PDXpert PLM Software

Simple, flexible product lifecycle management software for growing companies™

How to make the best PLM software license decision

A PDXpert PLM subscription license is significantly less expensive than public cloud-based PLM solutions. You'll also get tighter control of your product data, faster performance, and more flexible operation and upgrade schedules.

PDXpert PLM offers the benefits of SaaS without public cloud risk

A PDXpert subscription minimizes your up-front cost while providing the operational advantages of keeping your proprietary data on-site. Buy what you need now, and adjust your subscription as your requirements change.

PDXpert lets you:

  • Purchase your PLM software as a subscription.
  • Maintain mission-critical product data under your own control.
  • Enjoy LAN-based performance that is up to 1000 times faster than across the Internet.
  • Choose to accept — or delay — a software upgrade at your convenience.
  • Use low-cost, commonly-available hardware and software.

PDXpert also gives you the flexibility to use an in-house server or a third-party hosting solution.

On the public internet or an unsecured Wi-Fi, PDXpert's advanced forward secrecy encryption eliminates the need for a dedicated VPN. It's also faster and more secure than simple TLS/SSL-enabled websites, protecting your proprietary information while avoiding the hacking risks of a multi-tenant cloud PLM.

Unlike SaaS PLM software, on-site PDXpert PLM provides the best data access control, system availability, performance, and operational flexibility.

Which of these features are important to you? On-site
PDXpert PLM
Private cloud1
PDXpert PLM
Multi-tenant
public cloud PLM
Subscription pricing minimizes up-front investment
Supply chain partners can be allowed access to your data
Simple client software upgrades
Your intellectual property is under your exclusive control
Single-tenant architecture contains only your data
Choice of subscription or perpetual license
Switch between on-site and off-site as requirements change
Productive "rich client" Windows user interface with
drag-and-drop bills of materials and change forms
Local object & file cache for faster data access
Client-side ODBC parts cache for local CAD applications
Defer or skip an upgrade to meet your development schedule
Lock-in a validated FDA / ISO / FAA change process
Easily view back-end database with standard development tools
Published web prices prove you're always getting best rate
Secure client-server communications LAN-based security Forward secrecy with
dynamic certificates
TLS/SSL shared
static certificate
Typical data & file transfer rate LAN: 100 to 1000Mbps LAN: 100 to 1000Mbps;
Internet: 0.25 to 50Mbps2
Internet: 0.25 to 50Mbps2
Improve network performance by adding bandwidth LAN upgrade Limited by telecom Limited by telecom
Productivity impact of internet connectivity failure Remote users only All users All users
Add more storage for data & files Low cost disk Hosting cost Contract surcharge
Backup & disaster recovery Simple, provable Simple, provable Complex, promised
Cost to reclaim your off-site data from PLM supplier $0 $0 Quoted per customer
System downtime per year < 30 minutes (typical) < 30 minutes (typical) Allows >160 hours3
  1. Some features may be affected by the dedicated server or managed hosting service that you choose.
  2. May require multiple providers to ensure redundancy (fault tolerance) and diversity (survivability).
  3. A 99.5% uptime guarantee may only cover unscheduled events. For example, SaaS acceptable downtime = [(20 min/day scheduled) + (1420 min/day x 0.5% unscheduled)] x 365 days = 9891.5 minutes per year. With advance notice, additional SaaS service downtime is defined as "scheduled" and can be imposed without penalty. Now add downtime associated with network service or other failures to your facility.

Private cloud hosting: Control and flexibility

If an off-site solution makes sense — whether for multi-office access or to off-load operational management tasks — then consider a third-party Windows dedicated hosting solution.

Install the PDXpert system and database on a remote server, with the PDXpert client application running on local workstations and laptops. You'll enjoy all the rich drag-and-drop features and high-performance caching of the PDXpert client while keeping your sensitive product data under your own control.

Unlike SaaS solutions, you can easily change cloud hosting providers or choose to bring the server back on site. In most cases, installing the PDXpert server on a dedicated host is less expensive than cloud PLM software, particularly as your data grows.

Public cloud-based PLM is complex ... and complexity is expensive

SaaS PLM requires a complex IT infrastructure, expensive 24x7 staffing and rigid maintenance schedules. Multi-tenant architectures demand additional security to isolate clients' data, and require system-wide upgrades that can't accommodate your unique development schedule.

All of that extra complexity comes at a price. For example, the price-per-bit of SAN-based disk space and its high-speed infrastructure can be 10 times the cost of standard data storage.

If your primary concern is... Lowest cost solution More expensive
First-year license & support cost PDXpert subscription license Public cloud PLM
Long-term license & support cost PDXpert perpetual license Public cloud PLM

This added complexity of public cloud computing relies on new and emerging technologies. As a result, the most experienced development resources may be diverted to working on the SaaS plumbing - and not on improving your PLM experience.

Our proven on-site deployment — or a private cloud — provides the lowest cost over time as well as the most control over system configuration, data security, and scheduling your backups, upgrades and user training. See for yourself: a complete PDXpert system costs less than half of an off-site PLM service.

Just how important is your product data?

