach of
everyday users is a key way to realize the benefits from
pricing capabilities. Using expertise from PROS and
Microsoft, companies can focus on common tools as
the critical enablers for realizing the full value of pricing
systems for the entire company.
After an exhaustive review of advanced pricing
software vendors, it became very clear to us that
PROS is the right partner to support our profitable
growth initiatives and to improve operating ease and
speed for our dealer network. Joel Larsen, Director
of Pricing & Strategic Initiatives, Navistar Parts
Deeper integration between PROS pricing solutions
and the Microsoft technology stack brings the power of
advanced, science-based pricing to business users through
Microsofts familiar and widely adopted productivity
tools. It promotes an advanced, rich, and customizable
workspace for the end user while providing enterprises the
infrastructure to add additional capabilities and integration
points as necessary for their businesses.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
P ERF O R M ANCE
Transforming
manufacturing: enhancing
performance
Manufacturers that have the ability to monitor equipment performance and communicate timely and detailed information when
production or quality are trending in an unexpected way have a
greater ability to control costs and proactively manage operations.
Broad access to such information enables operators and managers
to collaborate and take action before things actually go wrong. Being proactive and anticipating actual production disruptions helps
manage inventories better and achieve the perfect order fulfillment, which in turn increases customer satisfaction and competitive
advantage.
In todays manufacturing environment, 80 percent of operational
personnel do not have the means or the accessibility to track performance of production, process, or assets in real time. Plant floor
and supply chain personnel can only react to disruptions after the
fact; for example, when the wrong inventory was already produced,
often causing over 10 percent of unnecessary inventory and missed
opportunities to reduce operational cost. Although equipment uptime and yield management provide useful performance indicators,
without the tools to monitor and analyze real-time performance of
equipment, disruptions and unplanned downtime can result in less
than 60 percent of total manufacturing productivitya situation
that manufacturing organizations cannot afford anymore. Leveraging advances in cloud computing, mobile devices, and big data,
Microsoft partners are transforming operations in ways that were
difficult or impossible before.
Consider M.G. Bryan, a heavy equipment manufacturer and

supplier of industrial equipment such as fracking trucks used in
natural gas extraction. This equipment operates in harsh conditions in remote locations where there is no IT infrastructure to
be connected 24x7. Every 200 hours, a change of oil is required;
every 5,000 hours, the equipment needs an overhaul. Without
timely preventive maintenance, a $60 dollar partsuch as a filterfailing can cause the entire equipment, a $1 million dollar
asset, to breakdown with severe damage. The accompanying
downtime could mean potentially millions of dollars in lost production. Maintenance is performed based on given schedules,
regardless of the actual condition of the equipment, because
stocking, transportation, and resources are not easily accessible
in remote locations. This makes the operation costly, and there
is no way to determine root causes of failure. Through a solution developed by Microsoft partner Rockwell Automation, M.G.
Bryan adopted a cloud and mobile infrastructure from Microsoft
to transform asset monitoring and maintenance.
M.G. Bryan periodically transfers controller dataa large volume of sensor datato the cloud, where it can be stored, correlated, augmented, and analyzed to provide intelligent business information. Operators, managers, and service providers
can detect actual equipment condition, failure indications and
patterns, drill down into root cause analysis granularly, anticipate
fixes, and respond proactively to minimize production impact.
The cloud-based solution enables mobile connectivity so that
apps provide real-time status, alerts, and remote commands,
anywhere and on any device. M.G. Bryan can now offer new
services for preventive maintenance and new services to overhaul and retrofit old fleets, both of which represent new revenue
streams. M.G. Bryan is also experiencing parts inventory reduction; the company can better manage maintenance crews. In
addition, its IT cost has dropped, due to the elasticity of the
cloud, enabling M.G. Bryan to monitor either a few or many
trucks at once. Plus, its O&G customers can monitor the performance of multiple sites from the back office, a practice that
used to be done only a few times a month, required physical
visits to sites, and delayed the upload of data for analytics and
KPI reporting.
Partners working with Microsoft to deliver solutions that leverage these and other DIRA concepts include Apriso, Camstar,
ICONICS, Rockwell Automation, Siemens MES, and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
APRISO
Partner Profile
Apriso + Microsoft deliver real-time visibility and

control over global manufacturing operations
Challenges and business trends
Real-time intelligence, analysis and decision support

are paramount to addressing the needs of todays
global manufacturers. Challenges include managing operations through multiple, disparate systems,
equipment, manufacturing models and a wide
range of labor skill sets. These challenges are only
compounded for those manufacturers operating
with a large network of 20, 50 or even more than
100 manufacturing facilities around the globe.

The increasingly competitive nature of business
is also applying pressure on todays manufacturers. The need for faster product introduction
coupled with increasing product proliferations has
compounded the difficulty for manufacturers to effectively manage their business, extend continuous
improvement and drive costs out.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
APRISO Continued
Business opportunity
In this ever-shifting global marketplace, manufacturing excellence depends on managing, controlling and synchronizing all production processes
across the enterprise and extended product supply
network quickly and efficiently in order to effectively respond to market pressures and surge
ahead of the competition. Getting there requires an
integrated solution for manufacturing operations
management that synchronizes activities across one
location or many, with as little interruption to the
business as possible. Further, this solution must aggregate data from multiple plants, warehouses and
third party contractors. It must collaborate workflows between multiple facilities to enable better
control and visibility to synchronize materials and
processes across the global enterprise.
With an integrated solution for

manufacturing operations management
manufacturers can:
> Accelerate engineering changes and new product
introductions
> Track performance, in real-time, across their
manufacturing and product supply network
> Manage product and process traceability and
genealogy on a global scale
> Synchronize manufacturing operations with demand to cut costs, inventory and waste
> Drive operational excellence across manufacturing and supply chain operations
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The best solution ensures ease of use, acceptance

and enablement by end users, without the burden of Manufacturing IT cost increases. And, the
enabling technology should be globally pervasive
while supporting local idiosyncrasies in order to effectively support all operations and geographies.
The right solution and technology

Microsofts Reference Architecture for Discrete Industries (DiRA) outlines a best practices framework
and approach that is ideal for global manufacturers. Aprisos FlexNet solutions including its Global
Manufacturing Suite, complements this reference
architecture to effectively address the challenges
faced by todays global manufacturers. Applying
Microsoft technology such as SQL Server, BizTalk,
SharePoint, and Silverlight while aligning to DiRA,
FlexNet reduces the barriers of information flow,
improves visibility and allows manufacturers to synchronize operations in order to achieve and sustain
manufacturing excellence.
Achieve better visibility across global

Proliferation of manufacturing data such as product genealogy, location and quality specifications
across multiple enterprise / plant-level databases
and complex supply chains inevitably results in
poor data accuracy and untimely access to data to
perform analyses. Aprisos FlexNet provides better
visibility to analyze quality, operational and other
trends across multiple, disparate enterprise systems
by establishing a platform for manufacturing operations management that complements existing ERP
and manufacturing databases. This enables global
manufacturers to improve control over global
product and process traceability through detailed
genealogy and quality root cause analysis.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Improve responsiveness and control across

Aprisos FlexNet not only provides visibility and
monitors manufacturing performance at a global
level, but offers a platform to consistently execute
standardized business processes on an enterprise
wide basis. An example of this multi-facility business process is containment, sometimes referred
to as Spill Containment or Global Containment.
Through collaboration, action and business processes, as highlighted in Microsofts DiRA, Aprisos
FlexNet enables manufacturers to respond quickly
and efficiently to unplanned manufacturing events
that could impact product quality. The result is
global containment of product defects with corrective business processes that can be implemented quickly to resolve manufacturing processes,
engineering related quality issues, or contractor
quality challenges.
Based on the synergy with Microsoft DiRA pillars

representing Business Intelligence, Business Process Management/Integration and Collaboration,
Aprisos Microsoft-based FlexNet leverages Microsofts leading technology capabilities to create proven business value. As a result, a combined Apriso
and Microsoft solution provides global manufacturers an enterprise level solution for manufacturing
operations management that enables the necessary
visibility, control and synchronization to achieve and
sustain manufacturing excellence.
Better synchronization across global

product supply network
Detailed real-time visibility and cross-facility business processes together enable better synchronization of supply and demand across the global
supply chain. An example is synchronizing material
flows from subcontract manufacturing operations
to OEMs and leveraging alternative parts as a result
of the original part defect and subsequent part
containment. In completing the scenario, Aprisos
Microsoft enabled solution helps manufacturers
to synchronize operations, reducing the impact of
daily disruptions and challenges.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
CAMSTAR
Partner Profile
One seamless platform,

advancing product quality
Camstars Enterprise-class software Platform is
built to Advance Product Quality by unifying collaborative design, planning, supply, manufacturing, and customer experience through an enterprise closed-loop quality process. The capabilities
and architecture allow companies to get the most
out of their IT investments.
Camstars Enterprise Platform leverages leading
edge technologies available in the marketplace
today - a service-oriented architecture, a flexible
data model and a configurable user interface - that
dramatically decrease the time and effort necessary
to deploy and validate the solution.
Key components to Camstar's

technology
Easy-to-Use Common Web User Interface

Camstar offers an advanced Web User Experience
in which role-based access is precisely aligned
with job functions, making users more productive,
effective and efficient. The design supports delivering specific relevant information to each person
whether operators, engineers, technicians, managers or executives so they can quickly assess and
respond to conditions that are meaningful to them.
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Common web services framework

The common service oriented architecture loosely
couples the user interface and the application
services, making it possible to assemble the exact
functionality a user needs under a single User Interface. It also simplifies interoperability among Camstar services and external applications and systems,
accelerating integration and minimizing maintenance
efforts.
Open technology for true composite

applications
Every business functional element is broken down
into self-contained Camstar Application Services
components. These components are exposed and
presented to end users as specialized User Interface
compartments (Web Parts). The underlying Application Services provide a robust portfolio of Composite Applications for Manufacturing, Quality and
Intelligence.
Camstars Unified Development Environment is
based on open industry Technology Standards such
as XML messaging, Web Services, WS-I Basic Profile,
and WS*. It allows its customers to easily build and/
or extend the composite applications. The prepackaged UI capabilities also make it easy for system
administrators to build, extend and deploy Windows
forms or Web-based user interfaces that consume
services exposed by the functional elements.

