Episode 5: From Complexity to Profitability: The Business Case for Modularity with Jakob Åsell

In this episode of the Share PLM Podcast, we are joined by Jakob Åsell - CTO at Modular Management. Jakob is a seasoned expert in product architecture, modularization, and digital transformation. He currently leads the delivery of the PALMA SaaS solution, helping companies create, document, and govern modular product architectures. Jakob’s background spans cloud infrastructure, UX/UI design for complex systems, and enterprise IT landscape assessments to enable impactful digital transformation. With decades of experience in modular design methodologies, PLM/PDM systems, and CAD/CAE tools, he has worked across all levels of design—from detailed engineering to conceptual systems—supporting clients globally.

Join us as we explore the complex but highly rewarding world of modular product architectures:

⚉ What is modularity in product design?
⚉ The value of a modular mindset
⚉ Complexity reduction and business drivers
⚉ Beyond PLM - Where PALMA comes in
⚉ Defining Modules: More than just building blocks
⚉ The approach for a successful modularization 
⚉ Jakob’s journey from CAD Engineer to Architect 
⚉ Top-down vs. bottom-up approaches in modular architecture
⚉ The dual-track support in Modular Management 
⚉ Modularity, sustainability, and circular economy 
⚉ Using recycled and reused components 
⚉ The role of AI in Modular Management
⚉ How to start your modular journey
⚉ Building knowledge and incremental transformation through positive feedback loops 


CONNECT WITH JAKOB:
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakob-asell/ 

CONNECT WITH SHARE PLM:
Website: https://shareplm.com/ 

Join us every month to listen to fascinating interviews, where we cover a wide array of topics, from actionable tips, to personal experiences, to strategies that you can implement into your PLM strategy.

If you have an interesting story to share and want to join the conversation, contact us and let's chat. We can't wait to hear from you!

Transcript

[00:00:11] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
Hello everyone and welcome to the Share PLM podcast. My name Beatriz Gonzalez, and I'm CEO of Share PLM. And as always, I'm with my co host Jos Voskuil. And we are very happy today because we have one speaker that we, we will be presenting in our Share PLM Summit. So, hello Jos. How are you doing? And who is our attendee today?

[00:00:34] JOS VOSKUIL:
Okay. Hi Beatriz. Well, I'm excited today working on my Share PLM Summit keynote, so we can't be prepared enough. And today, as you mentioned also Jacob will be there. And Jakob Åsell, we know each other already for a long time. We had discussions on modularity, the need for PLM objects beyond the bill of materials and to manage modularity and so I'm sure we will have a discussion on those topics. But first of all, welcome Jakob, can you please introduce yourself and to the audience and what keeps you busy in life?

[00:01:05] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Or Ola? I'm Jakob Åsel from modular Management here. I've been with Modular Management since 2004, so little bit more than 20 years now. My background, I was a mechanical engineer, started out with 3D CAD and PM system configurators, so that was back in the mid nineties. What takes me busy in life, in business, I'm working with our PALMA Development. So it's a software solution to help you build and take care of a modular product architectures. So really a strong compliment  to PLM and, and managing your product portfolios.

[00:01:42] JOS VOSKUIL:
Okay. So you're mentioning software, PALMA, and you're mentioning modular management. How did you come into the modular management?

[00:01:49] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah. So that was my original background. So playing around with 3D CAD, PM system configurators, that goes well with modularity. And then, I saw customer modular management were really easy to work with. So I was actually coming to Modular Management to establish a methodology, how to go from a modular concept into creating and realize those modular products, how to design them, and making use of these tools in that modular setting.

[00:02:23] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
What is, uh, Jacob for you and for the listeners, eh, modular Management, what is means a module of, of the product?

[00:02:31] JAKOB ÅSELL:
When we say product, first of all, it's not a singular product, it's an broader offering. And instead of making several independent individual products or build a material as we often talk about. With the modular product, we like to divide the products into kind of reusable chunks or, or like Lego systems. So once we identify those modules, we can have several variants of them and if we can organized so we have the same interface across those variants, that means that we can mix and match variants and build a big variety of products from as few parts as possible.

[00:03:10] JOS VOSKUIL:
And can everyone do modularity? What is the big value of it?

[00:03:14] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah, I think everyone can do that. It's a mindset and I think everyone trying to be efficient in life are modernizing things they don't even think of doing like your everyday cooking. Isn't that some piece of proteins, some carbons and so on.

