Md.

Golam Kibria
Assistant Professor
Dept. of IEM, KUET.

PRODUCT DESIGN AND

DEVELOPMENT
Chapter 2 : Development Processes and Organizations
A PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

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 A process is a sequence of steps that transforms a set of
inputs into a set of outputs.
 A Product development process is the sequence of steps
or activities that an enterprise employs to conceive,
design and commercialize a product.
 Many of these steps and activities are intellectual and
organizational rather than physical.

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USEFULNESS OF A WELL-DEFINED
DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
 Quality assurance

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 Quality assurance  Following the process is one way to
 Coordination assure the quality of the product
 Coordination
 Planning  It helps act like a master plan to let
 Management team members know when to
contribute and whom to work with to
 Improvement exchange information & materials
 Morale & Satisfaction
 Planning
 Built in milestones related to each
phase
 Management
 Able to assess performance of the
ongoing development effort
 Improvement
 Good documentation helps to identify3
opportunities to improve
 SIX PHASES OF THE GENERIC
DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

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0. Planning 1. Concept 2. System- 3. Detail 4. Testing and 5.
Development Level Design Design Refinement Production
Ramp-Up

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PLANNING

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 Often referred to as “phase zero” since it precedes the
project approval and launch of the actual product
development process.

 Output: Target market, business goals, key assumptions

and constraints.

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CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT

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 Needs of the target market are identified, alternative
products concepts are generated and evaluated, and one
more concepts are selected for further development and
testing.

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 SYSTEM-LEVEL DESIGN

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 Includes the definition of the product architecture and
the decomposition of the product into subsystems and
components.
 The final assembly scheme for the production system is
usually defined during this phase.

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 DETAIL DESIGN

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 Includes complete product specifications such as
tolerances, materials, geometry, etc.
 Specifications of the purchased parts

 Process plans and assembly plans of the product defined

 Output is control documentation -----the drawing or

computer files describing of each part and its production
tooling.

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TESTING AND REFINEMENT
 Involves construction and evaluation of several

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preproduction versions of the product
 Early (alpha) prototypes: Usually built with
production-intent parts -- parts with the same geometry
and material properties as the production version but
not necessarily fabricated with the actual processes to
be used in production.
 Alpha prototypes tested to determine whether (a) the
product will work as designed and (b) product satisfies
key customer needs.

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 TESTING AND REFINEMENT

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 Beta prototypes are usually built with parts
supplied by the intended production processes
but may not be assembled using the intended
final assembly process.
 Beta prototypes used to answer questions about
performance and reliability in order to identify
necessary engineering changes.

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 PRODUCTION RAMP-UP

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 The product is made using the intended production
system.
 Purpose is to train the work force and weed out any
remaining problems in the production processes
 Transition from ramp-up to normal production is
gradual

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THE GENERIC PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
PROCESS

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 Concept Development: The Front-
End Process
Expansion of concept development phase into Front-

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end process. The front-end process generally contains
many interrelated activities, ordered shown in figure.

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CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITIES

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 Identifying customer needs
 Establishing target specifications
 Concept generation
 Concept selection
 Concept testing
 Setting final specifications
 Project planning
 Economic analysis
 Benchmarking of competitive products
 Modeling and prototyping 14
IDENTIFYING CUSTOMER NEEDS

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 The goal of this activity is to understand customers’ needs
and to effectively communicate them to the development
team.

 Output: organized customer needs list, importance rating

for each need

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ESTABLISHING TARGET
SPECIFICATIONS

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 Specifications provide a precise description of what a
product has to do. They are translation of the customer
needs into technical terms.
 Targets for the specifications are set early in the process
and represent the hopes of the development team.

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 CONCEPT GENERATION

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 The goal is to thoroughly explore the space of product
concepts that may address the customer needs
 Concept generation includes a mix of internal and
external search
 Output: Usually a set of 10-20 concepts, each typically
represented by a sketch and brief descriptive text

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CONCEPT SELECTION

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 Concept selection is the activity in which various
product concepts are analyzed and sequentially
eliminated to identify the most promising concept(s).

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CONCEPT TESTING

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 One or more concepts are tested to verify that the
customer needs have been met, assess the market
potential of the product, and identify any shortcomings.

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SETTING FINAL SPECIFICATIONS

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 The target specifications set earlier in the process are
revisited after a concept has been selected and tested.

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 PROJECT PLANNING

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 The team creates a detailed development schedule,
devises a strategy to minimize development time, and
identifies the resources required to complete the project.
 Major results of the front-end activities are captured in a
contract book which contains the mission statement, the
customer needs, the detail of the selected concept, the
product specifications, the economic analysis of the
product, the development schedule, the project staffing,
and the budget.

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 ECONOMIC ANALYSIS

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 The team often with the support of a financial analyst,
builds an economic model for the new product.
 This model is used to justify continuation of the overall
development program and to resolve specific trade-off
among, for example, development costs and
manufacturing costs.

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BENCHMARKING OF COMPETITIVE
PRODUCTS

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 An understanding of competitive products is critical to
successful positioning of a new product and can provide
a rich source of ideas for the product and production
process design.

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MODELING AND PROTOTYPING

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 Every stage of the concept development process involves
various forms of models and prototypes. These may
include, among others: early “proof-of-concept” models,
which help the development team to demonstrate
feasibility: “form-only” models, which can be shown to
customers to evaluate ergonomics and style; and
spreadsheet models of technical trade-offs.