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Security
Camstar security is based on the Role-Based Access
Control (RBAC) model, ideal for enterprise wide
deployments. Authentication relies upon the Microsoft Windows Active Directory integration, and
authorization policy is implemented on the platform
as a specialized service. Access is assigned by role
according to job function, and roles are organized
in a hierarchy. The result is that users can have
unique access and authority based on their roles,
the manufacturing site and function, all through a
single login.
Camstar fully supports electronic signature validation and role-based configuration that comply fully
with FDA Title 21 CFR Part 11.
Interoperability
Business logicwithout code

Configurable business logic, rather than hard-coded
logic, allows Camstars applications to be tailored to
meet unique business requirements without changing or recompiling program code. Camstars serverside logic approach makes it possible to:
> Present the application to users through only a
browser
> Easily integrate Camstars solutions with existing
systems while ensuring integrity of the application
> Minimize validation when configuring business
logic or upgrading
> Make new functionality available without disrupting operations
Internationalization
> Designed specifically for use in global, distributed
enterprises, Camstar provides:
> Date and time stamps recorded in both GMT
and local time to facilitate analysis of data across
multiple time zones
> Support for multiple simultaneous user interface
languages, including the ability to toggle between languages
> User-defined labels for all languages to allow
end-user localization
Camstars robust services-oriented architecture

(SOA) unifies the many applications that operate
in a manufacturing environment. Employing Web
services and OPC interfaces, the architecture simplifies implementation and ongoing maintenance
of even the most complex business processes. The
architecture includes configurable data transport,
messaging and business process management.
As a result, Camstars solutions easily interoperate
with business applications and shop floor applicationswithout the costs associated with traditional
connection methods.
One seamless platform, advancing

productq quality
Camstars Enterprise Platform seamlessly integrates
Camstar Manufacturing, Camstar Quality and Camstar Intelligence to Advance Product Quality.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
ICONICS
Partner Profile
Visual intelligence for

operational excellence
Microsoft Discrete Manufacturing Reference
Architecture Framework
Overview
This document identifies and describes the various

ways that ICONICS software utilizes aspects of the
DIRA framework from Microsoft. The following sections describe alignment with some of the solution
pillars together with specific examples illustrating key
points.
Natural user interface
ICONICS software takes advantage of many of the

user interface improvements that Microsoft has
made available in its latest platform, in order to
offer its customers a truly rich user experience. This
includes features such as Multi-Touch, Office-style
ribbons, and Taskbar integration including jump lists,
progress indicators, and notification icons.
Multi-Touch is a particularly compelling advance in
the Manufacturing industry for more intuitive navigation within a 2D and 3D environment. For manufacturing companies who want a rich, immersive user
interface on operator workstations for example,
ICONICS offers Multi-Touch gestures such as zoom,
pan, and rotate to navigate through their buildings,
assembly lines and equipment.
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ICONICS GraphWorX64 support for

multi-touch gestures
ICONICS also emphasizes a consistent experience

across multiple platforms. Whether the user is accessing their information via a SharePoint dashboard, a
rich desktop application, any Web browser, or even a
Windows Phone 7 device, there is strong consistency
across all environments thanks to the fact that ICONICS built its visualization using Microsofts Silverlight
technology.
Role-based productivity & insights
An ideal operation should have a unified visual

intelligence system to reach any and all parts of the
enterprise in real time from anywhere with contextualized information, so people are empowered to make
smart decisions fast. Plant floor and business systems
should be connected to present key performance
indicators (KPIs or results) in real time within a given
business context. The greatest benefit occurs when
the necessary information is available to people at all
levels at all times.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
ICONICS Energy AnalytiX solution for energy management leverages StreamInsight

technology to:
> Monitor energy consumption data and process
raw data coming in from meters and devices
> Process weather data to output degree days
> Aggregate and roll up energy consumption data
to higher levels of the enterprise
> Calculate carbon footprint based by consumption
and energy source type(s)
ICONICS application architecture
The most open approach is to create corporate

SharePoint portals to show KPIs, OEE data, realtime plant information, alarm notifications, business
information, and other shared documents. Such
portals can link to various third-party databases,
programmable logic controllers, devices, and business applications, capturing data and turning it into
actionable intelligence. ICONICS utilizes SharePoint
2010 because it offers a wide breadth of business
intelligence features out of the box, and adds value
to that platform by providing ICONICS manufacturing intelligence web parts for a unified dashboard.
SQL Server CLR integration is another feature that

ICONICS has chosen to use across many of its solutions. This helps ICONICS to facilitate the complex
task of processing massive amounts of information
for analysis and transforming it into key performance
indicators (KPIs) that are both meaningful and useful
for consumption by operators, plant managers, and
corporate level executives. ICONICS Productivity
Analytics OEE and Downtime solution is another example of a manufacturing intelligence product that
leverages this powerful technology. CLR integration
has enabled ICONICS to deliver intuitive KPI charts
for analyzing equipment performance and efficiency
such as those shown below, that were previously
cumbersome (if not impossible) to create using standard T-SQL methods.
ICONICS empowers its users to make better decisions faster thanks to timely insight offered via its
AnalytiX suite of products, which are built on top of
Microsoft SharePoint 2010 and SQL Server technology. The SQL Server 2008 R2 platform in particular
brings a number of exciting advances to the table,
such as StreamInsight technology and Common
Language Runtime (CLR) integration.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
ICONICSContinued
ICONICS productivity analytics charts

fed by CLR technology
Smart Connected Devices
The ability for plant personnel to acknowledge

alarms and analyze real-time information about their
operations directly from their mobile devices is an
ideal way to stay connected anytime and anywhere.
MobileHMI from ICONICS delivers rich visualization
of real-time data and Key Performance Indicator
(KPI) alerts directly to wireless devices.
ICONICS was able to leverage its existing GENESIS64
Silverlight components to provide a compelling and
consistent HMI experience to users on the Windows
Phone 7 platform. This kind of mobile technology
enables customers to stay in touch with their manufacturing operations while on the go.
ICONICS visualization on the Windows

Phone 7 platform
In addition to porting over the basic visualization
components, ICONICS also created an intuitive
menu system based on native controls available
within the Windows Phone platform, to allow users
to more quickly find and navigate to their desired
information. The Pivot Control is one such navigation
paradigm leveraged by ICONICS.
Summary
Simplicity, ease of use, powerful visualization capabilities and a consistent user experience across
devices enables ICONICS to fully engage users on
the plant floor or in the field. Its AnalytiX products deliver powerful insights to all people through
SharePoint 2010 and SQL Server 2008 R2. And its
GENESIS64 Silverlight components deliver real-time
information to mobile workers including Windows
Phone.
For more information please visit ICONICS at http://
www.iconics.com
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
ROCKWELL
Partner Profile
Operations intelligence
application
In order for automotive manufacturers to be able to
adapt to a continuously changing market, it is critical
to be able to utilize accurate, real-time intelligence
in making effective business decisions. Operations
data exists, but it is often found in disparate sources
spread across diverse operations. This includes
cross-functional data from finance, production,
quality, safety or the supply chain, as well as
varied formats such as business systems, custom
applications and spreadsheets. Accessing this
practical information requires inordinate amounts of
time and effort.
Overview
An example of Rockwells use of Microsoft

capabilities includes the ability to provide deep
operational insight. This application derives
operational indicators by combining data from
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems,
historians, Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES),
production, quality and manually entered operator
data. With this information, the application displays
KPIs such as on-time delivery, overtime costs,
Jobs Per Hour (JPH), estimated shift production,
scrap/rework rates, safety, plant, line and work cell
productivity (OEE), and quality indices such as First
Time Through (FTT).
Benefits
Applications such as Rockwell Softwares Operation

Intelligence Application provide additional
capabilities for the end user in the areas of
downtime & efficiency, operational insight, intelligent
KPIs, corporate Initiatives and analysis & reporting.
Supported by Microsoft state of the art software
and technologies our Customers have demonstrated
the ability to:
> Improve quality and First Time Through (FTT)
performance
> Improve financial performance of production
operations
> Increase operational and production agility
> Improve operational visibility and decision-making
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
SIEMENS
Partner Profile: MES
Managing complexity with SIMATIC IT

for discrete industries
You know the growing challenges that discrete industries face: New markets, new materials and new
products demand sustained increases in plant efficiency
and productivity as well as greater flexibility throughout
all production processes. Highly dynamic markets and
challenging performance demands make efficient data
handling in integrated production plants a key factor for
success. The best way to meet these demands is with a
holistic and scalable Manufacturing Execution System.
MES with SIMATIC IT is part of the world of Totally Integrated Automation vertical and horizontal integration
is the core of both. Integrated strategies for regulatory
compliance and guaranteed data compatibility and
interoperability across the production process connect
all processes in your enterprise and make them entirely
transparent. The Siemens MES with SIMATIC IT is an optimization solution that is scalable and holistic. It fulfills
different requirements of IT levels on the manufacturing
automation and the corporate management level of
your plant.
102
The Siemens MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) discrete manufacturing portfolio, including
SIMATIC IT Production Suite and SIMATIC IT Intelligence Suite (Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence)
are built on the Microsoft platform, including .NET,
Silverlight, SQL Server, SharePoint, Windows Phone
7 among other infrastructure, application platform
and productivity components. Strongly aligned with
the Microsoft DIRA (discrete manufacturing reference architecture) pillars, these technologies support
the Siemens MES applications with capabilities
including ease of use, mobility and compelling user
interfaces that simplify broad user adoption; business intelligence to empower all users with actionable insights; collaboration and portals enabling all
authorized people to seamlessly access information
across the enterprise and the extended supply chain;
and infrastructure management tools for reliability,
scalability and cost efficient IT operations. Customers thus realize the best value from their investments
in SIMATIC IT and Microsoft platform technologies
benefiting fully from the Siemens TIA (Totally Integrated Automation) vision.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Figure 1: SIMATIC IT is part of the Totally Integrated Automation vision expanding innovation,
improving flexibility in operations and enabling agility in the supply chain.
SIMATIC IT is an integrated manufacturing operations
portfolio, with embedded manufacturing intelligence
and a very broad range of quality management functionality. Besides its core features, it is unique in the
market due to its architecture, allowing for the deployment of production models, yet adding industry specific
templates. All this combined with its real-time features
provides a manufacturing organization with a high level
of responsiveness, that is badly needed in todays very
dynamic and volatile markets.
Turning data into business value by increasing

efficiency and performance
Users need data to be transformed into helpful information, in a format they can use to optimize operations, in
other words: accessible, understandable, actionable, visible. SIMATIC IT for Manufacturing Execution and Intelligence closes the loop of performance improvement by
gaining visibility across the production, inventory, assets,
and maintenance and quality aspects of manufacturing
operations.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
SIEMENSContinued
Figure 2: Simatic IT provides enterprise manufacturing intelligence from plant floor to corporate
business functions.
By integrating Manufacturing Execution and
Intelligence, the (E)MI function can directly
extract meaningful data from the MES database, allowing better decision support and
faster reaction times.
With SIMATIC IT, Siemens integrates Manufacturing Execution functionality with Manufacturing
Intelligence, as such allowing manufacturers in
process, discrete and life sciences industries to
benefit from a scalable and layered, role-based
and industry specific intelligence offering, ranging
from the shop floor to the business level. Siemens
believes that combining MES and EMI, ensures
purposeful use of important data in a timely way,
104
that will allow all the players in the plant and in

