If you’re like many engineering managers, IT infrastructure may not be your favorite topic. You think about it when absolutely necessary, but often neglect it or place it behind other capital investments. What's more, there's a good chance your current IT solutions...
Engineering Operations
What Is Engineering Technology Management (a.k.a EngOps & DevOps)? Is It Right For You?
When it comes to IT solutions, most mid-market manufacturing companies rely on one of two options. They have a dedicated in-house IT team, or an outsourced IT managed services provider (MSP). But manufacturing companies who care about product development and...
How to Increase Uptime of Your Engineering Systems
Picture this: all your engineering applications run slow, or worse, continue to shut down. Yet, the IT team reports no alerts within the remote monitoring and management systems despite the problem. What is the root cause and how do you fix it? Remote Monitoring and...
Problems that Engineers in Regulated Industries Face
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Og6826J7EOo Video Transcript: I'm Carlos Almeida, VP of Engineering at SPK and Associates. I've spent most of my professional life doing software engineering. 25 years plus in the world of high tech in the electronic design automation...
Managing PTC Integrity Licensing (Windchill RV&S)
When licensing your Windchill Requirements Validation & Source (RV&S) server, there are a few options for purchase or implementation. Many readers may recognize Windchill RV&S as the latest version of PTC Integrity -- or, if you have worked in...
How to Maximize Engineering Design Automation for CAD/PDM
In recent years, interest in engineering design automation across multiple industries skyrocketed, especially due to the high return on investment (ROI). Relieving your engineers from tedious, error-prone tasks and directing them toward automation presents a fantastic...
How Workflow Integration Boosts Engineering Productivity
How to solve the problem that hides in plain sight Engineers rarely talk about “workflow integration” for items like CAD files or project data management (PDM). They’re too busy doing their jobs! However, that exact mindset presents a major issue. Many engineers think...
SPK Wins 2020 Managed Service Provider Award
We are thrilled to announce that SPK and Associates won the Channel Futures / Channel Partners 2020 Managed Service Provider (MSP) 501 Award for a second consecutive year! This prestigious award is widely viewed as the most comprehensive global survey of Information...
Flexible Continuous Integration Pipelines With CD
What is a Continuous Integration Pipeline? The purpose of a continuous integration pipeline is to allow teams to constantly integrate and build software updates in order to quicken release cycles, lower costs, and reduce risks. In a simple implementation of a...
4 Advantages of SolidWorks Cloud PDM (Updated 2023)
Considering the leap to cloud-based CAD and PDM solutions? A move to platforms like SolidWorks 3D CAD in the cloud paves the way for unmatched flexibility. Imagine accessing intricate engineering data from anywhere at any time. And, the benefits don’t end there. In...
Improve your build/test/deployment with CloudBees CD (formerly Electric Cloud Flow)
Repeatability is an intuitive aspect of daily life. If you throw a ball up, it comes down. If you throw it up twenty times, the same thing will happen, up and then down twenty times. When repeatability doesn’t occur and it’s supposed to, we get anxious. ...
Engineering Inefficiency is the Enemy of Innovation
I was intrigued by the information and conclusions presented in OnShape’s recent report, “The State of Product Development and Hardware Design 2019.” However, I was not as surprised as they were to hear that the biggest problem in R&D is still complex processes,...