Context Of Product Development Research Articles

The implication of user-generated content in new product development process: A systematic literature review and future research agenda

This study aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of user-generated content (UGC) research within the context of new product development (NPD). A systematic literature review (SLR) was conducted across three prominent databases, namely Web of Science, Scopus, and Science Direct, using keywords to identify relevant articles. 5585 of 13,381 articles were deemed relevant following the application of inclusion and exclusion criteria. These articles were then thoroughly analyzed to create a comprehensive review of the topic. The selection process involved evaluating the titles and abstracts of all publications that were discovered, and carefully choosing 136 articles for full-text review. From these, 58 articles were ultimately selected for detailed analysis in this study. The study highlights the role of UGC in augmenting NPD process and identifies potential areas for future research based on evidence derived from an SLR of articles published between 2012 and 2023. The research methodologies adopted in this paper involve descriptive analysis and TCM framework (T-themes, C-contexts, and M-methodologies). Finally, the article concludes by shedding light on its potential applications by providing four themes and highlighting the importance of future research in the field with five propositions.

Fostering product development efficiency through cross-functional team leadership: Insights and strategies from industry experts

This study investigates the impact of leadership models on the efficiency and innovation outcomes of cross-functional teams (CFTs) in product development contexts. With the aim of identifying effective leadership practices, the research focuses on how transformational, shared, and situational leadership models influence team dynamics, communication, collaboration, and ultimately, product development efficiency. Employing a systematic literature review combined with content analysis, the study analyzes peer-reviewed articles and scholarly books published from 2013 to 2024. This methodology facilitates a comprehensive examination of current leadership models and their applicability to CFTs. Key findings reveal that transformational leadership inspires and motivates team members, shared leadership enhances ownership and accountability, and situational leadership adapts to the dynamic needs of product development projects. These leadership models significantly contribute to fostering an environment conducive to open communication and collaboration, driving innovation and efficiency in product development processes. Based on these insights, strategic recommendations for industry leaders include adopting flexible leadership styles, promoting open communication, encouraging shared leadership, and investing in leadership development. These strategies are pivotal for leveraging the diverse expertise within CFTs and enhancing product development outcomes. The study underscores the critical role of leadership in maximizing the potential of CFTs for innovation and efficiency. It highlights the need for leaders to adapt their strategies to the unique challenges of managing diverse teams, offering a path forward for effective team leadership in product development. Keywords: Cross-functional teams, Leadership models, Product development efficiency, Innovation outcomes.

Toward Sustainable Global Product Development Performance: Exploring the Criticality of Organizational Factors and the Moderating Influence of Global Innovation Culture

In today’s dynamic and global landscape, innovation and globalization are intricately linked drivers that propel modern businesses forward, serving as indispensable pillars upon which organizations heavily rely to maintain their competitive edge. Leveraging innovation within the context of global product development (GPD) practices is imperative for organizations seeking to survive and effectively compete in the rapidly evolving marketplace. While preceding studies have primarily focused on the importance of individual and organizational capabilities, policies, and cultural factors in driving product development (PD) performance, they often overlook their interconnectedness within a global context. To address this gap, this study delves into the relationship between organizational factors and global product development performance (GPDP) while examining the moderating influence of global innovation culture (GIC). These organizational factors encompass technological innovation capabilities (TICs), team creativity (TC), dynamic capabilities (DCA), and competitive advantage (CA). Our hypothesis suggests a positive impact of these factors on GPD performance. Employing a structural equation modeling (SEM) approach through SMART-PLS 3, we analyzed data collected from 480 questionnaire forms distributed among registered global product development (GPD) organizations operating in China. The empirical findings underscore the significant influence of organizational factors on GPD performance, highlighting the critical role of global innovation culture in shaping these relationships. These insights shed light on the importance of establishing a harmonious balance between organizational culture and various factors to enhance interaction among organizational elements and optimize global product development performance. Ultimately, these efforts can lead to improvements in the overall effectiveness and sustained global product development.