the enterprise to act more efficiently and make
better decisions yielding benefits at the operational level and through to the business level. SIMATIC
ITs business process driven environment provides
extensive support of these capabilities. Figure 2
shows the full span of coverage from control and
plant floor environments through to process integration into the business function level.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
The Manufacturing Intelligence system includes analytical tools to analyze data across sources and more
importantly, across production sites (scorecards,
dashboards, performance monitor). Users can create a balanced score card, defining what they want
to analyze and drill down based on any of several
criteria. This way it is possible to combine real-time
data from the MES system with historic data and
data from the ERP system into a broader view that
explains a certain situation. Involved parties at all
levels of the production line, plant or enterprise have
the possibility of visualizing data summaries relevant
to their role, and can alert decision makers to collaborate and resolve issues quickly. This can be done
any place, any time, as it is fully supported across
multiple devices and form factors including mobile
devices such as Microsoft Windows Phone 7.
SIMATIC IT libraries for

discrete industries
To provide a real strong industry characterization,

Siemens implemented on top of SIMATIC IT a series
of plug-n play add-ons for addressing specific
industry-related functions. This is the concept of SIMATIC IT Librariesa collection of SIMATIC IT configurations, business rules, GUI screens and reports
for fulfilling specific industry functionality.
A group of SIMATIC IT Libraries is dedicated to
the discrete industry, with the goals of minimizing the solution development costs and achieving
consistency in estimating project time and efforts.
Besides core capabilities needed in discrete manufacturing such as quality and defect management,
SPC and integration to the shop floor, SIMATIC IT
offers dedicated libraries for Assembly and Complex
manufacturers, for Automotive lines and Mechtronic/
electronic lines.
Overview of features
> Decision support from shop floor to top floor with
role based access to metrics and reports
> Ability to turn operational improvements into
business value
> Modular and scalable offering for increased efficiency thanks to real-time data acquisition
> Visibility and improved plant availability
> Improved performance root-cause analysis and
performance reporting
> Standardized KPI management, integrated asset
and energy management
Benefits for discrete manufacturers:

> Reduced costs and improved manufacturing efficiency
> Reduced safety stock and on-hand inventory
> Lower inventory stocks
> Component delivery lead time reduction
Lower manufacturing cost

Optimization of traceability and governance
Increase manufacturing effectiveness
Increase of quality and customer satisfaction
Reduction of scraps and waste
> High performance interconnectivity with Shop
Floor devices
> Dashboard, easy guided configuration and KPI
analysis
> Integration with Intelligence Suite for Company
wide comparison and correlation with economic
indicators
For more information and details on SIMATIC IT for
the discrete industries please visit us at: http://www.
automation.siemens.com/mcms/mes/en/industry/
discretemanufacturing/Pages/Default.aspx
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
TATA
Partner Profile
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS):

Manufacturing 2.0 Solution
To deliver manufacturing integration and
intelligence, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), offers
Manufacturing 2.0 Solution. The solution combines
the Microsoft manufacturing initiative along
with SAP interoperability solutions. This enables
Customers to integrate their Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP), Manufacturing Execution Systems
(MES), and other plant systems into a single source
of data, thereby optimizing their performance and
maximizing their Return On Investment (ROI).
TCS Manufacturing 2.0 Solution uses an innovative
their business approach to deliver manufacturing
integration and intelligence. The solution provides
a collaborative environment to create tightly
integrated technology ecosystems. As a result, you
gain access to best-of-breed solutions that deliver
the functionality, integration, data synchronization,
and certified platforms, to optimize performance
and maximize your return on product investments.
106
Leveraging existing infrastructure for enhanced

ROI. TCS Manufacturing 2.0 Solution provides a
comprehensive platform that enables integration
of composite applications with disconnected
environments. This includes the ERP systems
and Microsoft manufacturing applications,
such as Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft
BizTalk, which can be successfully integrated into
your IT environment. These provide you longterm benefits such as reduced costs, increased
production and plant efficiencies, and improved
customer responsiveness. The solution also
leverages TCS SAP-certified Stratus ftServer
system, which delivers high uptime required to
continuously process transactions and maintain
tight integration between shop-floor systems and
the main data center.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
INN O V ATI O N
Transforming manufacturing:
driving innovation
Innovation has always been critical to a businesss long-term success. But with the pace of change today, organizations that do not
continually innovate on their products, services, internal processes,
and business models will be quickly left behind. The organizations
that can identify the right ideas to develop, make the smartest investments across their portfolio, and bring innovation to market
on time and ahead of the competition will be the most successful.
Driving innovation in a repeatable way is critical to the long-term
success of manufacturers. However, driving innovation remains
elusive for many enterprises because they cannot generate enough
ideas or identify the right ones to invest in and develop. They are
often missing processes to focus innovation on business strengths
or growth objectives. Where practices are in place, those practices
are disjointed across groups that ultimately hamper the ability to
make strategic investments. When products and projects are sanctioned, a general lack of coordination and collaboration within the
product development team results in products launched too late
or behind the competition, further resulting in lost market share
and decreased profit margins.
To accelerate profitable innovation that can drive competitive differentiation in the market manufacturers need to have a robust set
of capabilities driving the sharing of ideas in a social setting and to
enable collaboration across teams. The innovation management
process needs to identify the best ideas to develop according to
business priorities and metrics, in addition to having a comprehensive product strategy to optimize investment. It should also involve
more people, at the right time, and efficiently manage the product
development process to accelerate time to market. Several DIRA
capabilities, especially social business, dynamic business networks,
and role-based productivity, when applied to innovation management deliver compelling benefits.
Boeings Space and Intelligence Systems division, which competes
for government and commercial satellite projects worldwide and
differentiates by offering value-added capabilities, experienced
these same issues. Driving consistent innovation with new products was hampered because the company was unable to expand
beyond the mature workforce and capture the creative thinking
of its highly trained but inexperienced new workforce. Boeing did
not have an easily accessible way to engage with employees who
are geographically dispersed, facilitate collaboration between
workforce generations, record intellectual property, or evaluate ideas and proposals in an objective manner in order to
increase the confidence in investment. Also, uncovering new
opportunities for differentiation in specific areas, such as payload weight, power management, and remote maintenance,
was not easily captured and managed. Boeings legacy product
data management system was too cumbersome for the mature
workforce and too complicated for the newer workforce, resulting in many specialized processes, lack of utilization, and poor
collaboration, which adversely impacted product development
schedules.
Imagine bridging the generational gap, infusing new thinking,
and accelerating your time to market with powerful, easy-to-use
collaboration tools. And imagine breaking down barriers between
the few highly experienced domain experts and the younger,
highly trained but inexperienced workforce to launch new ideas.
The experts bring a wealth of knowledge and traditional methods, while the new generation brings a wealth of freethinking
and modern methods such as social networking, crowd-sourcing,
and digital work practices. Combining these two worlds increases
creativity, infuses new thinking, provides learning opportunities,
and fosters a culture of innovation, all with an ultimate goal of
products that have competitive differentiation. And then imagine these groups sharing ideas in a social setting that enables
collaboration across teams, generations, and geographies, bringing the best ideas to development that aligns with your business
priorities. Finally, imagine that you have all of the above, with the
processes in place to manage the product development and accelerate your time to market.
Microsoft is working with our partners to deliver state-of-theart solutions today, combining the best of both through a range
of technologies, solutions, and services that span your innovation and product development needs. Partners and customers
can leverage the powerful collaboration, search, and business
intelligence capabilities of Microsoft SharePoint to amplify
any role in the enterprise; the presence and anytime, anywhere
communications of Microsoft Lync, the product and program
portfolio management capabilities of Project; and the ideation
in an enterprise social setting with Yammerand put it all together through solution accelerators such as Innovation and
Process Management.
Partners working with Microsoft to deliver solutions that leverage these and other DIRA concepts include ARAS, Dassault
Systmes, PCubed, PTC, and Siemens PLM.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
ARAS
Partner Profile
Aras & Microsoft enable global companies to drive

innovative new products to market faster with PLM
To develop your next-generation products in todays
dynamic business environment requires a new level
of orchestration and agility. Thousands of people in
globally distributed teams across your company and
out to your customers, suppliers, and outsourcing
partners come together to conceive and make the
products that will become future engines of growth
for your business. Faced with constantly changing
market conditions and aggressive competition, youve
got to enable greater collaboration than ever before
in global product development while ensuring that
your processes can adapt quickly throughout the
value chain to bring your new innovations to market
faster with higher quality and better margins.
Transforming global product

development
Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen notes that, on average, 95 percent of the
new products that come to market each year fail to
achieve the level of success anticipated, including
those from industry leaders and marquee brands.
With more riding on new product contributions to
revenue than ever before, the pace of innovation
continues to accelerate, and the ability to effectively
manage global product development has become a
critical factor in determining your companys ability to
deliver value to shareholders.
108
To succeed in the 21st Century your product development processes must achieve new levels of
collaboration while doing so with stringent security.
Your processes must scale globally and be capable
of quickly adapting as your companys competitive
practices respond to market changes in order to realize emerging opportunities.
Delivering the next generation of

PLM technology
Aras, a gold certified Microsoft partner and provider

of advanced product lifecycle management (PLM)
software solutions for manufacturing companies, understands these challenges and is helping businesses
respond proactively.
Through next-generation PLM technology in an
open architecture, Aras enables your company to
transform global product development and overcome problems that can lead to failed new products,
such as missed market windows, poor quality, and
excessive development costs.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
What really drove our selection of Aras was

the comprehensive PLM functionality and
advanced technology.
Tony DeGregorio, CIO, Textron
Defense Systems
Together with Microsoft, Aras provides a modern
PLM solution that leverages the Microsoft Discrete
Manufacturing Reference Architecture (DIRA framework) themes. The goal is to provide your business
with a powerful combination of our two companies
key strengths: the ubiquitous, robust, and easyto-use platform and tools from Microsoft and the
highly scalable, flexible, and secure PLM solutions
from Aras.
Aras and Microsoft recognize that transforming
global product development and innovation to
achieve greater performance requires that the most
powerful PLM technologies be made more scalable,
flexible, and easy enough for everyone.
Based on the Microsoft DIRA framework, we deliver
our advanced PLM platform with a complete suite
of business-ready solutions for strategic business
processes, including global product development,
systems engineering, multi-site manufacturing,
supply chain, and quality compliance. These solutions give your company a flexible PLM backbone
that federates and integrates with existing enterprise systems to provide the basis for modernizing
and transforming your global product development operations.
The combined power of Aras and

