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Advances in Manufacturing >

2014 , Vol. 2 >Issue 2: 130 - 140

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40436-014-0079-9

Approaching lean product development using system dynamics:investigating front-load effects

  • Alemu Moges Belay ? Torgeir Welo ?Petri Helo
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  • 1.Department of Engineering Design and Materials, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Richard Birkelands Vei 2B, N-7491 Trondheim, Norway
    2. Department of Production Technology, University of Vaasa,P.O. Box 700, FI-65101 Vaasa, Finland
e-mail: alemu.m.belay@ntnu.no

Online published: 2014-06-28

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Abstract

Competing with successful products has become perplexing with several uncertainties and transmutes from time to time as customers’ expectations are
dynamic. That is why manufacturing firms exhaustively strive to look for a better competitive frontier using wellestablished and innovative product development (PD) processes. In this paper, we would like to answer three research questions: (i) What would be the effects of frontloading
in PD? (ii) Can we improve our PD process endlessly? (iii) When is the critical time that the firm should take remedial action for improvements? As a contribution to the vast numbers of improvement methods in new product development (NPD), this paper investigates the effects of front-loading using set-based concurrent engineering (SBCE) on cost and lead time. Models are developed and treated using a system dynamics (SD) approach. We assign a hypothetical upfront investment for SBCE and compare its effects on  total cost and lead time of the development process. From the research, it is found that the total cost of PD is reduced almost by half—although the front loading is higher in order to encompass multiple design alternatives. The total product lead time is reduced by almost 20 %. The model reveals the critical time for improvement of the PD process. We use SD tool (e.g., STELLA) for simulation and visualization of the complex PD model, using SBCE as one of several strategies to frontload activities in the NPD process.

Key words： Front-loading ; Set-based concurrent engineering (SBCE) ;  Innovation ;   Lean product development (LPD) ;  System dynamics (SD)

Cite this article

Alemu Moges Belay ? Torgeir Welo ?Petri Helo . Approaching lean product development using system dynamics:investigating front-load effects[J]. Advances in Manufacturing, 2014 , 2(2) : 130 -140 . DOI: 10.1007/s40436-014-0079-9

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