Regulatory Focus, Ambidextrous Learning, and Opportunity Recognition in New Product Development

This study focuses on individual managers’ ambidextrous learning and examines its psychological antecedents and consequences in the new product development (NPD) context. Specifically, drawing on the paradox theory and the regulatory focus theory, this study examines the relationship between regulatory focus (i.e., promotion focus and prevention focus), ambidextrous learning, and NPD opportunity recognition, from the individual ambidexterity perspective. Based on the survey data of 225 NPD managers in high-tech small and medium-sized enterprises in China, we find that NPD managers’ promotion focus and prevention focus, acting as an enabler and a deterrent respectively, affect their ambidextrous learning, which in turn facilitates opportunity recognition in the NPD process. Further analyses reveal that ambidextrous learning mediates the effects of promotion focus and prevention focus on opportunity recognition in the NPD. Our findings offer new insights on the individual ambidexterity research regarding the unique role of ambidextrous learning, manifested as actionable managerial capability. The findings offer novel insights on the role of NPD managers’ ambidextrous learning in the NPD process, and practical implications for NPD managers to self-regulate their behavior for the benefit of opportunity recognition.

Enabling novel paradigms: a biological questions-based approach to human chemical hazard and drug safety assessment.

Throughput needs, costs of time and resources, and concerns about the use of animals in hazard and safety assessment studies are fueling a growing interest in adopting new approach methodologies for use in product development and risk assessment. However, current efforts to define "next-generation risk assessment" vary considerably across commercial and regulatory sectors, and an a priori definition of the biological scope of data needed to assess hazards is generally lacking. We propose that the absence of clearly defined questions that can be answered during hazard assessment is the primary barrier to the generation of a paradigm flexible enough to be used across varying product development and approval decision contexts. Herein, we propose a biological questions-based approach (BQBA) for hazard and safety assessment to facilitate fit-for-purpose method selection and more efficient evidence-based decision-making. The key pillars of this novel approach are bioavailability, bioactivity, adversity, and susceptibility. This BQBA is compared with current hazard approaches and is applied in scenarios of varying pathobiological understanding and/or regulatory testing requirements. To further define the paradigm and key questions that allow better prediction and characterization of human health hazard, a multidisciplinary collaboration among stakeholder groups should be initiated.

Leveraging the modular design approach to enhance variation of SME LORI jewelry

LORI SME (Small and Medium Enterprise), operating as a producer of fashion accessories characterized by local craftsmanship, encounters challenges in accommodating diverse customer preferences due to resource constraints. To unleash its full potential, there exists a pressing need to adopt innovative design methodologies. This research endeavors to investigate the application of a modular design approach as a strategic solution for augmenting the variety of LORI SME accessories, thereby facilitating the creation of a range of jewelry products that can be easily tailored and adapted to meet individual customer requirements. The study utilizes a qualitative research methodology, encompassing literature reviews, interviews with the owner, exploration of visual motifs and materials, and practice-based research. The findings of this research illuminate that the adoption of a modular design approach significantly enhances the diversity of LORI SME's jewelry offerings, particularly in the case of its necklace products. This modular approach provides SMEs with a broader array of customizable necklace options characterized by distinctive local motifs and high craftsmanship value. These findings furnish valuable insights for SMEs within the LORI SME sector aiming to expand their product portfolios. Additionally, they offer guidance to designers and artisans regarding the potential advantages and challenges associated with the incorporation of modular design strategies in the broader context of small business innovation and product development.

A digital twinning reference model to facilitate multi-stakeholder decision-making

In product development, stakeholders aim to make decisions based on the available information. This information is not always complete, coherent, unambiguous, or reliable. By contextualising the information content, stakeholders from various perspectives are supported in decision-making. Currently, the available information is often process-centred, which originates from legacy systems and interfaces. The information needs to become perspective dependent to be relevant for all stakeholders involved. Perspective dependent information usage allows for adequate filtering and selection. To ensure sufficient flexibility in the uncertain context of product development, the digital twinning approach can be instrumental. This digital twinning approach supports in facilitating contextualised and unambiguous information for multiple perspectives. To allow for a structured and transparent digital twinning approach a sound foundation is required, for which this paper introduces a reference model. It facilitates a function-oriented development of digital twinning solutions, ensuring the integration of multiple perspectives. A use case scenario is used to verify and validate the reference model.

