Konrad Exner

A transdisciplinary perspective on prototyping

New societal challenges influence product development on different levels, from business strategies of companies to engineering activities. For instance, the extension of product centered development to Product-Service Systems including products, services, infrastructure, business models etc. demand specialists of different domains regarding the development of such solutions. Therefore, transdisciplinary team work is not an academic concept, but a necessity in practice. Besides classical challenges regarding team work, transdisciplinary teams have to face differences in the mutual understanding of development concepts, thus, resulting in misunderstandings. The research group Rethinking Prototyping focusses on prototyping processes, in particular by integrating different approaches and analyzing future potential of prototyping. The main idea is to bring different perspectives into collision to learn from each other and develop a common understanding of prototyping. For this purpose a two-day workshop has been conducted, bringing together a group of engineers, architects, interaction designers, media designers etc. Various domain specific design tasks have been analyzed and performed in mixed teams while recording the design process of the group and specific wording of each participant regarding prototyping. This paper describes the research approach and the qualitative results of the study.

Virtual Prototyping and Validation of Cpps within a New Software Framework

As a result of the growing demand for highly customized and individual products, companies need to enable flexible and intelligent manufacturing. Cyber-physical production systems (CPPS) will act autonomously in the future in an interlinked production and enable such flexibility. However, German mid-sized plant manufacturers rarely use virtual technologies for design and validation in order to design CPPS. The research project Virtual Commissioning with Smart Hybrid Prototyping (VIB-SHP) investigated the usage of virtual technologies for manufacturing systems and CPPS design. Aspects of asynchronous communicating, intelligent- and autonomous-acting production equipment in an immersive validation environment, have been investigated. To enable manufacturing system designers to validate CPPS, a software framework for virtual prototyping has been developed. A mechatronic construction kit for production system design integrates discipline-specific models and manages them in a product lifecycle management (PLM) solution. With this construction kit manufacturing designers are able to apply virtual technologies and the validation of communication processes with the help of behavior models. The presented approach resolves the sequential design process for the development of mechanical, electrical, and software elements and ensures the consistency of these models. With the help of a bill of material (BOM)- and signal-based alignment of the discipline-specific models in an integrated mechatronic product model, the communication of the design status and changes are improved. The re-use of already-specified and -designed modules enable quick behavior modeling, code evaluation, as well as interaction with the virtualized assembly system in an immersive environment.

Interplay of styling, design and service performance in developing Product-Service Systems

New innovations are a decisive competitive advantage in todays global markets. Besides technical improvements the extension of classical product centred offerings with services to a provider of individual solution offers tremendous benefits. Furthermore, an exceptional product styling enables emotionally added value. Developing these offerings requires a joint and structured collaboration among the stakeholders, e.g. stylists, designers and engineers, already in the early phases. In practice, this can evoke a number of difficulties due to differences in working processes and philosophies of the different stakeholders. In order to face this challenge, the design process of offering development needs to be investigated. Furthermore, new methods and processes have to be developed. This paper describes an investigation of the different methods in developing a product focusing on stylists and engineers. Additionally, it describes the investigation of the challenges that occur during the development of Product-Service Systems. Based on survey results a new approach is presented which is in turn validated with a use case. Eventually, an integrated offering development process is proposed.

KNOWLEDGE IN ENGINEERING DESIGN: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW ON ARTIFACTS AND IT SYSTEMS

Intense collaboration within networks of stakeholders characterizes current engineering design processes. In these, engineers use IT systems to create artifacts, which manifest their knowledge allowing its circulation. Still, a research gap exists regarding the understanding of kinds, relations and interdependencies between IT systems, artifacts and knowledge types. This article addresses this gap by presenting results of a systematic literature review. The results contribute to close the mentioned gap, give insight on focusses of current research and identify further need for investigations.

PLM Customizing: Results of a Qualitative Study with Industrial Experts

The implementation and utilization of a product lifecycle management (PLM) system, including the continuously adoption to business processes, methods and functions, implies massive challenges and outlay for organizations. Despite the importance of customizing in PLM projects, there are no adequate models to support organizations in their customizing process. This paper focuses on the customizing process of PLM systems considering not only the technical IT view, but also the organizational and the human context. In order to identify the state of the art in industrial practice eleven qualitative interviews have been conducted. The results and implications are presented in this paper. The findings comprise five dimensions and an additional generic PLM customizing process.

The Results of Rethinking Prototyping

The scientists and academics in the transdisciplinary project called “Rethinking Prototyping” have not only been working on concrete hybrid prototyping approaches in their research, but also on a joint understanding and a general concept of prototyping as well. A differentiated analysis of the terms used in contexts connected with prototyping led to the finding that their application both differs from discipline to discipline and is partially complementary, too. In the transdisciplinary context of complex interrelated developments, it is not expedient to attempt a definition that will cover all prototyping concepts. Rather, the prototyping methods and concepts should be placed and described in a multi-dimensional matrix. This article discusses considerations in this regard and presents their reflection in the “layer cake” publication format.

Perspectives on Future Prototyping—Results from an Expert Discussion

The role of prototyping in today’s product development processes has been examined in numerous empirical studies and investigations. In various disciplines, prototyping is understood as a significant methodology for supporting clarification, conception, and design phases. Due to this significance, the question how prototyping will evolve in the future is of high relevance for those who are planning development processes, developing prototyping tools and for design researchers generally. However, quite little is known about possible future evolutions in prototyping and only few authors explicitly address this topic in the literature. This article explores perspectives on future prototyping based on the results of a focus group discussion that was conducted amongst ten prototyping experts from academia and industry. The results suggest that prototyping will maintain and even expand its general importance for product development processes. Moreover, significant changes are expected in the fields of prototyping design methods, prototyping technologies, and societal impacts of prototyping.