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Product Design & Development

The Generic Process for Developing New Products

Provides a Roadmap from Conceptualization and Design to Market

Positioning and Strategy

A Professional Approach to Product Development

Product development is the process of creating a new product to be sold by a business or

enterprise to its customers. In the document title, Design refers to those activities involved in creating
the styling, look and feel of the product, deciding on the product's mechanical architecture, selecting
materials and processes, and engineering the various components necessary to make the product
work. Development refers collectively to the entire process of identifying a market opportunity, creating
a product to appeal to the identified market, and finally, testing, modifying and refining the product until
it is ready for production. A product can be any item from a book, musical composition, or information
service, to an engineered product such as a computer, hair dryer, or washing machine. This document
is focused on the process of developing discrete engineered products, rather than works of art or
informational products.

The task of developing outstanding new products is difficult, time-consuming, and costly. People
who have never been involved in a development effort are astounded by the amount of time and
money that goes into a new product. Great products are not simply designed, but instead they evolve
over time through countless hours of research, analysis, design studies, engineering and prototyping
efforts, and finally, testing, modifying, and re-testing until the design has been perfected.

Few products are developed by a single individual working alone. It is unlikely that one individual
will have the necessary skills in marketing, industrial design, mechanical and electronic engineering,
manufacturing processes and materials, tool-making, packaging design, graphic art, and project
management, just to name the primary areas of expertise. Development is normally done by a project
team, and the team leader draws on talent in a variety of disciplines, often from both outside and
inside the company. As a general rule, the cost of a development effort is a factor of the number of
people involved and the time required to nurture the initial concept into a fully-refined product. Rarely
can a production-ready product be developed in less than one year, and some projects can take three
to five years to complete.

The impetus for a new product normally comes from a perceived market opportunity or from the
development of a new technology. Consequently, new products are broadly categorized as either
market-pull products or technology-push products. With a market-pull product, the marketing center of
the company first determines that sales could be increased if a new product were designed to appeal
to a particular segment of its customers. Engineering is then asked to determine the technical
feasibility of the new product idea. This interaction is reversed with a technology-push product. When
a technical breakthrough opens the way for a new product, marketing then attempts to determine the
idea's prospects in the marketplace. In many cases, the technology itself may not actually point to a
particular product, but instead, to new capabilities and benefits that could be packaged in a variety of
ways to create a number of different products. Marketing would have the responsibility of determining
how the technology should be packaged to have the greatest appeal to its customers. With either
scenario, manufacturing is responsible for estimating the cost of building the prospective new product,
and their estimations are used to project a selling price and estimate the potential profit for the
company.

The process of developing new products varies between companies, and even between
products within the same company. Regardless of organizational differences, a good new product is
the result a methodical development effort with well defined product specifications and project goals. A
development project for a market-pull product is generally organized along the lines shown in Figure 1.

Concept Development

Good concept development is crucial. During this stage, the needs of the target market are
identified, competitive products are reviewed, product specifications are defined, a product concept is
selected, an economic analysis is done, and the development project is outlined. This stage provides
the foundation for the development effort, and if poorly done can undermine the entire effort.
Concept development activities are normally organized according to Figure 2.
 Identify Customer Needs: Through interviews with potential purchasers, focus groups, and by
observing similar products in use, researchers identify customer needs. The list of needs will include
hidden needs, needs that customers may not be aware of or problems they simply accept without
question, as well as explicit needs, or needs that will most likely be reported by potential purchasers.
Researchers develop the necessary information on which to base the performance, size, weight,
service life, and other specifications of the product. Customer needs and product specifications are
organized into a hierarchical list with a comparative rating value given to each need and specification.

Establish Target Specifications: Based on customers' needs and reviews of competitive

products, the team establishes the target specifications of the prospective new product. While the
process of identifying customer needs is entirely a function of marketing, designers and engineers
become involved in establishing target specifications. Target specifications are essentially a wish-list
tempered by known technical constraints. Later, after designers have generated preliminary products
concepts, the target specifications are refined to account for technical, manufacturing and economic
realities.