Microsoft DIRA
Aras and Microsoft are committed to helping

companies everywhere leverage the latest PLM
capabilities based on the Microsoft DIRA framework
in order to transform global product development
for better new product success with faster time to
market and greater profitability. Through this partnership, the dynamic capabilities and feature-rich
functionality of Aras are combined with the power
of the Microsoft platform to achieve new levels of
performance and agility.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
ARASContinued
In switching to Aras, we now have a highly

capable, global PLM platform.
Bruce Leidal, CIO, Carestream Health
Dynamic business networks enabled

with PLM in the cloud
Together, Aras and Microsoft are delivering the next

generation of PLM to provide unparalleled scalability for greater performance across the extended
enterprise in the most complex global product
development processes.
Using the Windows Azure cloud platform, Aras is
ideal for multinational companies engaged in complicated PLM processes, such as follow the sun development and design anywhere/build anywhere
operations that span hundreds and even thousands
of locations around the world.
Aras on Windows Azure securely extends PLM processes through the value chain outside the firewall,
giving customers, suppliers, and outsourcing partners need-to-know access to product information
and workflows across the product lifecycle.
Social business enabled through

secure social in PLM
Aras integration with Microsoft SharePoint is ideal

for global enterprises with corporate-wide SharePoint initiatives that need to provide thousands of
users across the company with easy and secure access to PLM processes and 3D product information.
For example, when Aras is integrated with SharePoint, social capabilities can be included in a PLM
context to facilitate secure collaboration between
engineering teams and others throughout the
organization. At Aras, we call this Secure Social,
because compliance-grade security is combined
with social functionality.
110
Item-based product information incorporates

secure comments, tagging, presence, instant messaging, and more for greater knowledge sharing on designs while keeping critical intellectual
property safe.
Secure, scalable, adaptable

infrastructure unleashes the power
of PLM
Running Aras on Microsoft SQL Server 2012

delivers new capabilities and performance. The
powerful business intelligence functionality in SQL
Server enables product analytics in Aras for greater
insight and knowledge to make better decisions on
new product innovations.
The xVelocity engine, which includes data compression algorithms, increases PLM query speed, making
big data instantly accessible to the entire organization for analysis and decision-making. Thousands
of users around the world can securely tap into
terabytes of PLM data faster than ever before.
With SQL Server 2012 providing the foundation for
the dynamic schema in Aras, your global PLM environment can continuously adapt to rapidly changing market conditions and your upgrades occur
without impacting your customizations.
Role-based productivity and insight

in PLM
With Aras and Microsoft, ease of use drives productivity in even the most complicated PLM scenarios,
and data analysis has never been easier. People,
processes, and information are seamlessly integrated across disciplines and throughout the lifecycle to
simplify global product development operations.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Because Aras solutions work seamlessly with Microsoft Office and other tools, such as Microsoft
PowerPivot, your personnel have world-class analysis capabilities at their finger tips and PLM data can
more easily be analyzed together with data from
other enterprise systems.
Natural user experiences bring

greater engagement in PLM
The familiar Microsoft experience in Aras makes

PLM intuitive for people across the organization
with different context. Periodic and infrequent users
are able to collaborate and participate in PLM workflows as easily as regular power users.
The roles-based capabilities in Aras mean that people can tailor the PLM experience to optimize the
information on the screen, so they see only the data
necessary to get the job done while dashboards
provide executive visibility for informed decisions.
Smart connected devices
Together, Aras and Microsoft are committed to PLM technology leadership, and we
understand that powerful solutions must be
easy to use.
Peter Schroer, CEO, Aras
Aras leverages the Microsoft DIRA framework to
promote advanced PLM capabilities that are simple
and secure for end users while providing your
enterprise with the robust infrastructure necessary
to scale, integrate, and adapt as business conditions
change.
By leveraging the Microsoft platform, Aras gives
your business a new level of PLM flexibility for
greater corporate agility. Your company is better able to respond to market opportunities and
to react to competitive threats. We give you the
power to reimagine your global product development processes and the capability to bring new
innovations to market faster, with higher quality
and better margins.
Aras enables smart connected devices with continuous services that bring PLM processes to the user
in context. Mobile connectivity and smartphone
applications enhance global productivity on the go,
giving executives the ability to securely see and act
on PLM information at anytime, anywhere.
Flexible implementation capabilities make tablet
computing secure for PLM information on the shop
floor, in the warehouse, and in field maintenance
operations a PLM reality for the first time.
Summary
Leading companies recognize that transforming

global product development to meet the challenges of the 21st Century requires game-changing
technology. Together, Aras and Microsoft are
delivering the next-generation PLM platform for
greater PLM scalability and performance, combined
with simple yet sophisticated capabilities to enable
global collaboration at your company and across
your value chain.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
Dassault Systmes
Partner Profile
Dassault Systmes PLM gives discrete

manufacturing companies a competitive edge
In todays challenging economic conditions, discrete
manufacturing companies must be agile and flexible enough to deliver more value faster than ever
before while maintaining a reasonable margin.
Competitive pressures squeeze product lead times.
Security protocols grow more sophisticated to
protect intellectual property within an international
marketplace. Governments intensify requirements
for sustainable processes and products, and global
teams need new ways to incorporate the expanding
role of suppliers and increasing complexity of supply chains. Simultaneously, the Internet has evolved
to an environment with access to global information, online communities, and real-time interaction
that position end users and consumers to become
contributors and part of the product development spiral. Product lifecycle management (PLM)
is a proven strategy for thriving in tough markets,
making companies more effective, innovative, and
successful around the globe.
The Dassault Systmes vision is to enable everyone

from product designers, engineers, companies and
suppliers to end-use consumers and their respective communitiesto create, share, and experience
in 3D and to maximize the value of their intellectual
property and digital assets.
Leading Dassault Systmes PLM solutions give
manufacturing companies a competitive edge: the
optimal response to an on-demand marketplace
that requires that products be designed, tested,
produced, shared, and experienced virtually from
anywhere in real-time.
With CATIA for integrated 3D product design,
SIMULIA for realistic simulation, DELMIA for digital
manufacturing and production, ENOVIA for global
collaborative innovation, 3DVIA for 3D lifelike experiences, and Exalead for structured and unstructured
data search, Dassault Systmes delivers an integrated, end-to-end PLM platform.
This empowers discrete manufacturing companies
to deliver top performance around the globe and
capitalize on new opportunities and sources of revenue, including service and support, while meeting
the unique needs of a diverse range of customers as
though they were a market of one.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
V6 is a unique combination of online architecture,

openness, scalability, and flexibilityall on a single
platform, fully integrated with the Microsoft suite.
The V6 platform has been designed to offer six
key benefits to discrete manufacturing customers,
including:
single PLM Platform for intellectual propA

erty management: Harnessing a companys
collective intelligence requires a single platform
that can federate all product-related knowledge
no matter where it resides, not just within the
engineering and manufacturing realms but all
the way from idea to product experience. In
addition, companies can share selected product
information while also better protecting their
intellectual property and all confidential information more broadly as the data remains on the
server.
lobal collaborative innovation: Global colG

laborative innovation implies the expansion of
PLM users to involve consumers working with
designers and all the various professional users
employing the universal language of 3D and the
power of online communities.
3
4
5
6
ifelike experience: Advanced product inL

novation requires that a 3D product be experienced as it looks and behaves in real life, in
addition to providing an intuitive interface that
mimics real life.
nline creation and collaboration: CollabO
orative online authoring is enabled for real-time
concurrent work across multiple remote locations and with only a web connection. Product
development also brings product requirements
together with functional, logical, and physical
definitions of the product. Those capabilities are
major breakthroughs for any company implementing a global engineering and manufacturing strategy.
Ready-to-use PLM business processes:
Based on industry-specific business process
applications, ready-to-use PLM business process
software enables rapid deployment and, thus, a
quick return on investment.
ower cost of ownership: V6 offers a single
L
database, in the cloud or on-premises, for all
applications and embraces service-oriented architecture (SOA) standards, thereby dramatically
reducing the cost of ownership, enabling easy
enterprise integration and rapid implementations, and spurring more efficient collaboration.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
Dassault SystmesContinued
V6 customers enjoy interoperability with the entire

Microsoft platform. Among the dozens and dozens
of interoperable products and services, the following offer special benefits to discrete manufacturing
companies:
> Microsoft SQL Server: Serves as the scalable,
high-performance database engine for all incoming
and outgoing data during a products lifecycle for
CATIA, DELMIA, ENOVIA, and 3DVIA.
> Microsoft Office SharePoint Server: Provides
a security-enhanced and familiar window into the
complex environment of PLM to encourage adoption and further simplify global communications.
> Microsoft Lync: Helps reduce costs and improve
productivity through videoconferencing and instant
messaging for the V6 collaborative platform.
> Windows HPC Server: Provides additional computing power using high-performance computing
clusters for SIMULIA.
> Active Directory Rights Management Services
for Windows Server: Tracks and secures digital
information wherever it resides.
Dassault Systmes solution portfolio
> SolidWorks3D for mainstream 3D: SolidWorks technology for the mainstream 3D market
enables designers and engineers to make an easy
transition from 2D drafting to a 3D environment.
Its intuitive Windows user interface enables users
to productively employ SolidWorks software with
minimal training.
> CATIAvirtual product: CATIA V6 is designed
to enable the full spectrum of next-generation
collaborative virtual design. Its product portfolio is
comprised of four main domains:
1
2
3
4
114
ATIA Systems respond to the increasing chalC

lenges facing designers of smart products with
the growth of complex embedded systems within
products of all types.
ATIA Shape provides a full suite of surfacing,
C
reverse-engineering, and visualization solutions to
create, modify, and validate any type of complex innovative shapes and help streamline the
transition and collaboration between stakeholders
inside and outside the company.
ATIA Mechanical delivers a highly collaborative
C
and flexible design environment with full concurrent engineering and high-performance change
management through relational design.
ATIA Equipment provides an integrated enviC
ronment that enables the collaborative detailed
design of electronic, electrical, and fluidic systems
in context of a virtual product.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
> SIMULIArealistic simulation: SIMULIA provides a scalable portfolio of realistic simulation

