Skoda Power, a turbine manufacturer, needed to increase productivity by 30% to remain competitive. They transitioned from 2D to 3D CAD modeling with CATIA V5 to enable reuse of existing designs and expertise. This reduced part design time by up to 85% and increased productivity by 30%. CATIA V5 provided a 26% return on investment within 3 years by streamlining development and allowing Skoda to leverage their design knowledge and data.

1. IBM Product Lifecycle Management
Skoda Power increases productivity
by 30 percent with CATIA V5
“CATIA V5 allows us to
capitalise on existing
designs and in-house
expertise to reduce
design time for new
parts. The result is a
30 percent increase in
productivity.”
– Jan Ruzicka, Director Engineering,
Skoda Power
Custom manufacturer streamlines “To remain competitive and expand
Overview our reach, we knew we needed to
development
For more than 100 years, Skoda reinvent our design and development
n The Challenge Power, a subsidiary of Skoda Holding, processes to both reap the benefits of
Power generation solutions has developed and manufactured our long history of design excellence
provider Skoda Power needed steam turbines and heat exchangers and position our company to continue
to increase productivity, reduce for fossil-fuelled power stations, to be a leader in turbine design for the
costs and expand its geographical cogeneration units, incineration future,” says Jan Ruzicka, Director
reach to safeguard its competitive facilities, and nuclear power plants. Engineering, Skoda Power.
advantage The company boasts more than 900
product installations in 57 countries, in To meet this challenge, Skoda needed
n The Solution
addition to the service and consulting to adopt a scalable customised
To transition from a 2D to 3D CAD
activities it provides to its customers. product lifecycle management (PLM)
environment, Skoda Power chose
strategy that would allow the use of 3D
CATIA V5 operating on a Microsoft
Since Skoda Power provides custom models for structural and flow analysis
Windows ® platform and provide progressive product data
engineering for ‘made to order’
n The Benefit production to all its customers, it management. The ideal solution also
With CATIA V5, Skoda Power can wanted to streamline development, would facilitate the seamless transfer
leverage existing designs and reduce costs and expand its and reuse of existing data and
know-how, reducing parts design geographic reach to maintain its connect with Skoda Power’s existing
time by as much as 85 percent and advantage over non-custom turbine ERP system.
increasing productivity by competitors. Company management,
30 percent. however, knew its reliance on 2D
design technology stood in the way
of achieving its goal of increasing
productivity by 30 percent at the
product engineering stage.

2. CATIA V5 completes Skoda Power’s CATIA V5 provides 26 percent return on
PLM system investment in first three years
Although Skoda had previously The shift to 3D modelling with CATIA
considered moving to CATIA V4 for V5 allowed Skoda to increase
3D modelling, it was not willing to productivity by 20-25 percent in
IBM Eurocoordination
change its hardware infrastructure to the first two years and to reach its Product Lifecycle Management
UNIX® systems. With the introduction goal of a 30 percent increase in Tour Descartes
La Defense 5
of CATIA V5, Skoda found a solution productivity by the third year following
2, avenue Gambetta
that was both cost effective and could implementation. 92066 Paris La Defense Cedex
meet its designers’ needs running on a France
Microsoft Windows platform. Leveraging best practices developed
The IBM home page can be found at ibm.com
with the help of Technodat, Skoda has
IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com and the On
been able to effectively capture and
Demand Business Logo are trademarks of
reuse employee design knowledge International Business Machines Corporation in
and existing design data. With this the United States, other countries, or both.
‘knowledge cache’, Skoda has been CATIA® is a registered trademarks of
Dassault Systèmes.
An established strong relationship with able to reduce the design of new parts
Microsoft, Windows, is a trademarks of
business partner Technodat, coupled from a timeframe of several weeks to
Microsoft Corporation in the United States,
with the security and expertise just a few days. other countries, or both.
afforded by working with IBM PLM, UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open
played a critical role in Skoda Power’s This increase in productivity has Group in the United States and other countries.
selection of CATIA V5, developed by allowed Skoda to shorten product Other company, product and service names
may be trademarks, or service marks of others.
Dassault Systèmes. delivery times, reduce engineering
Any reference to an IBM product, program or
costs and improve product quality.
service is not intended to imply that only IBM
“The combined benefits of the products, programs or services may be used.
demonstrated advantages of CATIA And CATIA V5 is already paying for Any functionally equivalent product, program or
service may be used instead.
software for 3D modelling, our itself. A total cost analysis conducted
This publication is for general guidance only.
confidence in the size and quality by Skoda across the implementation
Information is subject to change without notice.
of IBM’s resources and our strong period, shows CATIA V5 has delivered Please contact your local IBM sales office or
local relationship with IBM Business a 26 percent return on investment in reseller for latest information on IBM products
and services.
Partner, Technodat, made the decision just 2.6 years.
Photographs may show design models.
to implement CATIA V5 an obvious one
© Copyright IBM Corporation 2005.
for Skoda Power,” says Ruzicka. “Our next challenge is to more widely
All Rights Reserved.
apply our use of CATIA V5 to our
Technodat provided assistance with complete R&D, engineering, design
training and managed the integration and production environments, but
of CATIA V5 with Skoda Power’s other we are pleased with the quick boost
systems, including its ERP system to productivity that CATIA V5 has
and several custom built, proprietary allowed us to achieve thus far and
scientific quantification modules the significant return on investment
specific to turbine design. it is already demonstrating for our
organisation,” Ruzicka says.
“CATIA V5 has been integrated
seamlessly with our existing systems For more information, contact our
and in-house applications to give us a IBM Marketing Representative, IBM
complete solution that has allowed us Business Partner or visit the IBM PLM
to quickly begin realising our goals of Web site at ibm.com/solutions/plm
increasing productivity and reducing
costs,” Ruzicka says.
05-BPA-001703 (12/05) LS