Product Development Management Research Articles

A State‐of‐Practice Survey of the Automotive and Space Industry Product Development Strategies

AbstractProduct Development is a process employed by all industries to support creating new opportunities. The approach to product development by the automotive industry is vastly different than the space industry. As disruptive technologies flow into the market, the space industry is in the midst of an evolutionary change. The methods of design, management and architecture are the topics reviewed in this work. From the background of the methods the analysis of each of these industries suggest that there may be an opportunity for further review. As the space industry continues to push into a new frontier of lower cost and quicker turnaround solutions, there can be great benefits to employing parts of the methods honed by the automotive industry. The possibilities of gaining knowledge from the automotive industry could in the future lead toward advancements in product development management and product development architecture methods that could continue fueling the evolutionary changes in the space industry.

Analysis of Implementation of SKKNI Sub Funding and Services for Graduate of Vocation in Banking Sector

The Indonesian National Work Competency Standards (SKKNI) are efforts to produce graduates ready for work according to industry needs. This includes the SKKNI for the sub-field of Funding and Services, covering four levels of qualifications for a prospective banker that include Teller, Customer Service, Funding Sales Representative, and Funding Product Development Manager. This study aims to determine the implementation of the SKKNI for Sub Financing and Services for Diploma III graduates at the current SMK level. This research is a qualitative descriptive study using observation and interview methods for data collection. The population in this study were all commercial banks and Islamic banks in Yogyakarta. From the questionnaires distributed to users, fourteen banks consisted of 9 (nine) conventional banks, and 5 (five) Islamic banks filled out the questionnaire. Constraints in the application of the SKKNI are caused by the qualifications of the positions regulated in the SKKNI. The gap between the provisions in the SKKNI and the regulations in force in banking is an obstacle for vocational schools in preparing graduates who meet industry demands.

Lean Stability Approaches in Pharmaceutical Product Development, Registration, and Post-marketing CMC Change Management; Industry Survey Insights

PurposeThis paper summarizes results from a recent pharmaceutical industry survey to understand the adoption status of science- and risk-based approaches in pharmaceutical stability (lean stability) in regulatory submissions across the full pharmaceutical product life cycle and to ascertain whether companies are deriving their stability strategies based on scientific risk or applying generic strategies.MethodsA comprehensive survey was distributed to pharmaceutical companies affiliated with the International Consortium for Innovation and Quality in Pharmaceutical Development (IQ Consortium) to solicit non-proprietary responses pertaining to regulatory strategies for stability monitoring across the product life cycle, perceived risks, and health authority feedback.ResultsAmong the 19 responding companies, utilization of lean stability approaches varied with respect to (1) phase of product life cycle, (2) specific product quality attributes cited in effective ICH guidances or which demonstrated shelf-life limiting stability trends, and (3) the degree of perceived risk of rejection by health authorities based upon companies’ degree of experience from previous regulatory submissions.ConclusionContinued collaboration between the pharmaceutical industry and health authorities—through case studies and revision/harmonization of regulatory guidances—will be essential for continued implementation of lean stability strategies to accelerate delivery of innovative medicines to the clinic and to the market.

Towards Supply Chain Visibility Using Internet of Things: A Dyadic Analysis Review.

The Internet of Things (IoT) and its benefits and challenges are the most emergent research topics among academics and practitioners. With supply chains (SCs) gaining rapid complexity, having high supply chain visibility (SCV) would help companies ease the processes and reduce complexity by improving inaccuracies. Extant literature has given attention to the organisation’s capability to collect and evaluate information to balance between strategy and goals. The majority of studies focus on investigating IoT’s impact on different areas such as sustainability, organisational structure, lean manufacturing, product development, and strategic management. However, research investigating the relationships and impact of IoT on SCV is minimal. This study closes this gap using a structured literature review to critically analyse existing literature to synthesise the use of IoT applications in SCs to gain visibility, and the SC. We found key IoT technologies that help SCs gain visibility, and seven benefits and three key challenges of these technologies. We also found the concept of Supply 4.0 that grasps the element of Industry 4.0 within the SC context. This paper contributes by combining IoT application synthesis, enablers, and challenges in SCV by highlighting key IoT technologies used in the SCs to gain visibility. Finally, the authors propose an empirical research agenda to address the identified gaps.

