In Episode 72 of Razorleaf’s Stay Sharp podcast, Unlocking the Power of the Digital Thread, co-hosts Jonathan Scott and Juliann Grant are joined by Rob McAveney, the Chief Technology Officer of Aras Corporation. From early days at Boeing through his many years at Aras, Rob has developed a broad understanding of manufacturing and digital engineering that has shaped his mission—creating software platforms that help solve tough business problems for manufacturers. Given that Aras was working on solutions to support the digital thread even before the concept had a name, Rob is the perfect guest for a deep dive into the topic.
Defining the Digital Thread
Rob’s simple explanation of the digital thread starts with the understanding that there are interrelations between data elements and “the idea of forward and backward traceability across the lifecycle of data elements,” he says. A more formal definition, he adds, “is connectivity of data, but also connectivity of process and connectivity of people.” Jonathan agrees, “If you just have the data connected, it’s a nice data source. But the other pieces are what bring it to life and give it value.”
Managing the Relationships
The digital thread is all about relationships or links between data elements, and the robustness of your digital thread depends on the strength of those relationships. In this situation, “strength” concerns whether information can flow bidirectionally between elements so that each element can be evaluated and/or changed based on information from the other. Rob explains that the semantics of a link are also important to its strength, which means encoding any causal or parent-child relationships between the two elements, such if the model was the result of the simulation study it’s linked to or the input. “There are all sorts of things that get into the semantics of a link that we often overlook,” Rob says, “because we have this maybe overly simplistic view of how data and systems interact.”
Other factors that make strong or mature relationships in a digital thread include tracking details of metadata, retaining an audit trail, invoking behaviors based on a change to one element, making changes based on new versions, and more. Rob explains, “You can actually run business logic based on what happened to that link. The ability to leverage the digital thread depends heavily on how mature this is.” Jonathan underscores the criticality to a business: “When people as about the business value of digital thread, that’s it. The value is in helping you avoid bad decisions through a lack of information.”
How Digital Threads Are Being Used
The biggest question people have about the digital thread, Jonathan says, is figuring out where to start and what specifically they need. The place to start, Rob explains, is to “think about the people who would consume the information that is contained within the digital thread and how useful that is across the product lifecycle, the supply chain, and the ecosystem or environment in which you operate.” A lot of people simply need access to data, not access to a full system that houses it, so consider what people need to consume and it’ll lead you to what you need. “It’s about exposing the right set of data, the right set of processes, the right collaboration environment for those people that are performing those use cases,” Rob concludes.
Jonathan brings up the question of AI, wondering if AI will end up obviating a digital thread. “AI doesn’t excuse you from building a digital thread,” Rob says. “AI can help you build a digital thread, and AI can be used to leverage the data that’s in that digital thread.” But we need to remember that AI is only as strong as the information it’s fed, and what’s important is ensuring you have an authoritative source of truth. Jonathan concurs, “Maybe AI will be able to help us build a digital thread when we’ve got really messy data sets. But at the end of the day, a human’s still going to have to look at it and decide, is that authoritative? Is that a good source of data that I trust and want to trust moving forward?”
Learn More About Leveraging Digital Threads
The full podcast contains more discussion and details on a variety of topics, including how Aras helps companies tailor their digital thread output for their specific needs, why Rob emphasizes that every company is unique and every company is continually evolving, why the quality of your digital thread is the most important factor for creating business value, and more.
Check out the full conversation in Stay Sharp Episode 72: Unlocking the Power of the Digital Thread, and join us each week for a new podcast.
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