Alliance performance and subsequent make‐or‐ally choices: Evidence from the aircraft manufacturing industry

AbstractResearch SummaryWe examine how the performance of a firm's prior alliances influences its propensity to persist with the alliance mode or switch to independent operations in the context of new product introductions (NPIs). Drawing on the behavioral theory of the firm (BTOF), we argue that a firm's alliance performance has a U‐shaped effect on its likelihood of undertaking the subsequent NPI independently and that competitive intensity strengthens this U‐shaped relationship. We also predict that firms with above‐aspiration alliance performance are more likely to achieve breakthrough performance in the subsequent NPI if they switch to independence than if they continue to ally. Data on NPIs in the global aircraft manufacturing industry (1944–2000) support our hypotheses. Our study extends the alliance literature and contributes to research on how firm performance influences subsequent strategic choices.Managerial SummaryThe dilemma of whether to continue or exit an alliance or relationship is a common one for individuals, countries, and firms. Our study examines firms' strategic decision to switch to independent operations after having partnered with other firms. Using the aircraft product development context, we show that firms that make such a change in their strategy are the ones that performed either much better or much worse than what they expected. Firms with alliance performance close to their expectations tend to persist with their current strategy. Of the firms that change their strategy, the high performers benefit much more from changing their strategy than low performers. We provide insights regarding when it is preferable for managers to continue to ally or to switch to independence, especially in launching new products.

The creative touch: the influence of haptics on creativity.

An increasing number of firms rely on consumers to develop new ideas for the marketplace. While many firms rely on online crowdsourcing communities, some have created facilities that encourage in-person ideation through which consumers can interact with product design materials. This research proposes that active touch engenders a positive effect on new product creativity and highlights the importance of touch during idea generation. We further suggest that interacting with an object via active touch increases positive mood, which enhances creative performance. Results from two studies provide support for these hypotheses. Study 1 demonstrates the positive effect of active touch on new product creativity. Study 2 replicates this effect in a different product development context and provides evidence that a positive mood mediates the active touch-creativity relationship.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11002-022-09628-5.

Exploring the Benefits of Remanufacture during Product Prototyping: A Cost and Time Based Analysis

AbstractWhilst remanufacture is identified as a key enabler for sustainable manufacture in future industry, its role within the context of new product development remains unclear. Where prototypes often go through multiple iterations with varying degrees of change, could remanufacture be adopted to reduce the time and cost components of design iteration? This paper presents a computational study to explore the potential savings afforded by remanufacture across stages of a rapid prototyping process. Results suggest significant reductions to development time and cost can be achieved.

Integrating Business, Social, and Environmental Goals in Open Innovation through Partner Selection

Although collaborative networks (CN) are widespread in academia and have come to be even more used in corporations all over the world, they still face several challenges on behalf of the new product development (NPD) context, especially in regard to the selection of the CN’s right partner. This becomes even more evident when it comes to promoting sustainable development goals within a CN’s activities, by selecting the right partners with a wide consensus from a CN’s management board, avoiding, therefore, the subjectivity around managers’ perception of a CN’s partner selection. Therefore, this work attempts to answer this problem, by presenting a soft-computing-based framework, to support the managers’ board on partner search and selection. The method presented here is further assessed by using a case study, based on the development of a green product, where, according to the obtained results, it is demonstrated that the proposed approach is extremely effective for partner selection, by assessing and prioritizing each candidate involved. The most suitable candidate that fulfills the CN’s requirements is then selected to be integrated as a future partner.

