Margherita Peruzzini

A QFD-based method to support SMEs in benchmarking co-design tools

Efficient collaborative product design is crucial for extended enterprises willing to develop complex products pursuing a short time to market. However, successful collaborative product design depends on the ability to effectively manage and share engineering knowledge and data throughout the entire product development process. Co-design software platforms aim to facilitate cooperation in distributed teams. In the context of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) the advanced co-design software implementation to support the supply chain is not a trivial task. SMEs have peculiar characteristics such as flexibility, ICT skills and financial resources, which are difficult to be integrated within a structured design network. This paper presents a method to define and evaluate a co-design platform dedicated to SMEs in the mechanical product field. System architecture is defined by applying suitable metrics based on collaborative process characteristics in order to assess functionality performance of the available tools. Benchmarking is based on different levels of collaboration recognized in the typical product development process in SMEs. Correlation between process metrics, software functionalities and specific collaboration requirements is managed by adopting Quality Function Deployment (QFD) techniques. A practical case study allows the robustness of the proposed method to be verified and the main advantages and future developments to be discussed.

Design for sustainability of product-service systems

Recently, numerous manufacturing companies are moving from product to services to create new business opportunities and to increase the product value. At the same time, sustainability is a crucial aspect for industry. In this context, the research challenge is defining a structured methodology to support the design for sustainability of product-service systems (PSS). While product sustainability has been investigated during the last decades and can be assessed by several tools, sustainability of PSS is almost unexplored. This paper defines an integrated lifecycle and proposes a methodology to identify a set of sustainability indicators to compare different use scenarios and find out the best ones. It adopts a holistic approach to assess sustainability on the basis of the three main impacts: environmental, economical and social. The methodology is illustrated by means of an industrial case study proposing a new model called ‘Hot water as a service’ evolving traditional water heaters.

Requirements Engineering for Servitization in Manufacturing Service Ecosystems (MSEE)

Nowadays, manufacturing enterprises shift to bundle their products with services to satisfy customer needs. This process is called “Servitization”. The European project “Manufacturing SErvice Ecosystem” (MSEE) is developing models supporting Servitization, based on Future Internet architectures and platforms. To allow efficient collaboration for the provision of Product-Service Systems (PSS), the business as well as the ICT environment needs to be adapted. However, stakeholders are typically not aware of all requirements for the transition in the areas of physical resources, organization and IT. This paper presents one of the results of MSEE project: the development of an adequate Requirements Engineering approach.

An approach to assessing virtual environments for synchronous and remote collaborative design

This paper considers applying novel Virtual Environments (VEs) in collaborative product design, focusing on reviewing activities. Companies are usually anchored to commercial ICT tools, which are mature and reliable. However, two main problems emerge: the difficulty in selecting the most suitable tools for specific purposes and the complexity in evaluating the impact that using technology has on design collaboration. The present work aims to face both aspects by proposing a structured benchmarking method based on expert judgements and defining a set of benchmarking weights based on experimental tests. The method considers both human-human interaction and teamwork-related aspects. A subsequent evaluation protocol considering both process efficiency and human-human interaction allows a closed-loop verification process. Pilot projects evaluate different technologies, and the benchmarking weights are verified and adjusted for more reliable system assessment. This paper focuses on synchronous and remote design review activities: three different tools have been compared according to expert judgements. The two best performing tools have been implemented as pilot projects within real industrial chains. Design collaboration has been assessed by considering both process performance and human-human interaction quality, as well as benchmarking results validated by indicating some corrective actions. The final benchmarking weights can thus be further adopted for an agile system benchmark in synchronous and remote design. The main findings suggest defining both an innovative process to verify the expert benchmark reliability and a trusty benchmarking method to evaluate tools for synchronous and remote design without experimental testing. Furthermore, the proposed method has a general validity and can be properly set for different collaborative dimensions.

Shift from PLM to SLM: A Method to Support Business Requirements Elicitation for Service Innovation

PLM is a widely recognized approach to reduce time to market, increase process efficiency and control product lifecycle. However, service-oriented management is becoming increasingly popular to create new business infrastructures able to self-organize tangible and intangible manufacturing assets in a distributed and interoperable way [1]. The final scope is to manage not simply the Product but also Services along the value chain. The great modern challenge is the implementation of such a service-oriented approach and the shift from PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) to SLM (Service Lifecycle Management). This paper proposes a structured method to define a TO-BE service-oriented scenario and elicit business requirements towards the creation of an SLM-based ecosystem. A case study is developed in collaboration with an Italian company leader in household appliances. It focuses on washing machine, investigates AS-IS and TO-BE business scenarios by adopting Functional Analysis and Business Use Cases (BUC), and then defines the necessary business requirements to implement a service-based approach and create the future SLM ecosystem.