solutions designed to enable companies across
a wide range of industries to improve product
performance, reduce the number of physical prototypes, and drive innovation. SIMULIA leverages
Microsofts High Performance Computing Server.
> DELMIAvirtual manufacturing & production: DELMIA covers the companys PLM digital
manufacturing solutions, ranging from virtual
process definition, workcell setup, optimization,
scheduling, and operation to maintenance of
real-time production systems. Its solutions assist
teams across the development enterprise make
better decisions faster and accelerate process
engineering to achieve maximum production efficiency, lower costs, improve quality, and reduce
time to market.
> ENOVIAglobal collaborative innovation:
ENOVIA enables companies to bring together
people, processes, content, and systems involved
in product creation, development, introduction,
and maintenance. By unifying and streamlining product development processes across the
product lifecycle, ENOVIA helps companies easily
and cost-effectively work on projects within and
outside of their enterprises. ENOVIA addresses
business process needs across a broad spectrum
of industries, managing both simple and highly
engineered complex products. Deployments can
range from small development teams to extended enterprises with tens of thousands of users,
including suppliers and partners.
The ENOVIA V6 products are organized by major

business processes:
> Governance, to help companies launch enterprise-wide new product introductions on time
and on budget.
> Global Sourcing, to allow companies to leverage
supply-chain capabilities throughout the product
lifecycle and make their suppliers an integral part
of product development.
> IP Lifecycle Management, to help eliminate costly
product development errors through improved
cross-functional product design, manufacturing
planning, and performance simulation.
> Unified Live Collaboration, to provide a single
real-time view of IP across all business process
domains, powerful collaborative process management capabilities, and a service-oriented
architecture that integrates with other enterprise
systems.
For more information:
www.3ds.com
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PCUBED
Driving innovation & product development
through social business solutions
Pcubeds role in the Microsoft Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture (DIRA)
From a business perspective, 22 years agoin 1990
Kenichi Ohmae published The Borderless World, which
changed the way managers view the world and their
businesses and how they innovate, market, and compete in a globally interlinked economy. This was the
start of what has become a reality with the Microsoft
Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture (DIRA)
for enabling a seamless world of connectivity built upon
a foundation of secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure for valued performance across boundaries.
To pragmatically support that vision, Pcubeds Innovation
and Portfolio Management (IPM) solution creates an environment that fosters the collaborative flow of creative
ideas across an organization while providing a structure
to collect and evaluate investment. Objective investment
decisions maximize business benefits, balance risks, and
address corporate constraints. Portfolio, program, and
end-to-end product lifecycle management provides
the visibility and control necessary to enable strategies
and achieve targeted organizational benefitsdriving
sustainable market success. It is applicable to all forms of
innovation within a company.
People really are a companys greatest asset, and all

people can and should be empowered to innovate in
an intensely competitive and fast-paced global environment. Innovation is no longer confined to R&D labs.
If employees feel that they are part of the innovation
process and the process is transparent, then they will
truly engage and contribute to the success of the organization, taking the time and effort to capture and drive
new ideas.
Social networkings relevance in the enterprise has become one of the top priorities for IT and line of business
as a tool for connecting with experts, driving topical
discussions and collaborative innovation. An individual
who works, say, in sales or marketing may have a great
idea for a new product but may not know if it is technically feasible to manufacture. Imagine if that person
could search on a few key words to identify people in
the organization who have that required skill set. Using
other collaboration tools, such as instant messaging or
email, they could easily arrange to meet over lunch and
discuss the idea. Figure 1 shows the new knowledge and
idea-generating domain in social computing.
Figure 1: The new knowledge and idea-generating domain in social computing
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
The impact of social computing across different

networks dramatically enables the ideation process.
The challenge then becomes evaluating, developing, and managing those ideas.
Pcubed approach
The most difficult part of the innovation

equation is not what? but how to?
Innovation is the conversion of knowledge and
ideas into new or improved products, processes, or
services to gain a competitive advantage. Businesses today have no shortage of ideas; rather, they
lack the ability to determine their value in a systematic, timely, and cost-effective way. Developing an
IPM process can help companies encourage people
to share their ideas, rate them, and make critical
decisions about their associated risks, benefits, and
strategic value.
Pcubeds three-phased approach defines and
positions the necessary collaboration, structure,
management, process, and technology to optimally
select and drive the delivery of innovative ideas with
the greatest impact on business success.
An innovation preconditions assessment examines a

number of factors, such as what the senior leadership role is in guiding cultural change, who the key
stakeholders are at all levels in the company (and
externally), how diverse expectations are managed,
and what the structure and mission of an innovation group would look like. If leaders only talk about
innovation but dont really move in that direction, pursuing innovation is a waste of time and a
distraction for the company. Its best to know that
up front.
The critical success factors are a leadership-defined
strategy for growing innovation muscle, a commitment to making innovation a core strategy for company growth and renewal, a pledge of long-term
funding, and a time horizon that accommodates
learning and adjustments to processes. Similarly,
appropriate strategic, portfolio, and project metrics
need to be tied to risk assessments. Also, the companys mainstream culture should accommodate
the coexistence of an entrepreneurial culture.
Another critical step in Phase 1 is to conduct innovation diagnostics using a set of precondition assessment questions, as shown in Figure 3. There are
four key areas to assess your competitive posture:
> Activitiesis the firm performing the right
activities?
> Valueis the value created preferred by a
majority of customers?
> Appropriabilitydoes the strategy enable the
firm to generate a revenue stream?
> Changedoes the strategy take advantage
of change?
Phase 1: envision and engage
The first phase is what we call organizational

awareness and innovation intent. The right culture
is needed to respond to innovation. Only by
understanding how attuned the current culture
is to innovation will you know how far it needs to
evolve to sustain a culture that thinks about and
supports innovation.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PCUBED Continued
This is complimentary to the many available techniques to capture ideas across the organization,
a largely unstructured and knowledge-intensive
process. The outputs from these activities can feed
into this phase of the IPM process. As the DIRA
framework underscores through the social business
pillar, enterprise social networks are increasingly
providing the means for capturing ideas from skilled
people across a company and building a community generated knowledge base. Collaboration and
social networking provide an essential foundation
Phase 3: execute
Figure 3: Innovation diagnostic with precondition assessment
Phase 2: evolve and evaluate
The second phase of our IPM process discipline encompasses creating new ideas and using portfolio
management to manage those ideas. PPM provides
an approach for performing that prioritization and
managing benefits realizationmaking sure your
company is gaining the benefits promised by its
investments in innovation.
As an example, Pcubed worked with an automotive intelligence company to deploy an ideation
and portfolio management process. A key element
of the system was to capture cost improvements,
which went into the business case for each idea.
We developed a hybrid approach to ensure that
ideas and projects were assessed not just on their
own merits but also based on how they fit within
the overall portfolio mix. As part of that project,
Pcubed developed detailed processes from inputs
to gateways to outputs. Each stage had clear
roles and responsibilities, so nothing fell through
the cracks. That commitment to follow-through is
important for earning employee trust within the
innovation discipline.
The final phase is managing innovation delivery,

including tracking and promoting innovation projects. The unique nature of innovationthings that
havent been done beforecalls on an organization
to sort out its project management strategies amid
a high level of uncertainty in areas such as technical
know-how, market need, and resource expertise.
Therefore, its essential that the company have a
mechanism for motivating entrepreneurial teams
and individuals. Frequently, the people who thrive in
innovative environments arent inspired by the same
rewards as people who work on the day-to-day
operations side. Although the motivations may be
different, both need to have a place at the table.
Critical success factors for instilling innovation
discipline are: an innovation-driven reward structure; staging investments tied to project milestones
(this is especially important for more complex and
radical innovations); and systems for building the
organizations learning-based processes and tools
for reducing uncertainties. Figure 4 shows the
integration of Microsoft and PTC* technology with
Pcubeds Innovation, Portfolio, and Program Management process. (*PTC is a cutting-edge product
lifecycle management (PLM) tools company and a
global partner of Pcubed and Microsoft.)
One Pcubed client in the financial services industry
used a portfolio management tool to optimize its
portfolio of innovation-related projects. The company achieved a 27-percent savings on resources
by managing the delivery process of those projects
more closely.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
Another company, this one in the luxury automotive

sector, turned to Pcubed to develop a system for
capturing new ideas. (It didnt use the term innovation, but the focus was still on new ideas.) One
such idea turned out to be a process whereby the
person ordering a car would be invited to come
to the factory to watch a portion of the manufacturing process and to choose colors of seats and
body. This VIP treatment fit nicely into the secure
innovation mold and turned out to be quite popular
with customers.
Planning and implementing an integrated approach

that addresses the end-to-end IPM lifecycle provides short-term results and benefits while creating
an environment for sustained innovation-driven
business improvements.
> Maintain or capture industry leadership positions.
> Accelerate the adoption of a systematic approach
to new business creation and commercialization.
> Reduce lifecycle (time-to-market) for major innovation investments by 25 to 33 percent or more.
> Increase revenue contribution to lines of business
by a factor of two to three times.
> Improve the bottom line by pursuing higher margin innovation investments.
> Implement similataneously: business improvement programs (BIP) and innovation product
programs.
> Streamline and accelarate work across interdependent teams.
> Increased efficiency and throughput across the
organization.
Figure 4: Integration of Microsoft and PTC

technology with Pcubeds Innovation, Portfolio, and Program Management process
Conclusion
Key innovation and portfolio

management benefits
Pcubeds Innovation & Portfolio Management

solution is not just theory. Pcubed brings practical
real-world experience in every point of the portfolio
delivery lifecycle to ensure each implementation is
a success.
Pcubed believes people like to be involved specifically in innovation. Employees who feel empowered and are recognized by their organization for
doing great things motivate others to do great
work. Pcubed encourages organizations to invite
employees to participate in their innovation efforts, develop internal innovation portals, make the
process transparent, demonstrate that their input is
valued, review ideas regularly, and reward people
for successful efforts. The Microsoft DIRA framework, guided by the six themes of innovation and
productivity, help enable and invite employees to
participate in the innovation process or to capture
the creativity.
There is no shortage of ideas. The challenge is how
to quickly identify the great ideas, nurture them,
give your organization every opportunity to be
innovation leaders, andfor most corporations, of
coursedrive revenue and profits. Pcubed encourages organizations to leverage their people and
their talents. Then innovation magic will happen.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PTC
Partner Profile
Extending product development

content to the enterprise
PTCs Windchill WebParts for SharePoint
Microsoft Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture
Most manufacturing companies today consider product development a cross-functional exercise, a process not limited to the bounds of the research and
development departments or even to the enterprise
itself. Instead, product development increasingly
includes multiple departments, partners, suppliers,
and even customers.
Still, most Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solutions are designed to manage and support product
development processes with only the engineering user in mind. Modern PLM systems offer rich
functionality, supporting the highest level of insight
into and control over the entire product development lifecycle. They enable companies to master the
increasing complexity of products and processes. But
they do so at an expense. Tailored to the needs of
heavy users, the complexity of the PLM application
itself bears the risk of locking out occasional users
in the product development community.
120
Creating a barrier between occasional users and product information within the PLM
system presents two major challenges:
> Resources across the extended organization are a
source of valuable feedback that could influence
product design and development decisions.
> Resources across the extended organization
need access to accurate and timely information
related to product designs and product development processes.
The business opportunity
Addressing these challenges and unlocking product

