A two-stage model of adaptable product platform for engineering-to-order configuration design

Product platforms are used to enable mass customisation to serve a large number of different market segments. The products are configured-to-order, meaning they are compiled using a variety of pre-developed building blocks. However, the building blocks that make up a traditional platform can only se...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of engineering design 2015-09, Vol.26 (7-9), p.220-235
Main Authors: Levandowski, Christoffer Erik, Jiao, Jianxin Roger, Johannesson, Hans
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
adaptable design
Architecture (computers)
Consumption
Customizing
design bandwidth
Design engineering
engineering-to-order
Feasibility
Flexibility
Market segments
Mathematical models
multi-level configuration
multilevel configuration
Platforms
Product design
product platforms
Segments
Tradeoffs
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Summary:Product platforms are used to enable mass customisation to serve a large number of different market segments. The products are configured-to-order, meaning they are compiled using a variety of pre-developed building blocks. However, the building blocks that make up a traditional platform can only serve customer requirements that are known. Engineering-to-order (ETO) development serves companies where customer requirements vary frequently. Here, designs are tailored to fit specific customer requirements upon request, an approach which is time consuming if serving a large number of different customers. This paper presents an approach for ETO configuration design. It comprises a two-stage model that enables design reuse while simultaneously maintaining flexibility to manage changes in customer requirements. The proposed artefact model is configured modularly to progress the design work and to create an architecture to work with, and scalable flexibility is maintained until the customer requirements are considered stable enough to optimise the final design. An illustrative case shows the approach's feasibility to a two-stage configuration of a rear frame of a jet engine. While using overall design considerations to select modules, trade-off curves are used for final scalable configuration. A change in customer requirements is accommodated by scalable flexibility, thereby creating an adaptable product platform.
ISSN:0954-4828
1466-1837
1466-1837
DOI:10.1080/09544828.2015.1021305