The Effect of Role-Based Product Representations on Individual and Team Coordination Practices: A Field Study of a Globally Distributed New Product Development Team

The investigation of the appealing indication that a modular product architecture is best associated to a loosely coupled organizational structure—that is, the mirroring hypothesis—has produced contradictory evidence, especially in the dynamic and ambiguous context of new product development. By integrating modularity theory and product-representation theories, we investigate how individual agency affects coordination in teams developing modular products. We conducted a field study of Flower-Net, a globally distributed team in a major IT company, engaged with the development of a modular software using agile practices. Our grounded model shows that, whereas top managers defined the product as modular and coordinated work accordingly, individuals developed different representations of the product’s architecture and conflicting individual coordination practices. We traced the individual development of product architecture representations back to the individual interpretations of organizational roles as more or less “segmented.” Conflicting individual practices, associated to different role-based product representations, were not addressed by the team—that developed a state of illusory concordance—and impaired the functioning of the team. This study contributes to the literature on modularity and the mirroring hypothesis by proposing individual role-based representations as an underexplored level of analysis for the matching between product and organizational modularity (Mirroring Hypothesis II). It also contributes to the debate on how representations affect team coordination, by detailing how role-based product representations can influence team members’ divergence and sustain illusory concordance.

THE VALUE OF THE NON-USER: DEVELOPING (NON-)USER PROFILES FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF A ROBOT VACUUM WITH THE USE OF THE (NON-)PERSONA

AbstractThis contribution explores non-user integration in a product development context of the development of a vacuum robot in order to analyse users as well as non-users of a product. While user profiles like the persona have been part of product development and product design for years, the non-user has not been widely explored.Within this contribution the known concept of the persona is extended and further developed to the non-persona, a profile that describes non-users and why they do not use a certain product, in this case the vacuum robot. Including the non-user in product development offers the chance of addressing yet unidentified product requirements and therefore opening the product up to a bigger audience. This template works for both users and non-users and can be used to include both sides in a development project.

Multi-state vertical-blinds solar shading – Performance assessment and recommended development directions

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the potential of a novel multi-state sun-tracking vertical-blind (ST-VB) concept using building performance simulation (BPS). A multi-domain simulation toolchain was developed and verified to evaluate the interior vertical-blind concept. The toolchain is used to quantify whole-building performance effects of design choices in the development of the initial concept within a larger framework of functional and aesthetic requirements. Multiple control concepts are tested, including different sun-tracking approaches, utilising the double-sided blind to switch between absorbing and reflecting solar radiation, and the ability to fully retract the blinds versus rotating them into an open position. Different possible materialisations of the blind are tested by evaluating the performance sensitivity of each of the potential control strategies to varying the blinds' solar and visible reflectance. The most promising ST-VB strategies perform substantially better than a conventional automated roller-blind strategy in terms of preventing visual discomfort (8% less DGPs0.4exc0deg), the admission of daylight (75–99% higher sDA300lx/50%), allowing for views to the outdoors (8–33% more hours with a view), and energy performance (11–35% reduction in primary energy consumption for heating, cooling and lighting). This research concludes with a set of recommendations for the development of the ST-VB system and by extrapolating the ‘lessons-learned’ for future research and development into multi-state solar shading systems. The novelty of this research can be found in that automated control concepts for interior vertical blinds have thus far been largely unexplored. Additionally, this research contributes to the body of knowledge on performance modelling of complex fenestration systems and the use of BPS in the, relatively new, context of product development.

Analyzing the Environmental Consequences of Production Processes from a System of Systems Perspective: A Case of Gear Manufacturing in the Automotive Industry

Many research studies have been done to investigate different aspects of environmental challenges. In the product development context, there have been attempts to reduce the environmental impacts of associated activities including the production processes themselves. As a result, various technological improvements have been made and new production processes e.g. powder metallurgy technologies have been introduced that may demonstrate a lower environmental footprint compared to conventional processes e.g. cutting machining technologies. However, a production process with a lower environmental impact may lead to reducing the quality/performance attributes of the produced parts (gear) and probably of final products (transmission box). Therefore, the efforts intended to produce more sustainable products by using production processes with less environmental footprints may lead to some unintended consequences such as increased maintenance requirements and/or demand. This is a rebound effect from a system of systems (SoS) perspective. This paper aims to analyze the impacts of more environmentally friendly production processes on the total environmental impact associated with a product given they may have a negative impact on a part/product’s quality and performance or usage. This paper introduces a methodological approach to analyze the environmental sustainability of a production process at a SoS level. This is done by including the entire supply chain of a product-system and its interacting systems by using the results of the attributional/consequential life cycle assessment (LCA) method. The approach validity approach is demonstrated in the case of gear manufacturing in the automotive industry.