and process information creates clear value for the
entire enterprise.
For example, allowing direct input from crossdepartmental resources can increase innovation
productivity:
> Proposal teams track and report on customer requirement requests from incoming RFPs, allowing
product development teams to address gaps and
future trends.
> Field service teams provide reliability and serviceability information based on products in service,
allowing product development teams to improve
performance and reduce maintenance costs.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Allowing cross-departmental resources to directly access product development data also drives productivity and decision quality for the extended enterprise:
> Marketing teams can access the latest prototype
designs to prepare marketing materials in time with
aggressive launch schedules
> Proposal teams have insight into planned features and
release dates, reducing customization requirements
and lowering development costs
> Service teams immediately see if new parts or documents are available, improving customer satisfaction.
Beyond the benefits realized by connecting users with
specific information, there is also considerable value
in aggregating information from different enterprise
sources, allowing users visibility to PLM information in
the context of other business applications.
The existing PLM environments within any given company represent a huge untapped potential for increased
productivity, efficiency and, ultimately, entrepreneurial
agility.
Enabling technology
How difficult will it be to realize this potential and how

much effort will be required? Corporations tend to shy
away from large IT integration projects, as integrating monolithic business applications often requires
substantial budget and resource investments without a
clear return.
Providing a view of information from the PLM system

in the context of other business systems can be done
without heavy integration efforts, if a few prerequisites are accounted for:
Provide a familiar user experience and role-tailored
visibility and access, so that information from the
PLM system can be self-served even by occasional
users.
1
2
L everage the business functionality stack of SharePoint, creating a single portal where users can access
aggregated information
L everage existing IT investments in applications like

ERP, PLM, MRP, and CRM by using this collaboration
platform to connect data from each in context
The wide adoption of Microsoft SharePoint as a collaboration platform makes it a natural choice to create
portlets - applications within SharePoint that serve as
window into the respective business systems.
PTCs Windchill WebParts for SharePoint provides access
to the wealth of information inside the PLM application.
Leveraging the reach and the ease of use of SharePoint,
users from the entire organization can put product and
process information stored in the PLM system to use in
their individual work context.
Without becoming an expert in PLM, users are enabled
to aggregate information into dashboards, manage PLM
workflow tasks and access documents, parts, and 3Dimages managed inside the PLM system, thereby leveraging the investments in PLM for the entire enterprise.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PTC
Partner Profile
Community-driven product development

PTCs Windchill SocialLink
Managing the increasing complexity of products and

product development processes requires a high degree of collaboration across globally distributed development organizations and suppliers. These teams
rely on PLM applications to manage product information, and to map business processes and product
development workflows. PLM systems, like most
enterprise applications, are optimized to manage
structured information. However, to be truly efficient
and agile, manufacturers must support collaboration
that encompasses both structured and unstructured
information.
Informal collaboration the proverbial chat at the
coffee machine is often the source of new ideas
and innovation. But as product development resources are increasingly geographically distributed
across multiple time-zones, this type of personal
interaction is often no longer possible. Compounding
the challenge is that the systems in place to manage
design collaboration have in most cases not been
designed to incorporate a component of informal
collaboration.
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At the same time, new trends in the demographics of manufacturing are creating an even greater
need for supporting information collaboration
and managing unstructured information:
> An aging workforce means that all information not
captured within systems the tacit knowledge in
the heads of experienced employees - will disappear as they retire.
> The expectation of employees entering the
workforce combined with an ongoing war for
talent requires companies to provide an agile,
friendly work environment and the modern, Web
2.0 style collaboration opportunities that recent
graduates are familiar with from their personal
and academic lives.
A strategy to map both structured and unstructured

information, formal and informal collaboration is a
necessity.
Leveraging Web 2.0 collaboration paradigms can
add this increasingly important component to the
collaborative product development process. Putting Social Computing to work to further connect
the extended enterprise will introduce a higher
level of operational agility and introduce immediate business benefits for the Enterprise:
2/11/13 11:44 AM
> Discovering knowledge and new insights

> Quick expertise location
> Improved collaboration among a distributed
workforce
Social Product Development combines Social

Computing capabilities found in SharePoint with
PLM capabilities found in PTCs Windchill application to provide a rich set of new functionality:
> Product Communities linked to the Windchill
PLM application
> Communities of Practice to enhance knowledge
sharing among professionals with a common
interest
> Activity Feeds for Product Developers to stream
info to keep people informed
> Microblogging for Product Developers
> Notifications for Product Developers to ensure
insights from communities are not missed
> Profiles for Product Developers - People browsing
and product development skills to better connect
with colleagues
> Windchill Social Toolbar to bring social product
development into end users environment/workstream
Innovation:
Enabling technology
Knowledge sharing:
> Leverage the wisdom of the crowds

(crowd sourcing)
> Get insights from sources you did not know existed
> Low TCO, complete and robust solution
There are also numerous benefits to
the user, such as:
> Solve problems quickly: Get questions answered
in rich discussion forums and solve problems and
brainstorm with peers
> Discover Better by finding experts with product
development skill, finding relevant information
with community scoped feeds and discover best
practices and new ideas
> Collaborate Smarter by gathering recommendations from trusted sources while spending less time
looking for information
> Improve Productivity through enterprise search
capabilities
In order to make Social Computing work for the

enterprise, companies need to carefully look at a
few key requirements:
> Integrate Web 2.0 functionality into existing
systems and processes
> Secure, controlled environment.
> Leverage investments into existing collaboration
infrastructure.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PTC
Partner Profile
Managing product development initiatives

through program portfolio management
Increasingly, companies are coming under pressure

from customers and competitors to differentiate
themselves by delivering products and solutions
designed for specific market segments and regional
preferences around the world. For manufacturers,
this demand for innovation means a larger volume
of product releases with a shorter time-to-market
and the need to create extra efficiency without
raising costs or sacrificing quality. Manufacturers
can little afford spending precious resources on
failed product launches or programs that are not
aligned with business objectives. Added to this
pressure is the burden of increased complexity of
both products (i.e. complex mechanical, electronic
and software systems) and global, cross-functional
processes.
For Product Development Executives, Program

Managers & Project Managers, this environment
poses many daily challenges when it comes to managing portfolios of product development initiatives:
Those responsible for product development

investments need a great deal of visibility in order
to make informed, timely decisions about which
products, programs, and projects are a wise use of
company resources. And products, programs, and
projects must be carefully managed to ensure that
they continue to be a wise use of company resources - requiring Program and Project managers to
communicate and coordinate milestones, deliverables and resources across organizations, across
programs, and across company boundaries. The
communication and coordination hurdle created by
this large number of touch points is exacerbated by
the fact that each group, organization, team, and
company likely uses its own set of tools to manage
the day-to-day tasks and details of their work.
> Required data aggregation for Program or Portfolio reporting is manual and time consuming for
Program Managers, Project Managers and Team
Members.
> Attempting to standardize project management
tools across large, diverse programs leads to resistance by project teams and distracts management from the real objectives of the program.
> Engineering teams are absent from the program
process due to a lack of connection to the PLM
system, where project work products and deliverables are created and controlled.
124
Portfolio management
> Product Development Executives need visibility
into how engineering resources are allocated
across programs and projects in order to decide
when new projects can be added.
> Product development processes are rarely executed consistently across programs and organizations, making it difficult for Product Development Executives and Product Line Managers to
prioritize product development investments.
Program management
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Complex cross program dependencies

>N
o effective tools exist for large program
planning and execution. Trying to tackle the
problem of inter-project dependency tracking
quickly becomes overwhelmingly constraining
and time-consuming.
> Teams producing product deliverables for consumption by other product development programs have limited visibility into which programs
are depending upon them.
Instead, an ideal solution for product

development organizations would:
1
2
For manufacturers, significant benefits can be realized by addressing these challenges. Unfortunately,
most solutions focus only on project management,
generally in isolation from the broader program or
portfolio objectives. Traditional project management tools have proven unable to scale to manage
the development of complex products or large
development programs, limiting their effectiveness to isolated projects within a larger program.
Conversely, traditional Enterprise Project Portfolio
Management approaches have developed from
the needs of information technology departments
and other types of service delivery organizations.
But these solutions require a single system be put
in place for everything from time management,
work scheduling, and metric collection to resource
management and cross-project reporting.
3
4
aintain management focus on the most critical

M
program deliverables, milestones and project
team communication channels that must be
produced, met and maintained to ensure everyone is aligned to achieve program objectives.
Loosely couple the underlying project management environment to facilitate top-down
program planning with bottoms-up project
scheduling while allowing project team the flexibility to use the project and task management
tools that are most efficient for their needs.
Complement traditional program metrics like
earned value and percent complete with PDM
derived metrics like percentage of parts in the
released state or trend in engineering change
requests.
Combine this approach within a stage and gate
process methodology to ensure the ability to
properly balance resources across programs and
new project requests in a portfolio while providing managers with the insight and confidence
they need to kill underperforming programs.
This would provide product organizations better visibility, insight and control over their product
development initiatives and allow optimization of
resources across the pipeline of product ideas, project requests and current programs by those most
accountable for achieving the product development
portfolio and program objectives.
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
PTCContinued
Moreover, this solution would allow the natural

connection to product definition data and afford a
more tightly coupled, intelligent system for product
development organizations. Such an environment
would allow content, metrics and product attributes
to be presented in a program management context
and to drive program and portfolio decisions. It
would complement traditional project management
techniques by providing current, accurate, visibility
of project status, based on the actual product data
while automating the traditionally time-consuming
process of metrics capture, roll-up, and reporting to
the program office.
Ultimately, the solution would help answer

key business questions such as:
> What project development projects and new
product ideas should I invest in?
> Are my current product development programs
executing efficiently and on target?
> Are my current product development investments
still aligned with business objectives?
> Are my product development resources allocated
properly across my product family?
Enabling technology
PTC has created Windchill PPMLink as a Microsoft

