Concurrent Engineering Best Practices

Most of the applications of concurrent engineering have been in large organisations with fewer examples of successful applications in smaller firms. In this paper, a brief review of concurrent engineering practices is provided.

1. History Of Concurrent Engineering
2. Concurrent Engineering Pdf

This article needs additional citations for. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.

( December 2007) Concurrent engineering ( CE) is a work methodology emphasizing the parallelisation of tasks (i.e. Performing tasks concurrently), which is sometimes called simultaneous engineering or integrated product development ( IPD) using an approach.

It refers to an approach used in in which functions of design engineering, manufacturing engineering, and other functions are integrated to reduce the time required to bring a new product to market. Contents. Introduction A 2008 publication described concurrent engineering as a new design management system that has matured in recent years to become a well-defined systems approach to optimizing design and engineering cycles.

Concurrent engineering has been implemented in a number of companies, organizations, and universities, most notably in the aerospace industry. Beginning in the early 1990s, CE was also adapted for use in the information and content automation field, providing a basis for organization and management of projects outside the physical product development sector for which it was originally designed. Organizations such as the 's make use of concurrent design to perform feasibility studies for future missions.

The basic premise for concurrent engineering revolves around two concepts. The first is the idea that all elements of a product's life-cycle—from functionality, production, assembly, testing, maintenance, environmental impact, and finally disposal and recycling—should be taken into careful consideration in the early design phases.

The second concept is that design activities should all be occurring at the same time, i.e., concurrently. The idea is that the concurrent nature of these activities significantly increases productivity and product quality. This way, errors and redesigns can be discovered early in the design process when the project is still flexible. By locating and fixing these issues early, the design team can avoid what often become costly errors as the project moves to more complicated computational models and eventually into the actual manufacturing of hardware. As mentioned above, part of the design process is to ensure that the product's entire life cycle is taken into consideration. This includes establishing user requirements, propagating early conceptual designs, running computational models, creating physical prototypes, and eventually manufacturing the product. Included in this process is taking into full account funding, workforce capability, and time requirements.

A 2006 study claimed that a correct implementation of the concurrent design process can save a significant amount of money, and that organizations have been moving to concurrent design for this reason. It is also highly compatible with. Concurrent engineering replaces the more traditional sequential design flow, or 'Waterfall Model'. In Concurrent Engineering an iterative or integrated development method is used instead. The Waterfall method moves in a linear fashion, starting with user requirements and sequentially moving forward to design and implementation, until you have a finished product.

In this design system, a design team would not quickly look backward or forward from the step it is on to fix or anticipate problems. In the case that something does go wrong, the design usually must be scrapped or heavily altered. The concurrent or iterative design process encourages prompt changes of tack, so that all aspects of the life cycle of the product are taken into account, allowing for a more evolutionary approach to design. The difference between the two design processes can be seen graphically in Figure 1.

Traditional 'Waterfall' or Sequential Development Method vs. Iterative Development Method in concurrent engineering. A significant part of the concurrent design method is that the individual engineer is given much more say in the overall design process due to the collaborative nature of concurrent engineering. Giving the designer ownership is claimed to improve the productivity of the employee and quality of the product, based on the assumption that people who are given a sense of gratification and ownership over their work tend to work harder and design a more robust product, as opposed to an employee that is assigned a task with little say in the general process. Challenges associated with concurrent design Concurrent design comes with a series of challenges, such as implementation of early design reviews, dependency on efficient communication between engineers and teams, software compatibility, and opening up the design process. This design process usually requires that computer models (, ) are exchanged efficiently, something that can be difficult in practice. If such issues are not addressed properly, concurrent design may not work effectively.

It is important to note that although the nature of some project activities project imposes a degree of linearity—completion of software code, prototype development and testing, for example—organizing and managing project teams to facilitate concurrent design can still yield significant benefits that come from the improved sharing of information. Service providers exist that specialize in this field, not only training people how to perform concurrent design effectively, but also providing the tools to enhance the communication between the team members. Elements Cross-functional teams Cross-functional teams include people from different area of the workplace that are all involved in a particular process, including manufacturing, hardware and software design, marketing, and so forth. Concurrent product realization Doing several things at once, such as designing various subsystems simultaneously, is critical to reducing design time and is at the heart of concurrent engineering. Incremental information sharing Incremental information sharing helps minimize the chance that concurrent product realization will lead to surprises.

