Q:-Discuss The Stages in Product Design Process: 1. Idea Generation

Q:- Discuss the stages in product design process
Product Design Process: 6 Major Steps Involved

1. Idea Generation:
The design process begins with understanding the customers and their
needs. Ideas for new products can come from a variety of sources both
within and outside the firm. Internal sources include employees, research
and development, market research sales force and reverse engineering.
The external sources include customers, legislation, environment,

technology and strategic position of the organisation. Competitors are also
the source of ideas for new products or services. Perceptual maps, bench
marking and reverse engineering can help companies learn from their
competitors.
Perceptual maps helps to compare customer perceptions of a

company’s products with competitor’s products. It is a visual method
of comparing customer perceptions of different product or services:
1. Bench marking refers to finding the best in class product or process,
measuring the performance of your product or process against it and
making recommendations for improvement based on the results.
2. Reverse engineering refers to carefully dismantling and inspecting

competitors products to look for design features that can be incorporated to
improve one’s own products.
Each of these sources gives a different emphasis on the requirements and

importance of idea generation.
2. Screening Ideas:
The purpose of screening ideas is to eliminate those ideas that do not
appear to have high potential and so avoid the costs incurred at
subsequent stages. Using group of people, proposals would be supported
by graphics, models and an outline specification and judged against a set
of criteria such as necessity to the firms survival, role in filling out an
existing product/service, degree of overlap with existing products and
services, utilizing existing processes and capabilities, impact on overall
sales and profits of the company.
To have a better evaluation of ideas, each of the dimensions of the ideas is

scored on a 0-10 scale and each dimension is attached weights as per
these dimensions. The resulting aggregate score helps in deciding which
idea to progress and which idea should be dropped.
3. Feasibility Study:
Initial screening of the ideas is designed to stop the ideas, which are
unsuitable for further considerations. Feasibility study consists of a market
analysis, an economic analysis, and technical and strategic analysis.
Marketing takes the ideas that are generated and the customer needs that
are identified from the first stage of the design process and develops
alternative product concepts. The market analysis through customer
analysis and market survey assesses whether there is an enough demand
for the proposed product to invest in developing further.
If the sufficient demand exists, then there is an economic analysis that aims
at establishing the production and development costs and compares them
with estimated sales volume. The profit potential of the product can be
studied using quantitative techniques such as cost benefit analysis,
decision theory, net present value (NPV) or internal rate of return (IRR).
The risk analysis is also carried out. Finally, technical and strategic analysis
is concerned with technical viability of the product with respect to
technology, process of manufacture, availability of materials etc.
Performance specifications are written for product concepts that pass the
feasibility study and are approved for development. The details of feasibility
are given in fig. 2.6.
4. Preliminary Design:
Design engineers take general performance specifications and translate
them in to technical specifications. The process of preliminary design
involves building a prototype, testing the prototype, revising the design,
retesting and so on until a viable design is determined. Design incorporates
both form and function.
Form design refers to the physical appearance of a product, its shape, size,
color, styling etc. Aesthetics aspects such as image, market appeal, special
identification, finish etc. will also form a part of the form design.
Production design is concerned with how the product will be made. Design,
which are difficult to make result in poor quality products. During the design
stage itself the manufacturing aspects should be considered. The
production design or design for production include simplification,
standardization and modularity.
Design simplification attempts to reduce the number of parts,

subassemblies and options into a product. Standardization refers to use of
commonly available and interchangeable parts and subassemblies.
Modular design consist of combining standardized building blocks or
modules in a variety of ways to create a unique finished product. Modular
design is common in electronics and automobile industry.
5. Pilot Runs and Testing:

In the preliminary design stage, prototypes are built and tested after several
iterations, pilot run of the manufacturing process is conducted. Adjustments
are made as needed before finalizing the design. Apart from continuously
testing the product for performance, market testing is also carried out to
check the acceptability of the product in the defined market and customer
group. This helps to know in advance, whether customer will accept and
buy this product on launching in the market. Thus, test marketing is a
powerful tool.
Final Design and Process Plans:
The final design consists of detailed drawings and specifications for the
new product. The accompanying process plans are workable instructions
for manufacture including necessary equipment’s and tooling, component
sources job descriptions, work instructions and Programmes for computer-
assisted machines.
6. New Product Launch:

Launching a new product or service involves ramp up production. The
process has been refined and debugged, but it has yet to operate at a
sustained level of production. In ramp up, production starts at a relatively
low level of volume as the organization develops confidence in its abilities
to execute production consistently and marketing’s abilities to sell the
product, the volume increases. Launching the new product or service
involves co-coordinating the supply chain and rolling out marketing plans.
Marketing and production will work in a co-coordinated way during this
phase.

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Q:- Discuss the stages in product design process

Product Design Process: 6 Major Steps Involved

The external sources include customers, legislation, environment,

Perceptual maps helps to compare customer perceptions of a

2. Reverse engineering refers to carefully dismantling and inspecting

Each of these sources gives a different emphasis on the requirements and

To have a better evaluation of ideas, each of the dimensions of the ideas is

Design simplification attempts to reduce the number of parts,

5. Pilot Runs and Testing:

6. New Product Launch:

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