Project Server and SharePoint 2010-based solution,
designed to help product development organizations manage portfolios of development programs
and to govern critical development programs.
Windchill PPMLink extends Windchill PDMLink engineering content to product development decision-makers funding new and sustaining product,
platform and technology development initiatives.
Windchill PPMLink moves beyond project team
execution and reporting, creating visibility to your
product development program with configurable
stage and gate processes, and scorecards that combine traditional project management metrics with
PLM-related product metrics. This allows management to focus on meeting critical business, devel-
126
opment, product, and customer milestones, while

ensuring product development programs execute
consistently and remain aligned with current business objectives.
> Stage and gate process configuration automates
new product development processes to ensure
programs across a product family or organization are executed consistently and have welldefined decision points to determine ongoing
resource investment.
> Automated metrics collection and balanced
scorecard tools enable effective program &
project monitoring, consistent measurement of
programs across a portfolio, and ensure that your
programs remain aligned with their objectives
and the business objectives of the organization.
> As an integral part of PTCs Product Development
Systems (PDS), content and metrics from Windchill PDMLink and other PTC product development solutions provide portfolio and program
teams a natural tie-in to product information.
> Visibility to where and when teams collaborate to
produce program deliverables provides unique
insight into the social nature of how your products are developed and serves as an early warning system for traditionally hard-to-detect issues
that might impact your program.
Windchill PPMLink couples the time-tested and
industry-proven stage and gate methodologies
required to effectively manage product development portfolios and efficiently execute product
development programs, with innovative program
management capabilities focused on managing
what is produced, not how. By integrating not
only project-level resource and scheduling data
from multiple project management tools, but also
key PLM data from Windchill PDMLink, Windchill
PPMLink delivers a single, aggregated, and intuitively organized view across disparate programs
and portfolios.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
SIEMENS
Partner Profile: PLM Software
Improved desktop productivity for engineers

results in faster project completion
Siemens PLM Softwares Solid Edge and Solid
Edge Insight leverage Microsoft technology to
deliver faster completion of design-through-manufacturing projects
Manufacturing organizations can implement product

lifecycle management (PLM) software to improve
the efficiency of their design-through-manufacturing
processes and reduce time-to-market for the introduction of new products. These organizations can
take advantage of mainstream PLM solutions that
are designed for easy implementation and a fast
learning curve, and that in turn enable faster design
processes, validation of designs without costly physical prototypes, improved efficiency for machining
operations and a single source of product data for
improved collaboration.
The benefits of implementing PLM are well documented for larger enterprises, but are equally
important to the success of small and medium-size
manufacturing organizations. Despite this, many of
these smaller organizations have not yet implemented PLM. These companies are typically concerned
about both the initial cost of the software and the
ongoing cost of maintaining and developing the
system. They also may not have access to a large IT
department who could take on responsibility for implementation and ongoing support of PLM. However
by selecting mainstream PLM solutions based on
Microsoft technology these risks can be minimized
and benefits can be quickly achieved.
Manufacturing organizations can start with a mainstream PLM application that addresses their greatest
area of pain and grow their capabilities incrementally
as demand requires. And, by choosing mainstream
PLM solutions that are open and scalable, they dont
risk losing their investment to inflexible or proprietary
technology or systems that limit their pool of potential customers or suppliers. PLM is one of the few IT
solutions that can actually assist in driving top-line
revenue growth, while allowing companies of all sizes
to innovate, collaborate, reduce cycle time and manage complexity.
Mainstream PLM solutions:

> Allow small and mid-companies to effectively compete with enterprise counterparts that command
superior resources
> Speed products to market by providing access to a
complete range of robust PLM applications previously not available to smaller manufacturers
> Provide preconfigured best practices to streamline
implementation and maximize effectiveness
> Assist customers who are trying to grow from 2D to
3D design processes
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2/11/13 11:44 AM
SIEMENSContinued
Enabling technologies
Solid Edge is the most complete hybrid 2D/3D CAD

system and makes use of synchronous technology
for accelerated design, faster changes, and improved
reuse of legacy data. With superior part and assembly modeling, drafting, transparent data management, and built-in finite element analysis, Solid Edge
eases the growing complexity of product design.
Solid Edge follows Microsoft Windows user interface
guidelines for a familiar look-and-feel resulting in a
fast learning curve and high productivity.
Solid Edge Insight is a design data management

solution for Solid Edge users that leverages Microsoft
SharePoint technology enabling product data and
processes to be integrated with wider business processes. Solid Edge Insight uses Microsoft SharePoint
2010 to deliver a social networking capability for
manufacturing organizations that is easy to implement and has a low cost of ownership.
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Customer case study: Jiangsu Zuzem Valves

Jiangsu Zuzem Valves Co., Ltd specializes in manufacturing valves, nozzles and bearing housings. For
the past 30 years, the company has made a commitment to building its branded valve product line by
quickly adjusting to changing market conditions and
by implementing advanced technologies for design
and manufacturing. Zuzem decided to fully engage
its research and development (R&D) operation with
PLM technology and chose Siemens PLM Softwares
Solid Edge software and its Microsoft SharePoint
based Solid Edge Insight data management solution.
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Solid Edge simplifies specific design

processes and is easy to use
Prior to the implementation of the Insight project,

three issues came to our mind: how to sort and classify the products and related process and consumption data, that is, to put the data in a place easily
accessible to all; exporting the data and generating
related forms to meet the needs of different departments and workshops; and ensuring the security of
the data, as various staff members have different
levels of authority to check and modify the data.
According to Zhou Zimin, director of

Zuzems Technology Development Center:
Insight can be used without adding a number of

specific commands and it does not require a timeconsuming implementation process. With Insight,
we are able to not only manage the Solid Edge 3D
model and product structure, but also control the
process data generated by other software.
Zuzem previously used 2D CAD technology to make

valve drawings, but the system could not effectively
design valves with complex curved surfaces. In addition, it was difficult to extract information from the
drawings that was needed by the production department, such as material, manufacturing specifications
and weight.
> Since the introduction of Solid Edge, we can

design the products with confidence and demonstrate them to customers before the prototypes
are manufactured. Moreover, we can obtain all of
the physical properties and input key manufacturing information into the models. Solid Edge
not only has powerful functions that specifically
meet our valve design needs, but its also very
easy to use.
> Solid Edge Insight provides both expected and
unexpected improvements
> Zuzem considers effective and efficient collaboration between its design teams and suppliers indispensable to containing cost and ensuring quality.
To improve this collaboration Zuzem introduced a
design data management solution built on Microsoft SharePoint: Solid Edge Insight.
> Xiao Peng, deputy director of the Technology
Development Center at Zuzem and in charge of
the Insight implementation, explains:
While implementing Insight, Zuzem technicians

soon learned that the Microsoft SharePoint based
system could be used as the companys intranet.
Today, company notices and internal information are
published online. Employees communicate with each
other through the systems mailbox and bulletin
board system. According to Peng:
Insight provides us with an unexpected advantage
an excellent internal communication platform,
Zimin adds that collaboration is essential to the companys ongoing future:
The ultimate goal of a dynamically growing company is to achieve the best collaboration between
the strategic business processes and IT applications.
We feel a dynamically growing company is the one
that achieves the right process/technology combination and pursues growth through continuous
innovation.
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SIEMENS
Partner Profile: PLM Software
Collaborative and social network-enabled

product development
Siemens PLM Softwares Teamcenter leverages Microsoft technology
to bring together formal and informal data and processes
The new climate of global competition forces companies to change the way they operate to remain
in business and thrive. The first step is a defensive
move: Companies take a long hard look at how they
operate in an effort to reduce waste and improve
efficiency. They employ programs such as Six Sigma,
TQM, and Lean Management to remedy the situation. However, those cost containment measures are
not enough to ensure growth. The second step is
to implement offensive measures to make products
more attractive to customers and more profitable.
Product lifecycle management (PLM) is one such
offensive strategy. PLM brings together distributed
organizations to innovate, develop, support, and retire
products as a single company. PLM enables manufacturers to seamlessly engage their strategic partners,
suppliers, and customers in the process of innovation,
capturing innovative ideas wherever they arise, and
providing the means to validate them and bring them
to market quickly and cost effectively. PLM provides
the framework to capture product knowledge created
by multiple MCADCAD/CAM/CAE, ECADsystems,
130
embedded software, and requirements documents and

to integrate this information into a single source of product and process information. With an enterprise PLM
strategy in place, manufacturers can establish a secure
digital environment through which all contributors can
participate in product and process innovations that result
in revenue growth plus cost containment.
New devices, such as smartphones, tablet computers, and other handheld platforms, and new forms of
collaboration, such as social networking and instant
messaging, are becoming significant productivity tools.
The unstructured ad hoc data created by these new
communications has historically been outside the scope
of enterprise PLM systems and, therefore, unavailable
to product development decision-makers. As a consequence, PLM has evolved over the past 10 years to
meet the changing requirement to support unstructured ad hoc collaboration.
Global Instant Collaboration with the extended
teamanytime, anywhere.
Social Networkingenabling extended teams
to give informal ideas and input throughout the
products lifecycle.
1
2
2/11/13 11:44 AM
As companies have become more global, they

need to find ways to collaborate with their globally
dispersed teams, partners, customers, and suppliers. An extended value chain makes it more difficult
to make informed decisions that support the whole
product design.
> How do you engage contributors at every stage of
the product lifecycle?
> How do you engage contributors in every discipline with information that is delivered in the
context of both the parts and functions each is
working on, in addition to those with which they
interface?
> How do you ensure that all of the components
and parts that make up the product, regardless
of where they are defined or manufactured, will
come together correctly in the final stage of product development?
The biggest challenge to collaboration is how to

marry structured and formal enterprise data with
unstructured and informal data and processes for
sharing knowledge and for collaboration. In formal
processes, the data is persistent and the process is
structured (that is, standard workflow). With informal
processes, the data is transient and the process is ad
hoc and collaborative.
Enabling technology
Siemens PLM Softwares Teamcenter software is

an enterprise PLM solution that leverages Microsoft
SQL and SharePoint technology to provide people
with common access to a single repository of all
knowledge, data, and processes related to products.
Teamcenter establishes an open, secure digital environment for the extended value chain to collaborate, capture, and reuse best practices in products,
processes, and intellectual capital.
131
2/11/13 11:44 AM
SIEMENSContinued
With the integration of Microsoft SharePoint

technology in its community collaboration solution,
Teamcenter marries formal and informal product
data and processes to power collaborative product development. Teamcenter uses Microsoft SQL
to manage enterprise knowledge while Microsoft
SharePoint supports ad hoc collaboration, including
social networking.
With the release of SharePoint 2010, Microsoft has
added the new dimension of social networking. The
Teamcenter community collaboration solution supports Microsoft SharePoint 2010 to deliver a social
networking capability that is integrated within the
whole enterprise PLM system. Teamcenter provides
a platform for informal collaboration and social
networking.
For extended team members and casual users