Analyze Competitive Products: An analysis of competitive products is part of the process of

establishing target specifications. Other products may exhibit successful design attributes that should
be emulated or improved upon in the new product. And by understanding the shortfalls of competitive
products, a list of improvements can be developed that will make the new product clearly superior to
those of others. In a broader sense, analyzing competitive products can help orient designers and
provide a starting point for design efforts. Rather than beginning from scratch and re-inventing the
wheel with each new project, traditionally, the evolution of design builds on the successes and failures
of prior work.

Generate Product Concepts: Designers and engineers develop a number of product concepts to
illustrate what types of products are both technically feasible and would best meets the requirements
of the target specifications. Engineers develop preliminary concepts for the architecture of the product,
and industrial designers develop renderings to show styling and layout alternatives. After narrowing
the selection, non-functional appearance models are built of candidate designs.

Select a Product Concept: Through the process of evaluation and tradeoffs between attributes,
a final concept is selected. The selection process may be confined to the team and key executives
within the company, or customers may be polled for their input. Candidate appearance models are
often used for additional market research; to obtain feedback from certain key customers, or as a
centerpiece of focus groups.

Refine Product Specifications: In this stage, product specifications are refined on the basis of
input from the foregoing activities. Final specifications are the result of tradeoffs made between
technical feasibility, expected service life, projected selling price, and the financial limitations of the
development project. With a new luggage product, for example, consumers may want a product that is
lightweight, inexpensive, attractive, and with the ability to expand to carry varying amounts of luggage.
Unfortunately, the mechanism needed for the expandable feature will increase the selling price, add
weight to the product, and introduce a mechanism that has the potential for failure. Consequently, the
team must choose between a heavier, more costly product, or one that does not have the expandable
feature. When product attributes are in conflict, or when the technical challenge or higher selling price
of a particular feature outweighs its benefits, the specification may be dropped or modified in favor of
other benefits.

Perform Economic Analysis: Throughout the foregoing activities, important economic

implications regarding development expenses, manufacturing costs, and selling price have been
estimated. A thorough economic analysis of the product and the required development effort is
necessary in order to define the remainder of the development project. An economic model of the
product and a review of anticipated development expenses in relation to expected benefits is now
developed.

Plan the Remaining Development Project: In this final stage of concept development, the team
prepares a detailed development plan which includes a list of activities, the necessary resources and
expenses, and a development schedule with milestones for tracking progress.

System Level Design

System-level design, or the task of designing the architecture of the product, is the subject of this
stage. In prior stages, the team was focused on the core product idea, and the prospective design was
largely based on overviews rather than in-depth design and engineering. Once the development plan
is approved, marketing may begin to develop ideas for additional product options and add-ons, or
perhaps an extended product family. Designers and engineers develop the product architecture in
detail, and manufacturing determines which components should be made and which should be
purchased, and identifies the necessary suppliers.

The product architecture defines the product in chunks, or the primary functional systems and
subsystems, and how these systems are arranged to work as a unit. For example, an automobile is
comprised of a body and a chassis with an engine, a transmission, final drive, frame, suspension and
braking system. The architecture of an automobile design determines the platform layout, whether the
vehicle is front-wheel-drive or rear-wheel-drive, the size and location of the engine, transmission and
final drive, the overall design of suspension system, and the layout and type of other necessary
subsystems such as brakes, wheels, and steering. The architecture may determine the layout of the
exhaust system, but it would not provide the detailed engineering needed to determine the diameter
and thickness of the exhaust pipe, the detailed design of mufflers, nor the engineering of motor
mounts and exhaust hangers needed to isolate vibrations from the passenger compartment.

The architecture of the product, how it is divided into chunks and how the chunks are integrated
into the total product, impacts a number of important attributes such as standardization of
components, modularity, options for change later on, ease of manufacture, and how the development
project is divided into manageable tasks and expenses. If a family of products or upgrades and add-
ons are planned, the architecture of the product would determine the commonality of components and
the ease with which upgrades and add-ons can be installed. A system or subsystem borrowed from
another product within the company's line will economize on development, tooling and manufacturing
costs. With outsourced components, the supplier may contribute much of the associated design and
engineering.

