As I write this column, our Operations Group has returned from MS&T and is clearing the decks to prepare our 2019 Annual Operating Plan. While we still have a lot of work to do before closing 2018, our thoughts are beginning to look toward 2019 and beyond.
You may recall that in 2017, our call to action was “Join the Renewal.” Our 2018 mantra has been “Grow the Renewal,” and with your help, we have. Our 2019 mission? “Complete the Renewal.” But how exactly do we do that? Answering this question is what we are all about as we conclude 2018.
A major deliverable of the ASM Renewal is the go-live of our Silverchair Digital Library (content repository and publishing system) in December 2018 with the ASM Handbook series as our first digitally reengineered content. At this writing, we are on schedule with the final systems-level implementation of our Digital Transformation, and the debut of its initial content.
The next task will be to prioritize and sequence the digital presentation of roughly 300,000 legacy content pieces— including articles, data sets, and education courses—in the ASM archive. Any new content required by our markets and our membership will go through a similar prioritization process.
More detailed aspects of our data and content strategy beg resolution as well. Currently, we are contemplating making ASM data sets available in both Granta platforms and in an open standard format widely used in the manufacturing world: ISO 10303.
The ISO 10303 standard enables interoperability among design, engineering, manufacturing, quality, and service disciplines in so-called “net-centric” manufacturing environments. The potential exists for ASM to electronically serve, with materials information in standard ISO format, each of those disciplines as adjacent markets to our traditional materials science or engineering space. Another trend supporting ASM serving these adjacent markets is “concurrency”—the ever closer integration (and common need for relevant materials information) of those disciplines in net-centric computer-aided product realization.
As ASM explores options for delivering content in ways most relevant to our users, I welcome your input. Is the above approach viable? Are there other, additional formats ASM should consider? Please feel free, as members and customers, to let us know. This is one important way you can help ASM Complete the Renewal.
William T. Mahoney, CEO, ASM International
[email protected]
