The Great BOM Debate: Engineering, Manufacturing, Service and AI

The BOM debate is not going away. In this Future of PLM panel, Michael Finocchiaro hosts a lively discussion on one of the most persistent problems in product lifecycle management: how engineering, manufacturing, ERP, MES, service, supply chain and now AI should connect around the bill of materials. Is the M-BOM a separate object, a different view, or an artifact of organizational silos? Should ERP own the “real” BOM? Can PLM natively understand manufacturing logic? What happens when service, as-maintained configurations, circular economy requirements, and product memory enter the conversation? And if AI is supposed to orchestrate all this, what happens when the underlying data is still fragmented, inconsistent, and owned by different departments? Featuring Christine Longwell, Gus Quade, Brion Carroll, Pat Hillberg, David Schultz, Oleg Shilovitsky and Michael Finocchiaro. Timeline: 00:00 Introduction and why the BOM debate needed a part two 00:54 Christine Longwell introduces her background in mechanical engineering, automotive and competitive intelligence 01:29 Gus Quade introduces his work at Autodesk across data and process management 02:20 MaintainX, Autodesk and the service connection 03:00 Jörg Fischer’s provocation: does the BOM even exist? 04:30 ERP, MRP and why manufacturing data cannot live only in ERP 05:31 Engineering defines the product, manufacturing defines the action 08:04 Why BOM discussions vary by industry 09:14 Fashion, tech packs, supplier collaboration and material definition 12:29 Is the M-BOM a different view or a different object? 14:55 Product memory, digital twin continuity and real-time BOM mutation 15:58 Oleg Shilovitsky on people, organizations, systems and ownership 19:21 Brion Carroll on product memory and lifecycle-wide product context 22:04 Pat Hillberg on durable goods, service, circularity and lifecycle responsibility 24:02 Why as-maintained data needs to feed back into engineering 25:36 Aircraft examples, digital twins and recording manufacturing events 27:30 Christine Longwell on organizational silos and AI orchestration 28:29 PLM, MES and the missing visibility between systems 30:11 David Schultz on end-to-end supply chain and service data 31:04 What does S-BOM mean: service, software, simulation or something else? 32:31 Why data normalization must precede AI 33:58 Conway’s Law and whether product structure mirrors organizational structure 35:54 Can any database or AI overcome lifecycle dysfunction? 38:24 Was there ever just one BOM? 39:31 When does the product become “real”? 40:50 Maintenance, MES and the need to look beyond one discipline 43:01 Ownership, user experience and why PLM, MES, ERP and service systems remain disconnected 44:38 Autodesk’s approach to a shared data model underneath multiple systems of engagement 45:06 PTC Orbit, Jetstream and the digital thread question 47:16 Should product memory belong to the CIO, CDO or lifecycle organization? 48:36 Master data models, systems of record and common exchange methods 49:26 Why product data needs its own equivalent of STEP or IFC 51:01 Closing question: what BOM belief will be proven wrong within five years? 51:27 Oleg on data misalignment, unit-of-measure errors and organizational disagreement 54:44 Gus on the false choice between CAD-optimized and ERP-optimized structures 57:37 David on abstracted models, point-to-point integration and manufacturing ontology 59:14 Brion on role-based views, shared ontology and AI-enabled product memory 1:01:16 Pat on digital thread adoption and why change may be slow until it suddenly is not 1:02:50 Christine on BOM as product definition and the coming PLM/ERP convergence 1:03:57 Why there may need to be a part three This is part two of an ongoing Future of PLM conversation on BOMs, manufacturing data, product memory and the future architecture of PLM. Subscribe for more discussions on PLM, digital thread, industrial AI, engineering software, manufacturing systems and the future of product development. #PLM #DigitalThread #BOM #EBOM #MBOM #Manufacturing #ERP #MES #ProductLifecycleManagement #IndustrialAI #EngineeringSoftware #ProductMemory #FutureOfPLM