Detail Design

Detail design, or design-for-manufacture, is the stage wherein the necessary engineering is done
for every component of the product. During this phase, each part is identified and engineered.
Tolerances, materials, and finishes are defined, and the design is documented with drawings or
computer files. Increasingly, manufacturers and developers are turning to three-dimensional solid
modeling using programs such as Pro-Engineer. Three-dimensional computer models form the core of
today's rapid prototyping and rapid manufacturing technologies. Once the database has been
developed, prototype components can be rapidly built on computerized machines such as CNC mills,
fused deposition modeling devices, or stereo lithography systems.

Testing and Refinement

During the testing and refinement stage, a number of prototypes are built and tested. Even
though they are not made from production components, prototypes emulate production products as
closely as possible. These alpha prototypes are necessary to determine whether the performance of
the product matches the specifications, and to uncover design shortfalls and gain in-the-field
experience with the product in use. Later, beta prototypes are built from the first production
components received from suppliers.

Production Ramp-up

During production ramp-up, the work force is trained as the first products are being assembled.
The comparatively slow product build provides time to work out any remaining problems with supplier
components, fabrication, and assembly procedures. The staff and supervisory team is organized,
beginning with a core team, and line workers are trained by assembling production units.

Technology-Push Products
 The generic development process is used with technology-push products, but with slight
modification. With technology-push products, the company acquires or develops a new technology
and then looks for appropriate markets in which to apply the technology. Consequently, an extra phase
is added at the beginning during which the new technology is matched to an appropriate market
opportunity. When the match has been made, the generic development process is carried out as
described.

Models and Prototypes

The terms prototype and model are often used interchangeably to mean any full-scale pre-
production representation of a design, whether functional or not. I prefer to use the term model to
describe a non-functional representation and the term prototype to describe a functional item. An
appearance model is a full-scale, non-functional representation that looks, as closely as possible,
identical to the prospective new product. Modeling and prototyping serve a variety of purposes
throughout the development effort.

Early on, engineering prototypes may be built of systems and subsystems to bench-test
performance and debug the system before proceeding with the design. Appearance models prove out
styling and ergonomics. A full-scale mockup of an automobile interior, for example, provides a real-
world test of ease of ingress, seating position, access to controls, visibility and appearance. Models
and prototypes are necessary because of the limitations of theoretical work and artificial mediums. A
product can be designed and put into simulated use on computer, but one doesn't really know how it
will work until the item is built and tested in its intended environment. Prototyping and modeling efforts
begin virtually at the inception of the project and continue into production ramp-up.

The Role of Industrial Design

According to the definition given by the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA), industrial
design (ID) is the "professional service of creating and developing concepts and specifications that
optimize the function, value and appearance of products and systems for the mutual benefit of both
user and manufacturer." An industrial designer combines artistic form with engineering necessities.
The ID practitioner blends the human meanings expressed through form, color, and texture with the
mechanical realities of function in a way that broadcasts a coherent and purposeful message to those
who experience the product. Good industrial design can create additional product benefits through the
selection of materials and the architecture of the design. Industrial designers have extensive training in
art, as well as training in basic engineering, manufacturing and fabrication processes, and marketing
practices. Dreyfuss (1967) lists five critical goals that industrial designers bring to a team when
developing new products:

Utility: The product's human interfaces should be safe, easy to use, and intuitive. Each feature
should be shaped so that it communicates its function to the user.

Appearance: Form, line, proportion, and color are used to integrate the product into a pleasing
whole.

Ease of Maintenance: Products must also be designed to communicate how they are to be
maintained and repaired.

Low Costs: Form and features have a large impact on tooling and production costs, so they
must be considered jointly by the team.

Communication: Product designs should communicate the corporate design philosophy and
mission through the visual qualities of the products.

Industrial design is costly and the value per dollar spent is often difficult to quantity. The value
becomes obvious, however, when one experiences the results. When the purchaser intuitively
understands a product's function, and senses the quality of its construction and the integrity of the
company that produced it, these subliminal messages are normally the result of good industrial design.

Industrial designers usually become involved in a development project almost at the outset.
Enthusiasm within the development team increases when industrial designers develop an attractive
concept early in the project. When members have a real concept to work towards, the effort ceases to
be a purely cerebral exercise, and instead, comes alive with personal meaning.
 Robert Q. Riley Enterprises, LLC.
P.O. Box 14465
Phoenix, AZ 85063-4465
Phone: 480-685-3225

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