'Incremental' meaning that as soon as new information becomes available, it is shared and integrated into the design. Cross-functional teams are important to the effective sharing of information in a timely fashion.

Integrated project management Integrated project management ensures that someone is responsible for the entire project, and that responsibility is not abdicated once one aspect of the work is done. Definition Several definitions of concurrent engineering are in use.

The first one is used by the : “ Concurrent Engineering (CE) is a systematic approach to integrated product development that emphasizes the response to customer expectations. It embodies team values of co-operation, trust and sharing in such a manner that decision making is by consensus, involving all perspectives in parallel, from the beginning of the.

” The second one is by Winner, et al., 1988: “ Concurrent Engineering is a systematic approach to the integrated, concurrent design of products and their related processes, including, manufacturing and support. This approach is intended to cause the developers from the very outset to consider all elements of the product life cycle, from conception to disposal, including quality, cost, schedule, and user requirements. Currently, several companies, agencies and universities use CE. Among them can be mentioned:. Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Goddard Space Flight Center. – French Space Agency.

– Italian Space Agency. – Satellite Design Office. Concept Design Center. See also.

's. References. NPD Solutions. DRM Associates. Retrieved 7 May 2017.

Ma, Y., Chen, G. & Thimm, G.; 'Paradigm Shift: Unified and Associative Feature-based Concurrent Engineering and Collaborative Engineering', Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, DOI 10.1007/s10845-008-0128-y.

Kusiak, Andrew; Concurrent Engineering: Automation, Tools and Techniques. ^ Quan, W. & Jianmin, H., A Study on Collaborative Mechanism for Product Design in Distributed Concurrent Engineering IEEE 2006. DOI: 10.1109/CAIDCD.2006.329445. ^ Kusiak, Andrew, Concurrent Engineering: Automation, Tools and Techniques. 'The standard waterfall model for systems development', November 14, 2008.

Kock, N. And Nosek, J., 'Expanding the Boundaries of E-Collaboration', IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, Vol 48 No 1, March 2005. Ma, Y., Chen, G., Thimm, G., 'Paradigm Shift: Unified and Associative Feature-based Concurrent Engineering and Collaborative Engineering', Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, DOI 10.1007/s10845-008-0128-y. Royce, Winston, 'Managing the Development of Large Software Systems', Proceedings of IEEE WESCON 26 (August 1970): 1-9.

Kusiak, Andrew, 'Concurrent Engineering: Automation, Tools and Techniques'. Rosenblatt, A.

And Watson, G. 'Concurrent Engineering', IEEE Spectrum, July, pp 22-37. Winner, Robert I., Pennell, James P., Bertrand, Harold E., and Slusarczuk, Marko M. 'The Role of Concurrent Engineering in Weapons System Acquisition', Institute for Defense Analyses Report R-338, December 1988, p v.

In the second half of 2013, CMI Defence, a weapons systems manufacturer from Belgium, started to explore Set-Based Concurrent Engineering (SBCE), its advantages, principles and tools associated with the approach. This is not the first time CMI Defence came across SBCE, but it was the first time they committed to it. The implementation was kicked-off at the engineering department, later followed by a first round of global implementation.

History Of Concurrent Engineering

This article briefly describes the SBCE process in CMI Defence, complemented with some theoretical foundations, for readers not so familiar with the Set-Based Concurrent Engineering approach (often called Set-Based Design or simply Set-Based Engineering). Is a product development approach where multiple solutions for the same need or problem are developed in parallel. As the solutions mature through time, teams gradually narrow their respective sets of solutions based on the knowledge gained through prototypes, experiments, and tests. As the teams narrow (reduce) their set of solutions, they commit to staying within the sets so that other design teams (working on a different subsystem or managing the entire system) can rely on their communication. Prior to the ‘Exploration Phase’, the team breaks down the product under consideration (the entire product; e.g.

Armored vehicle turret system) into its core subsystems (e.g. Feeding system, gun, armor, etc.), where each subsystem is then assigned to a team of specialists. This enables the development teams to enter the exploration phase where they create and explore multiple concepts for their respective subsystems in parallel.

