Title: Techniques for Comparing the Economic Effectiveness of Concurrent and Traditional Engineering
Abstract: This chapter describes the techniques through which a company can evaluate the economic effectiveness of the change from traditional to concurrent engineering. It discusses the main features of time based competition, in terms of its impact on the organization of design activities and compares in detail both competitive advantages and disadvantages of concurrent engineering in regard to traditional sequential engineering in time based competition. At present, time is a critical success factor in a number of industries, and its importance is assumed to grow further in the future. Time based competition is the term used for describing the leading role of the response time to customers' needs in determining the competitiveness of a firm. The term time based competition refers to two different performances of a firm, that is, timeliness and time to market. Timeliness is the time needed to respond to an order concerning an existing product. Time to market is the time needed for developing a new product, from the definition of the concept of the product to the delivery of the first unit to the market. Product development is organized within the company according to a traditional and sequential approach. The shortening of product life cycles increases the frequency of involvement of design resources during the life of the firm; hence, a wrong choice of the organization of design activities has a major impact on company performances.
Publication Year: 1994
Publication Date: 1994-01-01
Language: en
Type: book-chapter
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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