虽然巧克力被认为是一年中的任何时候，但它成为从圣诞节到情人节的流行物品。对于将商店货架上的零售商带来了多种甜点的零售商，这是一个反映特定假期的包装。我一直对食品和饮料制造商为每个季节的新食谱和包装设计的能力感到敬畏。他们怎么做？
我问苏尼尔·托马斯（Sunil Thomas）Selerant, a maker of process product lifecycle management (PLM), how these seasonal products get conceived, produced and delivered in time—especially when there may be special ingredients added to the mix. The planning, Thomas said, requires a bit of reverse engineering. “They give us the on-shelf date and our system works backwards to calculate when they need to start the project.” Exact timing is important, otherwise, they could lose the window of opportunity around the holiday business.
This is just one way aprocess PLM systemcan help food, beverage and CPG manufacturers, but seasonal sales are not the only reason batch-based companies are increasingly interested in lifecycle management. Overall, there is pressure to bring new products to market faster. There are also ever-changing regulations that differ in each country and complicated ingredient properties. There’s a need to collaborate and coordinate change management between scientists, chemists, engineers, packaging and label management. And, there’s the need for integration with enterprise systems and the supply chain. While most organizations may have isolated systems, Selerant’s DevEX software connects the processes to optimize time-to-market.
DEVEX是一种基于公式的PLM系统，它是食谱的“设计工具”，从实验室开始作为一个想法。类似于PLM中用于离散行业的CAD工具的情况，或drug design in the pharmaceutical industry, the DevEX formulation tool supports the creative process as an idea turns into a formula that may have a hierarchy of ingredients in the lab that translate to production.
托马斯说，该工具在附加监管信息的同时支持科学家的创造力，这非常重要。“每种成分都有特性。如果您查看用于酒精饮料和防冻剂的丙烯乙二醇，则每个国家都有限制使用情况。因此，使用这种成分时，您想知道某个国家是否允许它。”他说。
如果围绕成分有限制，DEVEX立即将其标记为揭示食谱在开发时是否通过或失败的监管要求，则表明对美国和加拿大来说可能还可以，但对欧洲来说可能不对。
In addition, Selerant offers a service that uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to gather regulatory information off of the Internet and then a team of experts validates the rules to feed into the compliance framework within the DevEX system.
使用DEVEX的制造商的业务价值是能够凝结从构想到产品发布所需的时间。CPG可能需要一年多的时间才能推出新产品。但是，基于公式的PLM系统可以将其挤压到六个月。托马斯说，而且通常花费六到八个月才能设计的假期促销产品可以在两个月内完成。
Some of Selerant’s customers include Nestle, Hillshire Brands, McCormick, Wrigley, Welch’s and Bacardi. And, now, B&B Foods, Inc., a maker of more than 50 well-known food brands, including Cream of Wheat, Green Giant, Mrs. Dash, Ortega and Pirate’s Booty, has selected DevEX software to manage the R&D and product development of all of its global brands.
B＆G Foods R＆D副总裁Rick Drummond表示：“ B＆G Foods正在简化我们将新产品推向市场的最佳位置的系统和流程。“ Selerant具有一系列的产品开发能力，我们很高兴能在我们使用任何未来的产品路线图中前进。”
