Abstract
Acquiring customer requirements (CRs) is important for enterprises to compete in marketplace since inexhaustible innovation chances could be discovered from CRs. However, it is insufficient to generate ideas for innovation solely depending on the market-pull CRs acquisition method or technology-driven CRs acquisition method. From the time dimension, these two traditional methods put different emphasis on CRs: the market-pull method focusing on digging CRs for design improvement from existing products while the technology-driven method pays more attention on CRs that future products need to satisfy sustainability in the market. This paper proposes a systematic approach for CRs acquisition on the basis that CRs at different time period have different impacts on innovation. The two traditional acquisition methods can be integrated based on time iteration. Firstly, CRs are divided into past customer requirements (PCRs), current customer requirements (CCRs) and future customer requirements (FCRs) in time dimension. Secondly, we believe that PCRs and their potential evolution information can be acquired by analysis of patents, CCRs can be identified by making use of tools in the market-pull CRs acquisition method, and FCRs can be predicted through evolutionary knowledge in TRIZ. Finally, a case study is provided to validate the feasibility of the approach.
Highlights
Defining and predicting customer requirements (CRs) is crucial in order to satisfy customer needs and ensure supplier success for the present and future [1]
Neither engineers in sales department nor engineers in R&D department have no systematic approach to comprehensively and accurately discover, identify and predict CRs throughout the whole time range, since sales department engineers always focus on capturing the voice of their current and future customers [2] and R&D department engineers pay more attention on CRs that lied in existing products and future technologies [3]
The approach proposed in this paper integrated the market-pull CRs acquisition method with technology-driven CRs acquisition method based on time iteration for providing useful indications to support follow-up product design activities
Summary
Defining and predicting customer requirements (CRs) is crucial in order to satisfy customer needs and ensure supplier success for the present and future [1]. The method of using customers as the research source for CRs acquisition is usually considered as the market-pull CRs acquisition method [3], and its research data include the customer satisfaction, user experience, and users’ behavior in online data systems. Cao et al [8] demonstrated that CRs can be obtained through the patent technical information analysis He presented the innovation direction of a product in different development cycles based on laws of needs evolution after sorting CRs of several mature products [9]. A systematic CRs acquisition method is proposed based on time iterations to acquire past customer requirements (PCRs), identify current customer requirements (CCRs) and predict future customer requirements (FCRs).
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