Chapter 4 - Product and Service Design

What does product & service design do?

What questions are asked about product & service design

1. Is there a demand for it?

2. Can we do it?

3. What level of quality is appropriate?

4. Does it make sense from an economic standpoint?

Is there a demand for it?

Market size/ demand profile

Can we do it?

Manufacturability and serviceability

Manufacturability

The capability of an organization to produce an item at an acceptable profit

Serviceability

The capability of an organization to provide a service at an acceptable cost or profit

What level of quality is appropriate?

Customer expectations, competitor quality, fit with current offering

Does it make sense from an economic standpoint?

Liability issues, ethical considerations, sustainability issues, costs and profits

Reason to design or redesign

The driving forces for product and service design or redesign are market opportunities or threats

Supply-Chain Based Idea Generation

Ideas can come from anywhere in the supply chain (customers, suppliers, distributors, employees, maintenance and repair personnel)

Commpetitor Based Idea Generation

By studying how a competitor operates and its products and services, many useful ideas can be generated (sometimes done via reverse engineering)

Researched Based Idea Generation

Divided into serveral different groups, R&D, Basic Research, Applied Research, Development

Basic Research

Has the objective of advancing the state of knowledge about a subject without any near-term expectation of commercial applications

Applied Research

Has the objective of achieving commercial applications

Development

Converts the results of applied research into useful commercial applications

Percent Chance of Success

Legal Considerations

Product Liability and Uniform Commercial Code

Ethical Considerations

Designers are often under pressure to speed up the design process and cut costs, and these pressures force trade-off decisions

Other Considerations

Human, cultural, and global design factors

Sustainability

Using resources in ways that do not harm ecological systems that support human existence

Key aspeccts when designing w/ sustainabiilty

Life cycle analysis, end of life programs, the 3 Rs (reduction of costs and materials used, reuse parts of returned products, recycling)

Cradle to Grave Assessment (aka life cycle analysis)

The assessment of the environmental impact of a product or service throughout its useful life

Remanufacturing

Refurbishing used products by replacing worn - out or defective components

• products can be sold for about 50% of the cost of a new product

  • process requires mostly unskilled and semi-skilled workers

Design for disassembly (DFD)

Designing a product to that used products can be easily taken apart

Product or service life stages

Standardization

Extend to which there is an absence of variety in a product, service, or process

Advantages of standardization

Fewer parts to deal with, reduced training costs and time, more routine purchasing handling and inspection, etc

Disadvantages to Standarization

Designs may be frozen too early, high cost of design changes and decreased product variety

Delayed Differentiation

Process of producing a product or service but not quite completing production until customer preferences are known

Modular Design

A form of standardization in which component parts are grouped into modules that are easily replaced or interchanged

CAD (Comp aided design)

Product design using computer graphics

• helps with productivity, creates databases, and provides the possibility of engineering and cost analysis of proposed designs

• CAD that includes finite element analysis (FEA) can significantly reduce time to market

Service Design

Begins with a choice of service strat which determines the nature and focus of the service and target market

• degree of variation in service requirements can be challenge

• degree of customer contact and involvement can be challenge