PLANO, Texas, Dec. 11 /PRNewswire/ -- UGS Corp., a leading global provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software and services today announced availability of a new, turn-key, real-time engineering collaboration solution for companies wanting to rapidly deploy a consistent, world-class system across a local or global PLM implementation. The Teamcenter(R) Community Appliance, developed with HP, is an extended-enterprise collaboration solution that consists of UGS software and services along with HP hardware to easily plug in to any new or existing Teamcenter Engineering environment.
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"The Teamcenter Community Appliance is really aimed at extending the total Teamcenter footprint for companies looking for the benefits of a world-class, consistently deployed solution for real-time engineering collaboration," said Steve Bashada, vice president of Teamcenter Applications, UGS. "By working closely with our partner HP, we have developed a 'plug and play' solution that dramatically reduces the cost, time and effort typically associated with deploying a new IT system. As a result, Teamcenter Engineering customers can quickly experience the enhanced communication and product innovation that is enabled through effective collaboration among product development teams across the street or around the world."

UGS and HP: proven solutions, unmatched experience, successful deployment

The Teamcenter Community Appliance offering is a result of the close and longstanding relationship between UGS and HP, two of the most experienced providers of industry-proven PLM software, hardware and services for the global manufacturing industry. The solution includes the community collaboration module of UGS' Teamcenter(R), the world's most widely used PLM software portfolio, and it is built on the Microsoft(R) Windows(R) Server System. It runs on HP ProLiant servers along with HP software, storage, networking switches, HA capabilities and it is bundled with planning, implementation and support services from UGS.

The Teamcenter Community Appliance solution is designed to reduce costs and time-to-value through rapid, consistent deployment in an existing Teamcenter environment. It also works in conjunction with the previously announced PLM Appliance offering, a pre-configured solution from UGS and HP that streamlines the implementation of new Teamcenter PLM deployments. (See UGS press release, October 27, 2004: UGS and HP Announce New Pre-Configured PLM Solutions to Streamline Acquisition, Implementation and Support.) Teamcenter Community Appliance maintains high system availability and security as well as broad adaptability to varied customer environments.

"HP is working together with UGS to address the secure distributed computing needs of real-time engineering collaboration in product development," said Bruce Toal, director of marketing, High Performance Computing, HP. "The Teamcenter Community Appliance solution addresses the needs of customers to quickly and effectively deploy real-time engineering collaboration solutions that are flexible, adaptable and easy-to-use, while providing real reductions to the total cost of ownership."

Real business value from real-time engineering collaboration

Companies that implement an effective real-time engineering collaboration system experience a wide variety of significant benefits that translate into real business value.

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?All of this can lead to an improved ability to produce innovative new products, and with the Teamcenter Community Appliance solution, these benefits are now available to a much wider audience.
"Teamcenter's ability to enable real-time collaboration has transformed the way we do business and dramatically reduced our travel costs, engineering changes and our entire product development cycle time," said Alan Walker, director, Collaborative Product Definition Program, Siemens Industrial Power Generation, AG. "Product information that used to be locked up in engineering is now available to sales, service, marketing, manufacturing and even our suppliers and partners through an easy-to-use user interface. Our ability to effectively collaborate globally with Teamcenter has streamlined several processes from RFP responses and procurement to design reviews and supplier sign-off. As a result, we have more time to spend on new product innovations that create value for our customers."

The Teamcenter Community Appliance is immediately available exclusively in North America as a complete solution from UGS. It will be offered worldwide in 2007 Q1.