[00:03:30] JOS VOSKUIL:
But when I hear it's a mindset, well, I also hear more complexity as same like system engineering is also a mindset, but there is a business driver and, and what do you see as the biggest business driver for modularity for your customers?

[00:03:42] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah, so why we are hired, that is really to help our customers become more profitable. So, as you say, complexity, and there's a lot of money to save by reducing complexity. And there is a lot of research on the number of parts, the count of individual part numbers that is the key driver for cost in a company.

So if you can reduce those and be more efficient and building more products with fewer in unique parts, that is key to profit.

[00:04:12] JOS VOSKUIL:
Okay. And well, reducing parts is a message that I also hear when people implement the PLM system because they say, then we see how many parts we use and we can standardize. But you have a, a space beyond PLM. Can you say where does modularity start or PALMA start beyond the traditional PLM systems?

[00:04:33] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
And Jakob and also with the CAT systems, CAT systems, PLM systems and where where…

[00:04:38] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah and PLM system versus PLM thinking is a slightly different. So I think…

[00:04:46] JOS VOSKUIL:
Good point. Yeah.

[00:04:46] JAKOB ÅSELL:
…we operate within the PM domain, but we're not a PM software, so to say. But if you want to take the full journey, you can really start understanding what are your customer needs, what are the different segments you have and what difference your segments?

And what do these segments, what are the benefits they would like to see from their products? And then understand what are the performance steps to how do you measure those benefits? And there you can really start understanding what is your, your scope of your product, what do you do your product need to deliver? And from that you, you take it into what kind of technology do you master? What functions do that technology deliver and how do you group those into modules? And really being efficient in finding the right number of variants and the flexibility of how you can combine those variants into products. So.

[00:05:41] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
And what are the teams that you involved in the definition of these modules?

[00:05:46] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Our definition of modules, you could say a module would have one or sometimes several functions. There is some sort of building block. So with the building block, it comes to interfaces that you need to be able to build something with it. So if you can standardize that interface. And what we add to this is also there need to be kind of a strategic reason for this grouping to be a module. So can you take some benefits, whether it's a module where you isolate some key functions where you can improve your operational efficiency in the company, kind of for your manufacturing to take credit for or where you add a broad variance of features. So attract a bigger markets, kind of a language pack or something where you really have many variants to fill the market needed. Or is it like where you drive performance development being best in class?

[00:06:49] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
And related to departments it’s the engineering who is defining product management or you need someone from every part of the life cycle?

[00:07:01] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Typically, we are called on from engineering departments or R and D managers, and they have a problem with the rest of the company not sharing their view. Sometimes it's from the manufacturing that they see a cortic world and they would like us to improve it. But to really be successful with modularity, we say that you need to have one modular system or architecture that all the stakeholders of the company buy into. So R and D, manufacturing, sales, purchase service after market. So you need to have a lot of people coming together and agreeing and saying, this is our common architecture, and they, so that is a challenge to, to have all those peoples involved.

[00:07:47] JOS VOSKUIL:
It interesting where Jakob how you avoid all those buzzwords that we use, like digital transformation and digital connection. Because when I hear you talking, you talk about PLM as a strategy, which means you need to have an infrastructure where people connect data because I think maybe the biggest competitor for modularity management is Excel.

Which might exist, where completely disconnected and I should say, all departments need to work together. So this is really a digital connection. Do you see modularity getting integrated in the business, or is it still as, as also be asked, is it an R and D job where other people are informed?

[00:08:29] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah you need to integrate it throughout your business. And if you wanna go technical, I think modularity and having a, a definition, what we talk about is a model. We have a number of different item types, building modules, variance interfaces, properties, call values, et cetera. By building a model and kind of unify that language. And having an overarching definition of the product that that can span over several IT systems and like one system, in our case, PALMA, can define what is the module, what are the variants. But in another system, a CAD system, you give the shape to that variant and you have a drawing how to produce it. And then you have a PLM system that kind of takes out the build a material on that design. 

And if you go to the manufacturing world in the ERP system, you have the corresponding materials on that same variant and the process how to build it and so on. So in that way, you kind of share that information of the modular architecture throughout the system or like as you sometimes talk about these federated PLM system. So I see modularity being key in achieving that.

[00:09:48] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
I'm curious about what is the effort from, you have an ETO product and you make all the modular structure, you define it, how it's impacting your designs in the CAD side. Do you need also to adapt them to feed the modular structure?

[00:10:05] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah, so I started as a CAD engineer. That was my first job, and to help surviving the day-to-day work I started working in a modular fashion without understanding it, kind of getting that common understanding first, I didn't do any major thinking on dentifying my modules was more like looking at the product and see here's a chunk of the machine I was working on. Let's make that the module.