Cloud PLM providers know exactly how many design files you've saved, how many change notices you've processed, how often you revise your BOMs. What else do they know about your products?

Off-site cloud-based PLM solutions are inherently riskier than an on-site or private cloud PDXpert system.

  • You're handing your mission-critical data to an outside supplier who must expose your product data to the Internet. And that supplier has processes, people and infrastructure that you can't interview, monitor or control. How can you be certain what will happen to your data, who has access to it, or how easy it will be to recover if you decide to change your supplier?
  • Obviously, cloud PLM is attractive to industrial hackers. Ironically, SaaS PLM providers publicly announce their new subscribers — and what intellectual property can now be targeted. Shared systems make spear-phishing easier, expanding the attack surface. Even when your company's data isn't the first objective, a multi-tenant architecture offers wide scope for bad actors after the initial breach. Similarly, a denial of service attack affects everyone on the system.

It is not a good idea to put sensitive data out in the cloud right now.... [We were] frequently able to find all of the credentials required to access corporate data stored on the cloud. If you look closely at the agreements, you'll see that the provider makes no guarantee that the data stored in the service will stay safe.

Fran Brown, managing director at Stach & Liu

Reliability and performance of public cloud PLM

Beyond issues of cost and security, there are the practical considerations of moving complex engineering data across the internet. A cloud-based PLM system involves many participants. Aside from your PLM provider's system reliability, for mission-critical data you should consider redundant connections to ensure reliability. In some areas, multiple telecom providers aren't available, limiting how much redundancy is even possible. Backups are not necessarily automatic, comprehensive or encrypted.

While your company's internal network may run at 100Mbps or 1Gbps, most external connections will rely on relatively slow telecom connections. If your external connections are already fully utilized, your cloud data may require added bandwidth to keep up with your product data's growth.

Web servers belong in the public cloud. But things like databases — that need really high performance, in terms of I/O and reading and writing to memory — really belong on bare-metal servers or private setups.

John Engates, Chief Technology Officer, RACKSPACE

Choose the PLM solution that supports all of your goals

PDXpert PLM software is uniquely crafted to meet the needs of growing companies, with a comprehensive set of features and a simple evaluation and purchase process.

We offer both perpetual and subscription licenses, which let you configure the software to your exact needs. You have complete control over performance, storage costs, maintenance and service interruptions, and - most important - your critical product data.

We invite you to:

What others say about SaaS

"The 'secret sauce' of how we make our product is on this system. If it was ever infiltrated, we would be in trouble. In this era of hackers, we are interested in the ability to control the software to do what we need it to do within our firewall and security processes, rather than rely on a hosted system." - IT manager, Infinera Corp.

"DDoS Attack Puts Code Spaces Out of Business ... CodeSpaces.com closed its doors this week, following a 12-hour security breach that completely wiped its servers" - Stephanie Mlot, PCMag.com

"Cloud Computing turns ... into a just-in-time supply chain maintenance issue. If a vendor goes bankrupt, or suffers a catastrophic failure, your data disappears immediately, and there may not be anybody around to help you find it." - Jay Heiser, Gartner

"Basecamp falls to blackmail-fueled denial of service attack. The DDoS attack means the company's marquee product [is] unavailable." - Ian Paul, PC World

"Data centers play fast and loose with reliability credentials" - James Niccolai, IDG News Service

"Saas: Software as Sadism.... So what’s the deal with all these forced upgrades? ... The implication is clear: all your code are belong to us." - Jim Turley, EE Journal

"...Government eavesdropping is likely to substantially reshape companies' understanding of their data's safety. ... [There] will be a serious reconsideration of the wisdom of putting data into the public cloud." - Andrew Binstock, Dr. Dobbs

"...CAD vendors are unable to reassure customers that their data are safe... this whole FISA scandal reminds us to not store documents on the cloud. " - Ralph Gabowski, CAD Editor, upFront eZine NEWS #779

"...If the cloud data center is offline, so is your business." - Tony Bradley, PCWorld

"Chinese hackers spying on American cloud ...may present cybersecurity risks for U.S. users and providers of cloud computing services." - Dave Jeffers, IDG Creative Lab

"...Small/micro organizations ... cannot afford having multiple Internet service providers for service availability and reliability. Saving[s] ... can be lost on redundant Internet connections and bandwidth." - CrossTalk

"With that data ... outside the organization, ... there may be legitimate worries of having designs lost or stolen.... Most organizations want ... control over their intellectual property...." - Peter Varhol, Desktop Engineering

"SaaS customers [must] consider how to protect themselves against the possibility of their SaaS vendor going out of business." - Managing Automation

"...Vendors are not pushing the cloud in order to lower their revenues. ... You will pay more." - Ralph Gabowski, CAD Editor, upFront eZine NEWS #633

"SaaS contracts should disclose any fees associated with getting [your] data back." - Liz Herbert, Forrester Research

"Salesforce.com Hit With Second Major Outage in Two Weeks" - Chris Kanaracus, IDG News

"Cloud Goes Boom, T-Mo Sidekick Users Lose All Data. ...This is a code red cloud disaster." - Information Week

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