These are developed for as long as factual information is needed to make a decision. Trade-offs between alternative solutions are explored and feasibility tests are carried out. Testing ensures that enough and right knowledge is generated for informative decision-making, while trade-offs indicate potentially stronger and weaker solutions.

In the second phase called ‘Set-Based Communication,’ teams look for feasible intersections between developed alternatives and rule out the inferior ones. Although some alternatives are not fit for further development, they are not discarded entirely. The ruled-out alternatives might still have interesting and valuable features, which teams can merge with stronger alternatives if/when applicable. Only when all teams are aligned and key knowledge gaps are identified, they enter the third phase, called ‘Convergence’. When the final sets are communicated and agreed upon, development teams commit to staying within their sets so that other teams can rely on them. In this part of the project, teams spend most of the times trying to find the answers to address and resolve the knowledge gaps that exist within their own subsystems, while at the same time ensuring their solutions are capable of seamless integration with solutions from other subsystems.

These integration events are ensuring the required knowledge is created and the functionality of the system is perfected before the solution proceeds to the detailed design phase. The final phase, known as the ‘Selection Phase,’ aims at selecting the most promising system solution which will be pursued in the following stages of the product life cycle. MATIC GOLOB Lean Analytics Association Matic has over 5 years of experience in working with global organizations from various industrial sectors, either leading or supporting the development and introduction of bespoke lean innovation and new product development solutions.

Over the past years, Matic has co-developed a framework to enable better, faster and more integrated innovation across the entire value chain, enabling companies to maximize their innovation capability and deliver truly customer-centric products and services, while minimizing the risk of market failure. Matic is a certified Service Design Thinking Facilitator, and the creator of the Set-Based Integrated Innovation Business Game co-developed with a multinational Swiss company.

He completed his Master’s degree in Global Product Development and Management at Cranfield University in 2012. Matic is a co-author of the Lean Product Development Best Practices book, and several journal and conference publications. He regularly appears as a speaker and workshop holder at various lean, product development and innovation conferences. OLIVIER CARLENS CMI Group Olivier Carlens is a Deputy Group CTO for CMI, a Belgian diversified group involved in Defense, Energy, Industry, Environment and Services.

He previously worked for the CMI Defence, a CMI Group subsidiary, and other Belgian Defense companies. His experience includes Project Management, Systems Engineering, Product Development and Innovation Management.

Olivier received a Master of Sciences in Ballistics and Weapon Engineering from the Royal Military Academy of Belgium, a MBA from Vlerick Management School and a Master of Sciences in technology Management from the Open University. MYRNA FLORES Lean Analytics Association Dr. Flores has over 20 years of experience collaborating as internal or external consultant in different manufacturing and services organizations, leading several initiatives related to Lean Thinking, Business Process improvement, Six Sigma, Supply Chain, Change Management, Open Innovation, Digital Transformation and Human Centered Service Design; providing also training and coaching. She is co-founder and president of the Lean Analytics Association (LAA) and visiting scholar at the College of Management of the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland.

She carried out her Post-doc at EPFL collaborating at the Lean Product and Process (LeanPPD) FP7 European project from 2009 to 2013. She completed her PhD in 2006 at the Politecnico di Milano studying Open Innovation Models to enable Industry-University collaboration for innovation. She obtained her Master’s Degree in Manufacturing Systems in 1999 and a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Monterrey Tec (ITESM) in 1996.

Matic Golob is a Senior Research Program Manager, trainer, and coach at Lean Analytics Association (LAA) where he focuses on the development, introduction and implementation of bespoke lean innovation and new product development solutions to support organizations on their continuous improvement journeys. He specializes in Set-Based Integrated Innovation, Design Thinking, Human-Cantered Design, SBCE, Visual Management, Knowledge Management, Training Development and Gamified Learning. Matic previously worked as a Research Fellow and Project Manager at Cranfield University, where he was a task leader of Set-Based Design activities for the British aerospace project named ‘Configuration Optimization of Next Generation Aircraft’. Throughout his career, Matic collaborated with multinational organizations from aerospace, construction, and the fast moving consumer goods industry to introduce and implement lean thinking into their existing innovation and product development processes. He completed his master degree in Global Product Development and Management from Cranfield University in 2012.

Concurrent Engineering Pdf

Matic is also a co-author of several journal and conference publications, as well as a regular speaker at lean and product development events, and he is currently co-developing his first book about lean product development best practices.