Introduction - Product Design and Development

Chapter 1 Ulrich and Eppinger - Product Design and Development

Characteristics of Successful New Products

A successful product is one that is being sold profitably. But profitability of a new product cannot be assessed quickly  in the early years. Hence measures which ultimately relate to profits are used.
The success of the product development project is determined by five dimensions.

Product quality
Product cost
Development time
Development cost
Development capability

Who in an organization are involved in new product development?

Main departments or functions involved are:

Marketing, Design, and Manufacturing

The Challenges of Product Development

The product development process is risky. It is difficult to create highly successful products more than half time in case of companies which are considered as good product development companies.

Trade-offs: Design decisions have tradeoffs. Light weight versus cost in case of air planes.
Dynamics: Evolution of technologies, customer preferences, competitor's new products and change in environment.

Details,
Time pressure,
Economics: A large investment has to be made in developing the product, process and acquiring resources to set up the production plant. It must have return on investment.

Approach of The Book by  Karl Ulrich and Steven Eppinger

Structured methods

Step-by-approach is provided for each major activity of product design and development.

The step by step approach makes the process explicit. It provides checklist for practice. Also, the process when implemented provides documentation which can be analyzed later and used as reference.

Industrial examples

Each chapter in the book is developed around an industrial example.

Organizational realities

The negative activities highlighted by the authors in the product development process and teams are:

1. Lack of empowerment of the team.
2. Functional allegiances transcending project goals.
3. Inadequate resources given to the team.
4. Lack of cross-functional representation on the project team.


Updated on 1 September 2019, 2 August 2016