who normally neither create PLM data nor typically
interact with engineering data management systems,
Teamcenter provides a flexible environment for ad
hoc meetings and sharing of critical information.
Its intuitive and familiar Microsoft web-based user
interface requires minimal user training while enabling
users to quickly establish virtual team workspaces
where they can capture ad hoc knowledge and
share product data. Customizable lists emable teams
to organize input captured during the voice of the
customer (VOC) data gathering process, idea capture
tools enable collecting and recording ideas in an ad
hoc manner, discussion boards enable capturing
threaded discussions that can be leveraged as paper
trails for later review, and web-based survey tools
enable members to rank and prioritize requirements.
Lightweight web access enables all development
teams to easily interact with each other and with prospective customers. Teamcenter supports rich product
data collaboration by enabling users to view, markup,
and analyze data appearing in any corporate CAD or
document format. This information can be conveniently stored in a repository that all team members
can access and leverage.
For the distributed team, Teamcenter keeps
everyone who participates in the product lifecycle
from the customer to manufacturingin sync with
the latest requirements, developments, and changes.
The digital environment enables companies to leverage a follow the sun strategy: extended review and
exchange processes support review processes on a
7x24 365-day basis, including the routine exchange
of comprehensive 3D images and full disclosure of
engineering data and test results. By making all PLM
data dynamically visible to the entire organization,
Teamcenter eliminates errors while making certain
that the correct product capabilities are developed
and aligned with VOC requirements throughout
132
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Jon Jarrett, senior manager of Engineering Systems

at ATK, adds: Were utilizing Teamcenter to connect
our products to our customers, to our suppliers, to
our vendors. They are part of the actual workflow
process. So they may approve our design changes
as well as our designs. In a collaborative role, were
able to utilize Teamcenter to get ideas from all sorts
of venues and manage changes within one system.
An integrated, enterprise approach ultimately
enables effective collaboration. Siemens provides a
footprint that we can take and utilize throughout all
of ATK, so that we talk a common language, so that
we communicate in a succinct way and know what
each other is doing, and so that manufacturing may
be done at a totally different plant than the design
engineering effort, Jarrett says. Were then able
to use the common tools that Siemens provides to
communicate across manufacturing, across quality,
across all of the aspects of the product.
every step in the development process. Wherever

changes originate in the enterprise, Teamcenters
process management capabilities ensure that they
are pushed out to key stakeholders and are immediately reflected across all systems and disciplines.
Teamcenter delivers integrated visual, document,
and application-sharing conference capabilities that
enable globally dispersed teams to review design
issues and product concerns in real time. These capabilities let team members quickly identify problems
and reach mutual decisions, thereby saving time and
minimizing the need for travel.
For more information: http://www.plm.automation.

siemens.com/en_us/about_us/success/case_study.cf
m?ComponentTemplate=1481&Component=84872
133
2/11/13 11:44 AM
SIEMENS
Partner Profile
Real-world applications of Teamcenter

community collaboration
Support for social networking and collaboration at Teradyne and ATK
Teradyne
Engineering change-order cycle cut by 84 percent, $2 million saved yearly

The Siemens and Microsoft solution directly addressed our need for structured processes for
handling engineering requirements and change
management, as well as our need to replace ad
hoc collaboration in project teams with consistent,
centralized, fully accessible collaboration tools and
methods, says Bill Duggan, Engineering Manager
at Teradyne.
Teradyne is seeing a variety
of benefits from the move to
the Teamcenter and Office
SharePoint Server solution.
Personnel now have faster and
easier access to more accurate
data, leading to less rework in
the manufacturing process, less scrap, faster changeorder cycles, fewer schedule slip rates, lower costs
for change orders, and higher customer satisfaction.
siemens.com/en_us/about_us/success/case_study.
cfm?ComponentTemplate=1481&Compone
nt=115037
ATK
ATK is a premier aerospace and defense company

with more than 18,000 employees in 22 states
throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, and internationally. ATK develops and manufactures armament, mission, and space systems, with the goal of
ensuring that its customers accomplish their goals
whether they involve a military operation, a satellite
launch, or a technological breakthrough.
134
At ATK, collaboration typically extends beyond the

organization. David Riemer, Vice President, Science
and Engineering, ATK Space Systems Group, explains:
We collaborate extensively with our NASA customer
on Ares and on the shuttle program. We do programs
with the Navy and the Air Force, and its important that
we can collaborate with them. We share and act as a
team using Teamcenters community collaboration.
Gather ideas from different venues and

manage change
Jon Jarrett, senior manager of Engineering Systems at
ATK, adds: Were utilizing Teamcenter to connect our
products to our customers, to our suppliers, to our
vendors. They are part of the actual workflow process.
So they may approve our design changes as well as
our designs. In a collaborative role, were able to utilize Teamcenter to get ideas from all sorts of venues
and manage changes within one system.
An integrated, enterprise approach ultimately enables
effective collaboration. Siemens
provides a footprint that we can
take and utilize throughout all of
ATK, so that we talk a common
language, so that we communicate in a succinct way and know
what each other is doing, and so
that manufacturing may be done
at a totally different plant than the design engineering effort, Jarrett says. Were then able to use the
common tools that Siemens provides to communicate
across manufacturing, across quality, across all of the
aspects of the product.
siemens.com/en_us/about_us/success/case_study.cfm
?ComponentTemplate=1481&Component=84872
2/11/13 11:44 AM
Acknowledgements
This report would never have been initiated were it not for the sponsorship of Sanjay Ravi, Managing
Director, WW Discrete Manufacturing. Partners are the essential component of Microsoft Industry Solutions,
and we would like to thank our DIRA partners for their insights and excellent contributions to this document.
Our Industry Solution Managers, who develop our solutions and drive our partner engagements, enabled
the partner contributions and enriched this document with their industry expertise. We would like to thank
Chris Harries, Enrique Andaluz, and Simon Floyd for their diligent work in this regard. The ideas in this
document are reflective of the collective insights and rich experiences of Microsofts discrete manufacturing
teams and community members, who work daily with customers in the field. And finally, were it not for
Javier Carregha, Industry Marketing Manager, and his continuous support throughout the development,
launch, and distribution of this work, it would never have seen the light of day.
For more information, please emailus atdira@microsoft.com

Author: Rohit Bhargava rohitb@microsoft.com
CTO, WW Manufacturing & Resources, Enterprise and Partner Group
Information about many of the Microsoft products mentioned in this report is available.
Microsoft Active Directory

http://tinyurl.com/3xfblg6
Microsoft Bing

http://tinyurl.com/ku5r8q
Microsoft Kinect

http://tinyurl.com/2888rql
Microsoft StreamInsight
http://tinyurl.com/l2jhgo

Microsoft Vertipaq

http://tinyurl.com/9tavy8t
Microsoft BitLocker

http://tinyurl.com/yzsda2x
Microsoft Lync

http://tinyurl.com/358j58j
Microsoft Visio

http://tinyurl.com/2axt5yl
Microsoft BizTalk Server

http://tinyurl.com/cpno2e
Microsoft Office 365

http://tinyurl.com/3b45lge
Microsoft Dynamics

http://tinyurl.com/45blbyb
Microsoft Outlook

http://tinyurl.com/2dx7z3v
Microsoft Windows

http://tinyurl.com/9p9e2qg
Microsoft Excel

http://tinyurl.com/6frbhxz
Microsoft PixelSense

http://tinyurl.com/7ndsw8f
SQL Azure

http://tinyurl.com/c5q2ur3
Microsoft Expression Studio

http://tinyurl.com/9zbfp
Microsoft SharePoint

http://tinyurl.com/33pvnh2
Windows Azure

http://tinyurl.com/yhfzgps
Microsoft Forefront
http://tinyurl.com/l5cxgy
Microsoft Silverlight

http://tinyurl.com/yeujwz9
Windows Internet Explorer

http://tinyurl.com/4ad37ng
Microsoft Hyper-V

http://tinyurl.com/qn63xm
Microsoft SQL Server

http://tinyurl.com/2bev6tk
Microsoft InfoPath
http://tinyurl.com/3q59rdb
Microsoft Visual Studio

http://tinyurl.com/2bw3k4w
Windows Server
http://tinyurl.com/3dqxju
135
2/11/13 11:44 AM
2/11/13 11:44 AM
TRANSFORMING MANUFACTURING IN A CONNECTED WORLD
Microsoft Discrete Manufacturing FEBRUARY 2013THIRD Edition
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Transforming manufacturing

January 2013Third Edition

High Tech &

Who should read this report

High Tech &

This framework describes a vision of how an entire manufacturing organization

Whats new in this edition

Copyright and Disclaimer

Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture

Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture

1.2.1 Emerging needs for manufacturers // 10

1.3 Why a Microsoft reference architecture framework? // 11

1.3.1 DIRAa bridge between emerging business needs and technology // 12

1.4 Role of the framework within the partner network // 14

17 Chapter 2: Transformation of manufacturing value chains

2.1.1 Advances in digital infrastructure // 17

2.1.2 Power shift to consumers // 20

2.1.3 Connected experiences // 20

2.1.4 Globalization and emerging economies // 21

2.1.5 Changing demographics // 21

2.1.7 Complex regulations // 22

2.2 Themes supporting performance across boundaries // 23

2.2.1 Natural user experiences // 24

2.2.2 Role-based productivity and insights // 27

2.2.3 Social business // 31

2.2.4 Dynamic business networks // 33

2.2.5 Smart connected devices // 35

2.2.6 Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure // 38

2.3 Journey to high-performance solutions // 41

42 Chapter 3: Solution building blocks and technology frameworks

3.2.1 Simple, functional, and easy-to-use business applications // 46

3.2.2 Simplified, familiar, role-based productivity and insights // 47

3.2.3 Social business // 58

3.2.4 Dynamic business networks // 60

3.2.5 Smart connected devices // 68

3.2.6 Secure, scalable, and adaptive infrastructure // 73

Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture

78 Chapter 4: Applying the reference architecture framework

4.1.1 Duet Enterprise: a foundation for role-based productivity in SAP environments // 80

4.2 Microsoft partner solutions // 82

85 Appendix: partner profiles

Transforming manufacturing: enhancing performance // 92

Transforming manufacturing: driving innovation // 107

Contacts: Inside Back Cover

Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture

Discrete Manufacturing Reference Architecture

Chapter 1: The need for a manufacturing

In a world of continuous disruptive change and ever-increasing competitive intensity, enterprises

1 In his blog titled Edge

Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture

1.2 Challenges in the business-IT environment

Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture

1.2.1 Emerging needs for manufacturers

Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture

1.3 Why a Microsoft reference architecture framework?

Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture

1.3.1 DIRAa bridge between emerging business

Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture

Chapter 1: The Need for a Manufacturing Reference Architecture

1.4 Role of the framework within the partner network

1.5 Scope of the reference architecture framework

A note on enterprise architecture frameworks

Although the term enterprise architecture is used extensively, no universally accepted

There is no vehicle for sharing accumulated knowledge across IT.