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 ADAPTING THE GENERIC PRODUCT
DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

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 Market Pull Products
 Technology Push Products
 Platform Products
 Process-intensive Products
 Customized Products
 High-Risk Products
 Quick-Build Products
 Complex Systems
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VARIANTS OF GENERIC DEVELOPMENT
PROCESS

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PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
ORGANIZATIONS

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The scheme by which individual designers and developers
are linked together into groups. Organizations are formed
by establishing formal or informal links among individuals
 Reporting relationships: Reporting relationships
give rise to the classic notion of supervisor and
subordinate.
 Financial arrangements: Individuals are linked by
being part of the same financial entity, such as that
defined by a particular budget category or profit-and-
loss statement.
 Physical Layout: links are created between
individuals when they share the same office, floor,
building, or site. 28
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
ORGANIZATIONS

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 Regardless of their organizational links, particular
individuals can be classified in two different ways:
according to their function and according to the projects
they work on.

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PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
ORGANIZATIONS

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 A function (in organizational terms) is an area of
responsibility usually involving specialized education,
training, or experience.
 Regardless of their functions, individuals apply their
expertise to specific projects.
 In product development, a project is the set of activities
in the development process for a particular product.

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FUNCTIONAL & PROJECT
ORGANIZATIONS

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 In functional organizations, the organizational links are
primarily among those who perform similar functions.
 In project organizations, the organizational links are
primarily among those who work on the same project.

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 MATRIX ORGANIZATIONS

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 The matrix organization was conceived as a
hybrid of functional and project organizations.
 In the matrix organization, individuals are linked
to others according to both the project they work
on and their function.
 Typically each individual has two supervisors,
one a project manager and one a functional
manager.

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VARIANTS OF THE MATRIX
ORGANIZATION
 Heavyweight project organization

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 Lightweight project organization.

A heavy weight project organization contains strong

project links. Project manager has complete budget
authority, performance evaluation, resource allocation
decisions.

A light weight project organization contains weaker

project links and relatively stronger functional links.
Project manager is more of a coordinator and
administrator. Update schedule, arranges meetings, hiring
and firing and performance evaluation. No real authority
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to control the project organization.
VARIOUS PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
ORGANIZATIONS

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CHOOSING AN ORGANIZATIONAL
STRUCTURE

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 The most appropriate choice of organizational structure
depends on which organizational performance factors are
most critical to success.
 Functional organizations tend to breed specialization and
deep expertise in the functional areas.
 Project organizations tend to enable rapid and effective
coordination among diverse functions.

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CHOOSING AN ORGANIZATIONAL
STRUCTURE

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 How important is cross-functional integration?
 How critical is cutting-edge functional expertise to
business success?
 Can individuals from each function be fully utilized for
most of the duration of a project?
 How important is product development speed?

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CHARACTERISTICS OF DIFFERENT
ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE

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TRADITIONAL DESIGN METHODS

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 Aggregation
 (include new functions)
 Adaptation
 (adapt to new conditions)
 Application
 (apply a proven technology to a new area)
 analysis of properties
 (thorough analysis of an existing design to improve)
 Brainstorming
 (find many solutions to a problem)
TRADITIONAL DESIGN METHODS

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 systematic search of field
 (obtain complete possible information)

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 Questioning
 (apply a system of questions to produce mental
simulation)
 mental experiment
 (observe an idealized mental model at work)
 valueanalysis
 Evaluation
 (find best variant among a few by point-counting)
TRADITIONAL DESIGN METHODS

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 invention
 Iteration

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 (to solve a system with complicated interactions)
 experimentation
 division of totality

 math & computer modeling

WHAT IS THE PRODUCT LIFE
CYCLE?

The PRODUCT LIFE CYCLE is a series of STAGES that a

product goes through from when a business first creates and
sells it until the time nobody wants it any more.
FOUR STAGES EXIST IN THE ‘WORKING LIFE’ OF MOST
PRODUCTS.
STAGE 1 - PRODUCT INTRODUCTION
Costly stage as lots of advertising and
promotion is needed to encourage sales.
SALES will start to RISE SLOWLY as
people become aware of the product.
PROFITS will start to APPEAR SLOWLY
as sales rise and start up costs are repaid
STAGE 2 - PRODUCT GROWTH
SALES will start to RISE QUICKLY as many
people begin to use the product.
PROFITS will start to RISE QUICKLY as sales
rise sharply.
STAGE 3 - PRODUCT MATURITY
SALES will start to SLOW DOWN as almost
everyone who wants the product will have it.
PROFITS will be MAXIMISED as the
maximum number of sales is made.
STAGE 4 - PRODUCT DECLINE
SALES will start to FALL as people start to use
other better or newer products.
PROFITS will start to FALL as sales fall.
At this stage a decision has to be made
about whether to withdraw the product
or use extension strategies to inject new
life into the product.
EXTENSION STRATEGIES
The marketing mix can be changed to inject
new life into a product by:

 Changing or modifying the PRODUCT

 Altering the distribution pattern (PLACE)
 Changing the PRICE
 Using a new PROMOTIONAL campaign

These methods can delay the replacement or

withdrawal stage for some time
LIFE CYCLE VARIATIONS
The speed at which different products move
through the life cycle will vary, and some
never seem to complete their life cycle at all
Ex: Cadbury’s Dairy Milk was introduced in
1905 and is still going strong!

This tends to be because the product has a

strong brand and a loyal customer base.
CHAPTER 2: HOME WORK

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 Exercise (Analysis of Properties)
 Focus on materials selection for an existing product
 Steps:
 1. Examine each component of a product (an incandescent bulb, stapler, can
opener).
 2. Break the product or decompose it, avoiding injury to eyes or hands and damage
to the other components.
 3. Construct and complete a table consisting the following items on its columns.
 a. list each component of the product
 b. define the function of each component
 c. identify the material used
 d. reason why it was selected
 e. select possible alternative.
 4. List five failure mechanisms
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THAT’S ALL FOLKS !

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