Boosting Productivity With Connected Product and Quality Processes

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About the Company

4moms® leverages advanced robotics and user-centered design to create superior infant gear like the MamaRoo® Multi-Motion Baby Swing which replicates the bouncing and swaying motions parents make when comforting their babies. Other 4moms products include the Breeze® Playard, MamaRoo Sleep® Bassinet, and the Connect High Chair®, which uses magnetic technology to make mealtime easier. Founded in 2005 and based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the company currently sells its products at all major retailers and select specialty stores, on 4moms.com, and in 58 countries.

AT A GLANCE

SYSTEM USED

Arena PLM

Best Thing About Arena

Facilitates real-time collaboration and eliminates manual, disconnected processes

Bottom-Line Impact

Keeps 4moms teams aligned on the latest product changes to deliver quality products faster

Key Benefits

  • Provides a single source of truth for managing product and quality information
  • Enhances cross-functional collaboration between internal product teams and global partners
  • Drastically reduces the time spent searching for information
  • Provides visibility into changes that impact product quality
  • Accelerates engineering change order (ECO) cycle times
  • Provides audit history of product changes for complete traceability
  • Streamlines compliance with various quality and safety regulations like ASTM and Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC)
Integrate Arena PLM with ERP system

BUSINESS CHALLENGES

Delivering superior baby gear to customers worldwide is a coordinated endeavor among 4moms product teams and international partners. Engineering, sales, and quality assurance (QA) must stay aligned to ensure product designs comply with global regulations and meet ever-changing customer requirements. In turn, suppliers and vendors in China must receive accurate specifications to build the right products on schedule.

Early on, manual processes made it difficult for 4moms to keep pace with changing product and regulatory requirements. Product information and design changes were managed and communicated through email and internal servers. Searching emails and files for the latest revisions was time-consuming. “We did not have a streamlined process for maintaining and tracking the full product history encompassing validation testing and changes,” stated Mike Werner, Manager of Document Configuration and Control at 4moms.

Considering its rapid growth, 4moms needed a more connected and streamlined approach to manage product development processes. Hence, they sought out an enterprise product lifecycle management (PLM) solution.

BUSINESS CHALLENGES

Delivering superior baby gear to customers worldwide is a coordinated endeavor among 4moms product teams and international partners. Engineering, sales, and quality assurance (QA) must stay aligned to ensure product designs comply with global regulations and meet ever-changing customer requirements. In turn, suppliers and vendors in China must receive accurate specifications to build the right products on schedule.

Early on, manual processes made it difficult for 4moms to keep pace with changing product and regulatory requirements. Product information and design changes were managed and communicated through email and internal servers. Searching emails and files for the latest revisions was time-consuming. “We did not have a streamlined process for maintaining and tracking the full product history encompassing validation testing and changes,” stated Mike Werner, Manager of Document Configuration and Control at 4moms.

Considering its rapid growth, 4moms needed a more connected and streamlined approach to manage product development processes. Hence, they sought out an enterprise product lifecycle management (PLM) solution.

Integrate Arena PLM with ERP system

THE SOLUTION

4moms chose Arena PLM for its advanced supplier collaboration and change management capabilities as well as its ease of use, flexibility, and affordability.

Blue quote mark

Arena’s cloud-native SaaS platform enabled us to get up and running quickly. Our product teams, suppliers, and vendors can quickly access information from any location using a web browser. We no longer spend time searching through emails or internal servers to get the information we need. By leveraging Arena’s multilingual interface, our U.S. employees collaborate seamlessly with colleagues in China.”

—Mike Werner, Manager of Document Configuration and Control, 4moms

Arena PLM aggregates the entire product record into a single source of truth. Engineering changes are linked to affected parts, bills of materials (BOMs), and other critical records. This ensures 4moms teams always have access to current and accurate product information.

Change orders are automatically routed to internal teams and external partners to drive real-time reviews and expedite the approval process. Arena PLM also maintains a full history of product changes so that 4moms has a traceable audit trail. By linking compliance evidence (e.g., validation testing) directly to the product record, Arena helps the organization easily track compliance status and reduce audit risks.

RESULTS

Since implementing Arena, 4moms has centralized BOMs for each product, enabling them to readily identify and track parts and assemblies. Each part is assigned a unique identifier, so there is no ambiguity when working with suppliers and vendors. Because everyone is accessing the same BOMs and working from the same part numbers and revisions, it eliminates errors during the production phase.

Arena’s automatic change notification and routing system promotes accountability by enabling specified team members to sign off on product changes. With the full product history at their fingertips, 4moms can easily compare redlines of the BOMs and see what changes occurred between each revision. This saves them considerable time in evaluating the success of various product changes.

Additionally, the QA team tracks all the product validation testing and views the results in Arena.

Blue quote mark

Tying each testing result to a specific product in Arena has been a game-changer. Each SKU has different QA requirements (both domestically and internationally). This enables us to manage the complex ecosystem of our QA testing and evolving compliance changes.”

—Mike Werner, Manager of Document Configuration and Control, 4moms

With Arena PLM now an integral part of 4moms’ daily operation, everyone can work seamlessly to deliver exceptional products that enhance the lives of parents and their infants.

Blue quote mark

Tying each testing result to a specific product in Arena has been a game-changer. Each SKU has different QA requirements (both domestically and internationally). This enables us to manage the complex ecosystem of our QA testing and evolving compliance changes.”

—Mike Werner, Manager of Document Configuration and Control, 4moms

With Arena PLM now an integral part of 4moms’ daily operation, everyone can work seamlessly to deliver exceptional products that enhance the lives of parents and their infants.