Sukhoi, Siemens PLM debut Russia's first paperless aircraft

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Siemens PLM Software, a business unit of the Siemens Industry Automation Division and a leading global provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software and services, announced that its Teamcenter software suite enabled the production of Russia’s first internationally-designed and manufactured, paperless aircraft.

Russia’s new entry into the competitive and rapidly growing global regional jet market involved an international team of international partners and world-class aircraft systems suppliers throughout Western Europe and the United States. The goal for SCAC was to bring all system suppliers into a virtual enterprise on a global platform, implementing the latest design and manufacturing technology.

The end result is an aircraft that consumes 10 percent less fuel than its nearest competitor, has a 10 percent lower overall cost of ownership and has the lowest price in its class. The SSJ100 also offers unprecedented passenger comfort in the regional jet category, with wider seats, wider aisles and larger storage bins.

To create this industry-leading aircraft, Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company and its partners worked within a single master data warehouse enabled with Teamcenter that included all 3D models and related data to completely define and digitally mock up any aspect of the SSJ100. This warehouse, or platform, enabled the company to create Russia’s first aircraft from a paperless design process.

Siemens PLM Software’s Teamcenter software suite, the world’s most widely-used PLM portfolio, was central to SCAC upgrade effort and was among key factors in achieving first flight in a fast-paced development program for the SSJ100 regional airliner.

Teamcenter helped coordinate the efforts of approximately 1,700 engineers and manufacturing specialists in more than eight locations with a world-class team of partners across the globe.

Viktor Soubbotin, President, Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company, said: “We set out with an aggressive plan and succeeded because of our collaboration with partners and suppliers powered by Teamcenter. The collaborative technology played a central role in bringing the SSJ100 into the air faster and at lower cost.”

Paul Vogel, senior vice president and managing director for Europe, Middle East & Africa, Siemens PLM Software, said: “Teamcenter gave SCAC a single synchronized knowledge platform for designing and manufacturing. In large, geographically distributed projects, like SSJ100 everyone should work with a single source of data to keep the control over all design changes during production. Watching and working with Sukhoi over the course of the design process has been inspiring."

"We, in a sense, provide the paint brush and palette, but the designers at SCAC and their partners around the world are the artists. And they truly have created a masterpiece in their first global effort and they’ve done it in record time.”