Masanori Ozawa

Analysis and design methodology for product-based services

Recently, manufacturing companies have been moving into service businesses in addition to providing their own products. However, engineers in manufacturing companies do not find creating new service businesses easy because their work-related skills, understanding of design processes, and organizational skills have been developed and optimized for designing products and not services. To design product-based services more effectively and efficiently, systematic design methodologies suitable for engineers are necessary. We have designed a product-based service design methodology called DFACE-SI. This methodology consists of five steps beginning with the generation of service concepts and ending with the description of service business plans. Characteristic features of DFACE-SI include visualization tools that can help stakeholders identify new opportunities and difficulties of the target product-based service. We also applied DFACE-SI to a pilot case study and illustrated its effectiveness.

Innovative Design Process and Information Technology for Electromechanical Product Development

Cleaving of an optical fibre (2) is achieved by bringing a fibre cleaving blade (3) into lateral contact with such a fibre. Undue intrusion of the blade into the fibre during prior art cleaving processes can damage the fibre so as to detract from the quality of the resulting cleaved fibre end surfaces. Improvemets in the quality of the resulting end surfaces can be obtained in relation to prior art techniques by superimposing a relatively small amplitude vibratory component on a relatively steady movement of the blade towards the fibre. This can also enable the conventional use of a backing anvil at the cleaving location to be dispensed with, thereby removing danger of contamination from the anvil.