Role of Feedback on Innovative Outcomes: Moderating Role of Resource-Constrained Environments

Emerging economies necessitate innovative new products to be developed using limited resources. This encourages scholars to explore factors that enhance innovative outcomes in environments with different levels of resource constraints. Extending the theory of feedback at workplaces to the context of innovation and new product development, in this article, we explore the effects of supportive and constructive feedback on innovative outcomes during new product development. We examine the moderating effect of resource-constrained environments on the relationship between feedback and innovative outcomes. To test our hypotheses, we conducted two studies to collect data from 191 executives in the first study and 92 engineers in the second study as they create innovative outcomes within low and high levels of resource-constrained environments along with different levels of supportive and constructive feedback. Both studies highlight that supportive and constructive feedback was valuable in enhancing innovative outcomes. Furthermore, our findings suggest that resource-constrained environment moderates these relationships. Our study adds to the existing literature by highlighting ways by which innovative outcomes in new product development could be enhanced in resource-constrained environments in emerging economies.

A methodology for precision manufacture of a nozzle using hybrid laser powder-bed fusion: A case study

This paper presents a methodology for precision manufacture of a nozzle using the hybrid laser powder-bed fusion (L-PBF) technology. A new distortion predictive model for hybrid L-PBF was developed using finite element techniques. The model was validated against experimentally measured distortion using optical scanning. The validated model was utilised to mitigate distortion by applying additional stiffeners to the nozzle geometry where the distortion was reduced by 60% to acceptable tolerance of ± 200 µm. Micro-milling trials were conducted to identify optimum cutting parameters delivering high material removal rates while maintaining the average surface roughness of less than 1 µm. Finally, a nozzle with reduced distortion and desirable surface finish was manufactured, which has been used in industrial research context for process and product development of food products.

TOWARD A COMPREHENSIVE DEFINITION OF THE NON-USER

AbstractThe user has been very well defined over the last decades. With human-centered design becoming more widely applied within various industries, the user's needs are being taken into account more than ever. What is often overlooked is the user's counterpart: the non-user. Integrating the non-user into modern development projects provides great additional value. This paper is compiling current definitions in order to analyse them within the context of product development and to make a contribution toward a comprehensive definition of the non-user that can be applied to various disciplines.

Extreme Engineering: Polarization in Product Development and Manufacturing.

Abstract The phenomena and application domains of interest to engineering science are continuously evolving. It is expected that along the path of progress, limits in technology, applications, or theory are encountered. To address these limitations, the concept of extreme engineering is proposed. It is discussed in the context of product development and manufacturing. Illustrative applications of extreme engineering in different application domains are listed.

Identification of evaluation criteria for algorithms used within the context of product development

Abstract Manufacturing companies are facing multiple challenges within the product development process nowadays. A dynamic environment due to new technologies, political influences on products as well as unstable markets are raising the complexity of product development processes. To address these uncertainties, the use Artificial Intelligence is increasing. Based on the availability of large data sets and computing capacity to analyse these data, especially the field of Machine Learning algorithms, as a subsection of Artificial Intelligence, it has high potentials to increase effectiveness and efficiency within a wide variety of different fields. One of these fields, in which Machine Learning algorithms can be used, is a variety of activities within the product development process. The paper presents an evaluation method, which helps to identify specific strengths and weaknesses of selected algorithms to identify possible usage within this process. First, the work describes different algorithms, categorizes them, and selects the most relevant for further evaluation. Second, a method to evaluate different Machine Learning algorithms is developed based on a literature review on influence factors for those algorithms. The objective of the evaluation method is to give users without in-depth knowledge of Machine Learning algorithms an applicable possibility to choose a potential algorithm. Finally, the most relevant algorithms are identified based on the literature findings. Those are evaluated based on the identified criteria to simplify the selection of a Machine Learning algorithm for product development tasks.