Applications of Semantic Web Technologies for Ontology-Based Knowledge Management in Product Development

In this paper, an ontology-based KM system (KMS) is presented, which provides users with a product knowledge model (PKM) that helps them to locate proper information, and supports reuse of product data among different application systems throughout the product life cycle. The model is divided into information resource ontology, management activity ontology, product semantic ontology, as well as organization competence ontology in order to realize semantic match for knowledge search, and enhance the performance of organization capability and knowledge sharing. Furthermore, prototype system architecture is proposed, using the Semantic Web technology, for seamless sharing domain-specific design knowledge among multidisciplinary organizations. Finally, the application of the prototype system is presented.