New PLM Capabilities, Now in Development
At Nora IPLM Lab, we are developing new ways to manage engineering changes, bring AI into practical PLM workflows, reuse product structures more efficiently, align engineering and manufacturing, connect product knowledge, and control configurations.
Modern product work needs a faster-moving PLM partner
Product teams manage increasingly complex BOMs, variants, requirements, suppliers, documents, changes, and manufacturing processes. Traditional PLM systems can govern these records, but the relationships between them are often difficult to understand when a decision must be made quickly.
Nora IPLM Lab is where we turn those challenges into active product development. We are building on a governed product lifecycle management foundation, testing several improvements at once, and bringing the strongest ideas closer to real product work.
Multiple PLM capabilities moving forward in parallel
This is a working development portfolio, not a single technology campaign. Nora IPLM Lab turns high-value engineering, manufacturing, and product-data problems into focused product work, each evaluated for practical value, governance, usability, and readiness to grow into the platform.
Change Cockpit for Engineering Change Impact Analysis
Engineering change reviews become difficult when affected BOMs, documents, requirements, manufacturing processes, and service records are spread across separate views. Reviewers may approve an ECO or ECR without a complete picture of downstream risk.
Nora’s product team is actively developing the Change Cockpit as an engineering change management workspace that brings impact, ownership, decisions, approvals, and implementation readiness into one governed review.
- Accelerate ECO and ECR reviews with connected product context
- See affected BOMs, documents, requirements, processes, and service data before release
- Capture traceable decisions, ownership, approvals, and risk signals
- Reduce downstream manufacturing, quality, and service surprises
- Coordinate engineering, manufacturing, quality, and service teams
Structure Clone Panel for Controlled BOM Reuse
Creating a new product or variant from an existing structure can save time, but uncontrolled copying creates duplicate product data, unclear ownership, and disconnected lifecycle records.
The team is actively designing the Structure Clone Panel to support controlled product structure reuse. Teams would be able to select complete or partial assemblies, preserve approved relationships and attributes, remap ownership, and preview the resulting structure before creation.
- Set up new products, programs, and variants faster
- Reuse assemblies, documents, attributes, and lifecycle context
- Reduce duplicate product data and disconnected BOM records
- Preview inclusions, exclusions, relationships, and ownership before creation
- Apply more consistent product data governance to reuse workflows
Manufacturing Process Management for EBOM and MBOM Alignment
Engineering definitions and manufacturing plans often evolve in separate systems, creating handoff gaps between the EBOM, MBOM, bill of process, work instructions, tools, and production resources.
Nora IPLM Lab is actively developing manufacturing process planning that connects engineering product data with how a product will be built, reviewed, and prepared for production.
- Connect EBOM, MBOM, process plans, operations, tools, resources, and work instructions
- Identify manufacturing operations affected by engineering changes
- Improve design-to-production traceability and lifecycle governance
- Reduce handoff gaps between engineering and manufacturing
- Increase manufacturing planning and production readiness
Manufacturing BOM
Bill of Process
Product Knowledge Graphs for Connected PLM
Critical product relationships extend beyond a BOM tree. Parts connect to requirements, documents, suppliers, risks, changes, processes, configurations, and service records, yet these dependencies can be difficult to discover and explain.
Nora is building Product Knowledge Graphs as a relationship-aware foundation for search, analytics, impact analysis, and a stronger AI-assisted PLM experience. The goal is traceable product context instead of isolated records or unexplained AI outputs.
- Reveal hidden dependencies, reuse opportunities, and change pathways
- Improve product-data search, discovery, and relationship navigation
- Support explainable AI-assisted PLM decisions grounded in governed data
- Create richer context for change-impact and risk analysis
- Strengthen the digital thread across engineering and manufacturing workflows
Configuration Cockpit for 150% and 100% BOM Control
Configurable product families introduce complex option rules, effectivity conditions, market requirements, and order-specific structures. Duplicating a product definition for every variation increases maintenance effort and weakens traceability.
The team is actively developing the Configuration Cockpit as a focused product configuration management workspace for comparing variants, validating rules, reviewing effectivity, and resolving an accurate 100% BOM from governed 150% BOM logic.
- Compare product variants, features, options, and rule outcomes
- Validate configuration logic and effectivity before release
- Resolve accurate 100% BOMs from controlled 150% BOM structures
- Reduce duplicate product definitions across markets, models, and orders
- Connect configuration decisions with lifecycle traceability
Configuration Options
Resolved Structure
What an active PLM challenger does differently
Nora IPLM Lab makes product momentum visible without turning development work into empty promises. Each capability starts with a real workflow problem and is evaluated against product context, governance, usability, and measurable engineering or manufacturing outcomes.
Traditional PLM roadmap patterns
- Feature-heavy lists that can obscure the user problem
- Impact spread across disconnected engineering and manufacturing views
- Complex workflows that often depend on specialist users
- Automation introduced without enough visible product context
- Separate data views that weaken end-to-end traceability
Nora IPLM Lab approach
- Several problem-led developments moving forward in parallel
- Relationship-aware product data that strengthens the digital thread
- Visible change impact and explainable context before automation
- Engineering and manufacturing workflows designed together
- Continuous improvement across the platform, with AI used where it adds value
Have a complex PLM workflow worth exploring?
Share the product-data, change, manufacturing, or configuration problem with the Nora IPLM team.
Active product development grounded in real PLM work
Nora IPLM Lab developments are evaluated against practical engineering, manufacturing, product-data, and lifecycle-governance outcomes.
Connected by default
Every capability should strengthen the digital thread across BOMs, changes, requirements, documents, suppliers, and processes instead of creating another isolated workflow.
Visible before automated
Teams should receive explainable context, impact, ownership, and risk visibility before AI or workflow automation acts on complex lifecycle decisions.
Flexible with governance
Experiences should support different product structures and processes while preserving ownership, traceability, approvals, and lifecycle control.
From product problem to validated PLM capability
Every Nora IPLM Lab concept is evaluated against real engineering, manufacturing, and product-data workflows before it becomes a product capability. Concepts may evolve, combine, or change before release.
Discover
Define the workflow problem, affected teams, connected product data, and outcome worth improving.
Prototype
Test interaction patterns, lifecycle relationships, governance needs, and technical feasibility.
Validate
Evaluate the concept against representative BOM, change, configuration, and manufacturing workflows.
Productize
Refine usability, performance, governance, documentation, packaging, and release readiness.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Nora IPLM Lab?
Where does AI fit in Nora IPLM Lab?
How does Nora IPLM Lab support engineering change management?
What is a product knowledge graph in PLM?
How can PLM improve EBOM and MBOM alignment?
What is product configuration management in PLM?
How does Nora IPLM Lab support digital thread initiatives?
Is Nora IPLM Lab a public product roadmap?
Who should provide feedback on Nora IPLM Lab concepts?
Share your engineering or manufacturing workflow with Nora.
Tell the Nora IPLM team where change impact, BOM reuse, manufacturing planning, product relationships, or configuration control creates friction in your product lifecycle.