Achieving Industrial Excellence: Enhancing Manufacturing Through A Hybrid New Product Introduction Process

Tats De is the director of engineering of the embedded controls and electrical systems. He is an experienced senior technology and people leader with a proven track record in orchestrating organizational restructuring, driving research and development initiatives. He specializes in the domains of embedded controls, software development, and the Internet of Things (IoT), particularly within smart appliances and industrial cooling space. He is distinguished for founding and leading the System Engineering, Model-Based Design, and Control division within the Commercial HVAC Business.

Manufacturing processes have traditionally followed a linear path in creating products, starting with the product’s concept and experimentation, followed by engineering design, setting up manufacturing infrastructure, and concluding with product distribution. Gradually, more and more products are incorporating electronics, microcomputers and embedded software and firmware. Many organizations are trying to fit the embedded software development activities in the existing linear new product introduction process. This has created sub-optimal utilization of resources and time in embedded software development.

Prominent web-oriented software development companies have introduced software development protocols such as Agile and Scrum, which excel in creating connected products, webbased platforms, and IT infrastructure. However, they don’t seamlessly align with traditional manufacturing paradigms, which create microcomputer-based products like appliances, automotive components, and medical devices. Agile and Scrum prioritize quick turnarounds and rapid issue resolution during development. In contrast, manufacturing involves extended timelines and complex interdependencies across various stages. To address this, a hybrid approach divides engineering activities into two segments: electro-mechanical and embedded software.

These two segments coexist within the same engineering entity, with one focusing on mechanical aspects and the other on software advancement. The rationale behind this division is to separate the activities and progress them at different rates. The mechanical aspect, significantly impacting the manufacturing process, adheres to the wellestablished sequential model within the manufacturing realm. This involves identifying potential risks and customer requirements, followed by a gradual step-by-step development process. The intricate interplay between the manufacturing process and mechanical components makes accommodating alterations in mechanical design challenging.

In contrast, the trajectory of software development doesn’t follow a similar linear progression. The software realm has the flexibility to embrace an agile methodology, allowing for rapid integration of changes, even in the later stages of development. However, it’s essential for the entire organization to understand and acknowledge the distinct nature of these two developmental cycles. 

The alignment between both cycles occurs at the culmination of the process (namely, volume production), not at intermediary points (design freeze, Production Part Approval, first article inspection).

In the manufacturing sector, the conventional expectation is for the production team or factory to await the completion and finalization of the design before initiating the manufacturing process. This is due to the resourceintensive and time-demanding nature of configuring manufacturing setups. It’s preferable to hold off on initiating the development and preparation of the production line while the engineering design remains subject to potential modifications. For instance, consider a situation where the original design for a metal box specified dimensions of three inches by five inches, resulting in the fabrication of corresponding sheet metal assemblies. If there’s a subsequent need to increase its size by 10 percent, all the resources and capital invested in the existing process would be wasted.

The proposed hybrid methodology introduces a contrasting approach in treating software and embedded system development compared to mechanical systems like fabricated metal or plastic parts, or electro-mechanical assemblies. This distinction arises from the fact that the long lead time steps like developing tooling, preparing supply chain, developing new material movement, establishing assembly automation, doesn’t hinge on the software which goes in these products. The assembly procedure primarily involves integrating mechanical elements, whereas the software dimension lacks a direct impact on the assembly process. As a result, the long lead time steps described before are not dependent on the software.

"Through the implementation of the hybrid approach, embedded software development can effectively leverage a larger portion of the overall project timeline, enabling the delivery of a greater number of features while optimizing resource utilization"

The logic underlying this differentiation lies in the capacity for the mechanical production system to prepare its operations while software engineers adopt an agile framework. This approach allows for just-in-time incorporation of software within the manufacturing line, bypassing the need to await the overall design’s completion before initiating readiness tasks for the manufacturing line.

Industries such as heavy appliances often see the mechanical engineering component taking up roughly half of the entire new product development lifecycle. Traditionally, software development is also expected to be completed in the same time scale as mechanical design. But this expectation creates an unnecessary acceleration and resource load on software development. When organizations can be convinced to decouple the design time scale of mechanical and software development, it dramatically improves quality and economics of software development. The implementation of the hybrid approach can allow a great deal of resource leveling, by spreading out software development schedule over a longer time frame, utilizing around 80 to 85 percent of the total project timeline. This substantial utilization can also provide ample opportunity to incorporate additional features and enhancements into the system before deployment.

To illustrate, consider an 18-month project timeline. In the context of the traditional manufacturing industry, about nine months would be dedicated to engineering design, followed by another nine months for factory implementation and production. If software development strictly adhered to this nine-month timeline, only a limited set of features could be integrated within that timeframe. Consequently, upon the product’s market entry, some of the desired advanced features would be absent.

Nevertheless, by employing the hybrid method and fully utilizing the available 18-month timeframe, a greater number of features can be assimilated into the system. This, in turn, results in elevated user experience and improved functionality. Importantly, this achievement is realized without extending the product development timeline, ensuring that a comprehensive array of features is delivered to customers within the predetermined timeframe. On the other hand, organizations may decide to keep the software feature set same but reduce the resource allocation because the software deliverables utilize 18 months, instead of nine.

In conclusion, organizations can elevate their productivity and innovation in creating smart products by adopting a hybrid approach to product development. Within this strategy, the electro-mechanical design process adheres to a sequential development path, whereas the software development process embraces an agile methodology. This enables the software development process to efficiently utilize fewer resources over an extended period, and delivery of a more comprehensive set of features.