And then figure out, I have now to do this 10 different performance steps and trying what do need to vary in order to achieve those and what can be the same? And that helped me defining, kind of had skeletons as saying, here's my interfaces, here's my kind of bounding box at all my design should fit within. So I don't need to verify every variant, every combination of the product, but I can fit all my variants into my module bounding box, and then I'm sure that all the module bounding box goes together, or the modular skeletons goes together, then I'm gonna reduce my kind of packing problem.

[00:12:21] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
Yeah, this is when you start from the CAD thinking, but when you have already your models defined in a way or for different products and you define your model structure more like in theory in the Ebo structure, then I think then the category comes, right? So to be able to, to that you need to readapt how you build your models and you define the new boundaries so it fits the model structure. Right?

[00:12:44] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah. So thinking of a modular architecture, you do a lot of kind of front loading work or planning ahead or top down design. So you start that way and you have a great plan. And with a software like our PALMA, you can start configuring your product, making sure that you can deliver to your different customer segments and so on. But then it comes the bottom up you need to actually design the product. You need to make sure that you can fulfill the ideas, the functions, the performance in your given space. And you don't do that all the time, so you need to change. It's an iterative process, but then, you know, what do you impact with this change? So.

[00:13:27] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
How do you train your design, the designers? So do you provide some training or how do you prepare your customers to.

[00:13:36] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah, so we have kind of two tracks with customers now. So in traditionally, we worked really from the beginning to the end, helped our customers to understand their segments and breaking their products up into like a top down design thinking. So it's what a bits of a longer journey it gave like an optimal result. Many customers they don't have that time. Time is luxury, you know, so they have kind of an ad hoc architecture, something that have over time become an architecture. So we help them to document what they have and probably 90, 95% of that is good. And what is not good becomes obvious we can kind of tune those things that are not so good. What you end up with is not something that is optimal, but something that works and you can start automate around it. And that is what brings you efficiency and profit, so you don't need to be kind of super optimal to benefit, but to automate and be efficient and reducing manual work, that is what we aim at.

[00:14:47] JOS VOSKUIL:
I hear you talk a lot about efficiency and profit, and of course this is how companies exist because without profit I think they're gone. But from the other hand, as a member of the PLM Lean Global Alliance, I'm also seeing modularity as one of the foundations for a sustainable future. If you want to implement a circular economy, you need to have repairable products, reusable parts of the product, refurbish one. Do you see already companies also investing in a circular economy and the concepts of modularity related to that for this reason, for sustainability reasons, do they change their business?

[00:15:22] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yes, definitely. So we had it already from the start before I was joining Modular Management, we had, recycling was one key driver for modularity.
We were always little bit teased with that saying, yeah, we see your conference, Sweden, with all this recycling, especially in US, they were not so happy about it. But now it becomes a world trend with the circular economy certainly, and sustainability.

So we have several research topics on it. And our take on it is slightly like understanding the cost structure of a product, so have direct cost and you have indirect costs and so on. The sustainability factors is a, is another kinda of currency. So you can understand and count it that way. And personally, I would like to set a price to it. So you don't need to choose should I be profitable or sustainable? You should be both.

[00:16:18] JOS VOSKUIL:
And I think this will be also the future anyway. I mean, we have the scarcity of materials that we discover that we need three or four earths if we live the way we live now. And interesting that you're mentioning the starting point as recycling. I think everyone thinks recycling is the part, but actually before recycling you have the reuse, the refurbish, and the repair, which is all I would say, reducing the cost of ownership and manufacturing of products. But yeah, there will be anyway, this push to reduce the amount of waste and materials harvested.

[00:16:51] JAKOB ÅSELL:
And as customers can start accepting not having brand new components when we buy a brand new product that like some components can actually survive several lifetimes of a product. And we shouldn't be scared if some of them were reused and have sign of wear and tear, whereas if it doesn't affect the performance of the product.

[00:17:14] JOS VOSKUIL:
Yeah. Are you supporting also this kind of financial cases of looking into, uh, using recycled materials instead of virgin materials in the product? Or is this more an external sustainability officer job?

[00:17:27] JAKOB ÅSELL:
So it is part of our research and in some specific projects, it's a metric. As also saying as you can have different kind of materials, if you're a global company, you can have like European material standards or Chinese material standards. You can also have recyclable material standards as well. But that is also something if we have the luxury to build more products, I would like to, to go into that, to kind of measure and track usage of products so we can see how much of a lifetime has been consumed in a given individual product that has been sold.

