Product architecture knowledge is typically embedded in the communication patterns of established development organizations. While this enables the development of products using the existing architecture, it hinders the organization's ability to implement novel architectures, especially for...

Title from cover. "August 2000." At head of each leaf: DRAFT - 8/28/00.

Design structure matrix (DSM) is a straightforward and flexible modeling technique that can be used for designing, developing, and managing complex systems. DSM offers network modeling tools that represent the elements of a system and their interactions, thereby highlighting the system’s...

This paper explores the performance of coupled development activities by proposing a performance generation model (PGM). The goal of the PGM is to develop insights about optimal strategies (i.e., sequential, concurrent, or overlapped) to manage coupled design activities that share a fixed amount...

This paper presents a model describing sequential iteration, one of the fundamental solution processes experienced in complex engineering design projects. The model is based upon the design structure matrix representation and assumes that each individual design activity is of deterministic...

Intense competition in many industries forces manufacturing firms to develop new, higher quality products at an increasingly rapid pace. Overlapping product development activities is an important component of concurrent product development that can help firms develop products faster. However,...

Recent advances in engineering collaboration tools and internet technology have enabled the distribution of product development tasks to offshore sites and global outsourcing partners while still maintaining a tightly connected process. Most firms in complex engineering industries are indeed...