Investigating the Sustainability of Product and Product-Service Systems in the B2C Industry

Numerous companies are recently pushed to move from Products to Product-Service Systems (PSS). The final aim is to increase the value perceived by the market and provide a more flexible and personalized offer by a wide range of services connected with the product use. The research question is: how to understand the performance of new service-based solutions and easily compare to traditional products? Sustainability is nowadays accepted as a guiding principle for both public and corporate strategies. Whereas product sustainability can be validly estimated by several tools, no certified methods have been defined for PSS sustainability estimation yet. This paper proposes the combination of LifeCycle Assessment (LCA) and LifeCycle Costing (LCC) techniques to the whole lifecycle phases for both Product and PSS. Data comparison can be usefully adopted to drive the change towards PSS in industry. An industrial case study focusing on washing machines is presented as a valid example of method application to support decision-making in the B2C industry.

Metrics-Based Approach for VR Technology Evaluation in Styling Product Design

In recent years, the interest of small and medium sized enterprises towards Virtual Reality (VR) systems is strongly increased thanks both to the improvement of VR tools effectiveness and to the cost reduction of technologies implementation. Due to the growing number of installed systems, many SMEs (Small Manufacturing Enterprises) companies require robust methods for evaluating technology performance. In this context, the present paper presents a metrics-based approach in order to analyze the VR system performance. It is specifically dedicated to the design review process during styling product design. The evaluation parameters are related to the effective communication and preservation of design intent. Metrics are classified in two main classes. The first one is related to the product, the process and the characteristics of VR technology. The second one is related to the design intent meanings preservation along the design process. Two experimental case studies are reported in order to test the approach in different operative fields.Copyright

Product-Service Sustainability Assessment in Virtual Manufacturing Enterprises

New directions in modern industry are creating distributed virtual enterprises and pushing companies towards service-enhanced products. Both trends converge when a Virtual Manufacturing Enterprise (VME) is created to provide product-service solutions. At the same time, sustainability is a crucial aspect for industrial networks. This paper proposes a methodology to assess the sustainability of Product-Service Systems (PSS) in a VME by modelling an integrated lifecycle, defining impact categories and KPIs, and evaluating all the partners’ contributions. The method allows easily comparing PSS design alternatives to each other or with traditional products. The industrial case study is represented by a “washing as a service” solution proposed by a worldwide VME. Sustainability assessment is useful to highlight the service benefits as well as the critical phases, and to support VME decision-making.

Smart Home Information Management System for Energy-Efficient Networks

Energy efficiency of smart home systems imposes the intelligent management of a huge quantity of data and the collaboration between multiple stakeholders. Indeed, thanks to recent developments in ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) and IoT (Internet of Things), it is possible to achieve higher performances and offer new energy-control services. However, data must be not only retrieved but also translated into significant information and related to interoperable tasks. This paper focuses on smart home energy control and defines a methodology to improve smart home information management in order to create an extended energy-efficient network comprehending the distributed manufacturing enterprise as well as the energy utility and the consumers. The case study focuses on a sub-set of interoperable smart devices and shows how to apply the proposed information management model to make an extended virtual enterprise provide energy-control services.

Design of a tactile display to support materials perception in virtual environments

Materials properties simulation by means of haptic devices is one of the most significant issues in the design of new humancomputer interfaces to support virtual prototypes interaction in numerous product design activities. Notwithstanding the several research attempts, a very natural perception of materials has not been achieved yet. We present a novel tactile display. It combines both mechanical and electrotactile approaches to simulate natural tactile sensations. In order to enhance experience acoustic and visual cues are integrated. A signal generation method allows correlating materials properties and simulating signals according to the characteristics of fingertip mechanoreceptors. The final scope is making users perceive the objects surface roughness, slickness and texture coarseness. Research results are the developed simulation method and the detailed design of the whole tactile display. The preliminary prototype is under construction.