[00:18:06] JOS VOSKUIL:
And we haven't spoken yet about AI.

[00:18:09] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah.

[00:18:09] JOS VOSKUIL:
What about AI and, uh, modular management?

[00:18:11] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah. It’s fascinating.

[00:18:13] JOS VOSKUIL:
Is it going to help companies?

[00:18:16] JAKOB ÅSELL:
It is going to help, it's going to distract. It's fantastic, especially the generative AI, which I am fascinated of. I'm trying to understand how we can make good use of it. We have been using AI much in a much more, in a more boring sense through combinatory analysis. So that has been a part of our product since 2007. We didn't know it was AI when we started, but later on. But we are working now on how to add like digital coaches and doing some tedious work where you need to optimize things and in this iterative process, having an AI robot to help you with, so yeah. We hope we can see some results of it in the live product moving forward.

[00:19:05] JOS VOSKUIL:
Yeah. I understood the AI agents is the, the buzzword, at least in our domain.

[00:19:10] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yes, agentic AI that is the hottest one right now. Yeah.

[00:19:15] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
Jakob if we have some listeners listening to us now, and they don't have the modular approach. They are completely in engineering toward their, uh, mindset. What are the steps that they would need to follow to have the modular structure in place for the products from the beginning to that point.

[00:19:35] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Oh, there are many paths you can take. So either you make a strong commitment and you get to buy in from management to buy you some time and where you can start doing this. As you can get part of your product being more cannot configured to order or not requiring manual engineering or manual labor for every new sold unit. Then that that will free up resources you can work more with the rest of the product.

[00:20:10] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
So to start with some parts configured to order. Do you recommend external support, external guidance, because sometimes are different. It's a difficult change of mindset if you have never done it, you know your products.

[00:20:24] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yes, so you can find someone to help you. There are many consultants doing that. There are lots of books, lots of materials, lot of of courses to go. We are supporting several universities with our methodologies. So if you are studying in Sweden we help you out in Stockholm. We have also another university in Brazil where we are helping them and we are working with more universities to spread this kind of gospel.

But many people have this also from their school or from their natural, kind of. It is not rocket science. It was invented by the Chinese, or first science are from the Chinese like 3000 years before Christ. So we are providing tools on how to help you doing that. So I think most people can do this by themself, perhaps not the optimal one, but that was not needed, as we said. It's, yeah, and then you come to a positive spiral. So if you set out to do 20% of your product and then you get some free time, and then you can do 40%, 60%, perhaps you don't go to a hundred percent, but if you can reach 80, 90%, it's a huge improvement.

[00:21:33] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
Okay, this is very good point. Like start, step by step. Not trying to go completely 100% to CTO. Mm-hmm.

[00:21:43] JOS VOSKUIL:
And then maybe important to mention if you are in North Europe, we have the North European Modular, uh, network, an organization also where companies come together and discuss their experiences with work groups and trainings. It's also where we met a few times with modular management.

[00:22:00] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
Great.

[00:22:01] JOS VOSKUIL:
So I think we're talking with a very experienced guy, Jakob, and that always raises the question, how can we get something out of this experience? Because experience is what you get when you don't get what you expect. So can you share with us your biggest experience for the listeners?

[00:22:20] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Oh, my biggest experience that's, but to what you say you don't experience is what you get, but what you didn't expect. So I set up in life and I dreamed about being the best 3D CAD modeling guy. And then I ended up here managing our software development team and building software that was thought on my agenda.

But I really enjoyed it, like to work with people rather than computers. And that is really part that I enjoy and, enrich my life.

[00:22:50] JOS VOSKUIL:
So the experience is that designing is beautiful, but building software and working with people can be much more fun, eh?

[00:22:57] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Yeah. Building a team and you have a common goal and you share their successes and you see how you can help other people succeed in their professional life. That is really what makes us tick here.

[00:23:08] JOS VOSKUIL:
It is the social part huh?

[00:23:11] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
Okay. Thank you very much Jakob for joining us today.

[00:23:15] JAKOB ÅSELL:
Thank you for having me.

[00:23:16] JOS VOSKUIL:
Okay.

[00:23:17] BEATRIZ GONZALEZ:
And thank you to, to our listeners for joining us. If you want to we discuss some topics, please leave us a comment and if you want to know better to Jakob join the Share PLM Summit that he will be a speaker there. So looking forward to it.