SAP Product Data Management (PDM) supports you when creating and managing product data for the entire life cycle of the product.

SAP PDM offers a complete solution for management of:

You can manage all types of technical, business, and administrative documents with the SAP Document Management System (DMS). The original application files can be linked to a range of objects in the SAP System, such as material master records, bills of material (BOMs), projects, customers, and change master records. In addition, you can access the documents with an external optical archive system. You can use Redlining functions for original application files of a document info record. You can write your comments on the original application file like when using a red pen.

The material master record is a central data object in the SAP System and contains all data for parts, products, semifinished products, raw materials, operating supplies, production resources/tools, and other types of material.

You can store general data that is relevant to the entire company here. Much of this data is defined in the engineering/design or standards department, such as material number, descriptions in various languages, weight, basic material, and classification data. However, data that is relevant to specific functions, such as sales, material requirements planning (MRP), and work scheduling, can also be managed. You can make this data available to various departments by using different views on a material master record.

You can classify all types of objects in the SAP System with the Classification System. For example, you can use your own criteria to classify and structure data from materials, processes, production resources/tools, documents, inspection criteria, customers, and vendors. Engineers can use the Classification System to choose similar parts (find duplicated parts) to avoid building, producing, and ordering parts redundantly. This saves time and reduces costs.

The SAP System supports a CAD integration interface for the integration of development and engineering/design processes in the logistics chain of a company. However, this interface is not only used for the integration of CAD systems. You can integrate all types of development applications into the SAP System, for example, office packages, graphical information systems, or plot management systems.

Engineering Change Management (ECH) in the SAP System provides a basis for documentation of modifications over the entire life cycle of a product. The original data is logged as well as the changes, allowing you to trace the complete product history.

Another important function of Engineering Change Management is its complete integration of planning and execution of changes in the logistics chain of a company. Engineering Change Management ensures that planned changes to master data are automatically available at specific times in such productive functions as sales, demand management and MRP, shop floor control, and product costing.

Bills of material solve the problem of differentiating between an engineering BOM and a production BOM. In order to ensure that this functional differentiation works, you can either create separate BOMs or define different views of the same BOM.
An undeniable trend at the moment is towards products with a multitude of variants. Therefore, product/variant configuration must be fully integrated into the logistics chain of your company. You can run checks while configuring a product, to ensure that the configuration is complete and consistent, thereby avoiding such impossible combinations as a convertible with a sunroof.
The graphical Product Structure Browser lets you display all the objects in your product structure and go directly to the processing function for any one of them. You have access to all data that is relevant to the product. This includes data stored outside of the actual engineering/design environment. The relations between all objects in the product structure are displayed graphically.

In modern PDM systems, the definition and control data for large product development projects is managed using a Project System. This allows for the easy completion of complex tasks within cost and capacity intensive projects that are limited in time.

A project can be structured in the SAP Project System by using work breakdown structures (WBS) and networks.

The WBS defines the structures for the organization and control of the project and outlines the project in individual, hierarchically organized structure elements.

The network (flow chart) sets up the elements from the WBS in a time-based sequence. You can use the network to define, for example, which events are dependent on each other in the project and which activities are required next or need to be defined in more detail. You can use standard work breakdown structures and networks as templates for managing new projects, to reduce the workload.

Project Information System, project planning board, progress analysis, and cash budget management ensure control and transparency during the course of a project.

As part of Collaborative Engineering and project management, you can also use the Internet to send product structures, project structures, and documents relevant to the development project from the SAP System to selected participants. The participants sent the objects, revised as necessary, or comments back to you. You then check them and adopt them, to the extent desired, in the SAP System.

The enterprise area PDM is divided into: