When I was asked to guest blog for Dassault Systèmes I knew exactly what I was going talk about. It had to be Intelligent Engineering (IE) as it’s been synonymous with our business from before the company started and its success over the past 6 years underlines its importance to both us and our customers.

First a little bit of background.

Intrinsys grew from Integral Powertrain, which has become a world leading high performance electric motor technology supplier. They were using intelligent engineering (IE) principles to meet their business goal of “providing a better customer experience than the competition.” In those days the technology and process sides of the IE triangle were being used to create automated design tools that enabled engineers to create high confidence concept solutions to meet client requirements in remarkably quick times. Early success with the latest 3D design technologies from Dassault Systèmes, and best practice processes when combined with bright and innovative engineers, the third side of the IE triangle, caught Dassault Systèmes attention. Soon after Intrinsys, the Intelligent Engineering Company was formed to sell and support the products they were using in Integral Powertrain to engineering businesses in the UK.

More than a philosophy

For many years, though Intelligent Engineering was practiced, it was only used in-house to deliver customer systems and not promoted as a way of working. Interest in the way we delivered PLM and projects rose to the stage where we started to run a series of relatively small customer events. Instead of satisfying the requirement and moving on, interest grew as did the size and frequency of the events. This lead to the 1^st UK Intelligent Engineering Forum in 2016 and the formalisation of an annual event that includes PLM and associated technology sharing on the back of world class processes.

So what’s Intelligent Engineering have to do with Digital Disruption?

The principles of Intelligent Engineering.

Technology use and awareness, best practice processes and a people focus.

Principal 1 Seek out the best technology and exploit it.

Simplify and automate as much of the engineering design and development process as is practical. Automation in areas that aren’t looked at as traditional opportunities for automation is a valuable and innovating experience. It keeps valuable Intellectual Property at the forefront of development and takes away the more repetitive, time-consuming tasks that suck in resources and add to project costs.

This is where the 3DEXPERIENCE platform comes into its own. The single database PLM solution creates the ideal environment to share the most up to date engineering data in a simple yet practical way. There are great tools for each contributor to use and share and also allows the management to ensure it happens in a controlled yet liberating way. Experts get to share their work seamlessly between functions, no more silos and greater sharing of not only issues but their solution.

The technology supports motivated and talented individuals to develop and share their experiences and information sources. Open, honest discussion and exchange of information becomes a unique value of the business and stimulates the introduction of new, more disruptive innovation around the business as new information sources are added to the mix.

Principal 2 Seek out the best engineering practices, independent of industry, and use the ones that work for you.

Workflow, process management and analytics have become features of PLM but where do you find the best processes for you?

You have experience, you engage with newly qualified and motivated engineers that are growing up with a new perspective of information and that’s where your disruptive innovation will come from. The PLM tools enable market information sourced from networking, conference and social interaction to flow into the business. If the market for your products and services is changing the key questions are how quickly can you adapt and will the new status quo, however long it lasts, be an attractive and sustainable market for your business? How well you access and process information, including analytics, is likely to be a key metric of your new business.

Principal 3 Attract and retain great people

The balance between experience, passion and drive has never been more interesting and more challenging. The software vendors, like Dassault Systemes, are helping us to simplify, manage, automate and collaborate on some very complex and difficult engineering and business tasks. At the same time they are opening up a window to the resources within communities that are discussing trends and sharing ways to take advantage of change.

What challenges does Digital Disruption offer up?

When you look at your business in a year or two you may be wondering what business you are in. Industry and business are re-modelling at an incredible rate. You can’t even say it’s the usual suspects as companies spring up in almost every industry. In some ways PLM is the catalyst as it ties so many areas together offering a green field step change to a new product on a light weight platform.  Even the on-premises historic route to software has been successfully challenged by the cloud as today’s generation grow up with cloud back up of their day to day information. Cloud is being accepted for lifestyle tech in the same casual and trusting way that no-one ever checks personal software terms & conditions before they accept them.

A lot of the bulk of a traditional business is being removed. This not only speeds everything up it also enables a faster rate of change in the future. Disruption doesn’t take the hard work and grind route to product it switches quickly to the end game.

Meet the challenges of a disruptive future with Intelligent Engineering

With access to the latest engineering software 3DEXPERIENCE from Dassault Systèmes through partners like Intrinsys we are enabling company’s success through sharing information, networking and partnership. It’s a new environment almost every day, one where we automate as much as we can, learn from the success or failure of others and develop a forward facing approach. An approach that doesn’t neglect lessons learnt but seeks out best practice, new sources of information and innovative solutions to customer and client issues that do more than meet their requirements, they excite.

At the end of the day an Ostrich burying its head in the sand is not the model for a business that intends to enjoy longevity in a disruptive future.

Enhance your Intelligent Engineering systems and processes at the UK Intelligent Engineering Forum (UKIEF), 5^th April 2017 at the MTC, Conference & Training Centre in Coventry. For more information about the event and the opportunity to join the networking group, visit ukief.org.