One of the biggest challenges for all organizations in the new millennium will be capturing and spreading knowledge and best practices within their own company and value chain. In the field of plastics part and mold design, that task will be significantly facilitated with the KnowHow! knowledge-management system. This interactive Web-based application is a workgroup portal for creating, validating, sharing, and managing engineering data related to plastics product definition, engineering, mold design, and manufacturing. The application comes pre-loaded with extensive materials, design, and troubleshooting information, complete with animation and illustrations. But the real value of KnowHow! is the ability to populate the site with current knowledge and the information continuously generated by the company and its suppliers to create an ever-increasing base of expertise on the design and processing of plastics. Publishing of documents and information on the site can be accomplished by those without extensive knowledge of the Web, and "support layers of information and guidelines can be customized into the application by the workgroup," says Jim Spann, director, product marketing. The system also can launch additional CAE applications from C-Mold, its competitors, or complementary vendors, complete with guidelines and best practices relative to the most effective use of these applications based on experience or policy. Commercially available in August, the product has been well received in companies with groups focused on part, product, and mold design. Another large potential community of users is custom molders. John Teresko, John Sheridan, Tim Stevens, Doug Bartholomew, Patricia Panchak, Tonya Vinas, Samuel Greengard, Kristin Ohlson, and Barbara Schmitz contributed to this article.