Optimal distribution of profit and leadership for a sustainable collaborative R&D projects

The highly distributed and frequently changing resources, as well as the rising costs and uncertainties of developing and launching new products necessitate that firms continuously collaborate in R&D projects. However, management of new product development, especially the leadership assignment of the sustainable collaboration between firms, presents a new set of challenges in sharing the benefits of innovation. This paper conceptualizes and formulates a sustainable collaborative R&D project involving two firms with diverse R&D and leadership technologies. Based on game theory, it examines the optimal mechanism of profit allocation and leadership distribution from a sustainability perspective that outweighs investigating them alone. The analysis shows that when leadership is technically impossible, the optimal profit allocation to each firm should be positively related to its comparative importance in the collaborative innovation project. However, when the two firms are much dependent on each other to complete the project, the focal firm, which is usually more important in the project, needs to give up more its profit shares to the partner firm to lighten the bottleneck R&D effects and induce a sustainable collaboration with partner firm. In contrast, when leadership is technically possible, the optimal leadership distribution for sustainable and effective collaboration depends on the interplay relationships between each firm's comparative importance in the collaborative R&D project, leadership ability, and the R&D and leadership efforts and costs. Furthermore, it is also found that distributing leadership to a firm with absolute dominances is always preferred to distributing to a firm with absolute weaknesses in both R&D and leadership technologies.

Knowledge-based marketing and competitive advantage: developing new scales using mixed method approach

PurposeOne of the most challenging issues businesses face today is seeking ways toward gaining competitive advantage (CA). Although previous research considered several aspects in this regard, the literature has largely overlooked the process of gaining CA via knowledge-based marketing (KBM) capabilities. This paper aims to conceptualize KBM, to develop a new scale for KBM and to examine how to gain CA through KBM.Design/methodology/approachDrawing from the related literature and building on the concept of KBM, this paper conducted a mixed-method approach. After reaching a pool of items using qualitative methods, this paper developed new scales and validated them. This paper developed the model by highlighting the antecedent role of KBM toward CA. In the quantitative phase, using data collected from both public/private and manufacturing/service firms, this paper classified the extracted items into five critical factors. Moreover, the relationship between KBM and CA was tested.FindingsThe results indicate that KBM construct consists of five critical capabilities, including market research, competitive intelligence, supply chain management, customer relationship management and new product development. Moreover, there is a positive and significant relationship between KBM and CA.Originality/valueThe traditional ways to achieve CA no longer work. Instead, success in the existing business context necessitates firms to seek CA through their knowledge capabilities. Previous research did not fully address KBM antecedents toward CA in a comprehensive model. By developing a new scale for KBM, this paper tested its relationship with CA, which has hitherto received scant attention in the field of knowledge and competition.

Eco-efficient industrial waste recycling for the manufacturing of fibre reinforced innovative geopolymer mortars: Integrated waste management and green product development through LCA

The aim of this research is to evaluate the possibility of using an eco-sustainable geopolymer binder, through the development of innovative technologies capable of offering tools for the water systems management, for the enhancement and protection of environmental resources. Specifically, a hydraulic pipeline made of geopolymer mortar has been designed as prototype. A detailed comparative environmental assessment analysis of unreinforced and reinforced geopolymer prototypes has been conducted using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). The LCA study has been performed to determine the environmental performance of the different mix designs and to identify the most important factors contributing to their environmental burdens. The results of the analysis indicate that the advantages of geopolymers make them a valid alternative to traditional binders in many industrial environments and in this case in the realization of useful artifacts for hydraulic engineering.

Rapid setup and management of medical device design and manufacturing consortia: experiences from the COVID‐19 crisis in the UK

The COVID‐19 pandemic caused severe ventilator shortages in many healthcare systems worldwide. The UK government reacted to this with a three‐pronged approach of importing, up‐scaling existing production and supporting new design projects. The latter two parts – labelled the UK Ventilator Challenge – included over 50 companies from various sectors including the automotive and aerospace industries. Nine multi‐partner consortia and five single‐company projects were initiated with varying approaches. This study explores lessons learned during the setup and management of these medical device designs and manufacturing consortia. A qualitative survey methodology was employed, and 32 semi‐structured stakeholder interviews were conducted. The primary data was triangulated through the collection of 42 secondary data sources such as webinars and radio interviews. Transcription and a three‐step data analysis process of thematic coding identified six lessons learned. The analysis of the data showed that a strong, appealing common goal can enable employee motivation and trust as well as align priorities across all companies involved. This facilitates the involvement and fruitful collaboration of companies with varying sizes and fields of expertise. Furthermore, selecting the most suitable employees with specialist knowledge for high‐priority projects and empowering them to make decisions can have a positive effect on project performance. The findings from the study complement existing literature on new product development and crisis management processes. In addition, the results uncover potential long‐term effects such as more openness for cross‐sector collaborations, which can serve as interesting sources for further research.

Success factors in product development projects: expert opinions

Successful product development is a common challenge for technical and management experts. The increasing pressure on time reduction and cost savings while enhancing product features, requires rethinking project management methods. This paper analyses the opinions of product development experts about the success factors of product development projects. A voluntary online survey was used for data collection in 2020. The study confirms that development engineers, test engineers, project managers, and product development managers have partially different approaches to important success factors. Precise regulation and focus on collaboration are considered essential topics. The results show that knowledge management and collaboration with other organizational units must be improved. Enhancing the interpretation of project success and forcing the better utilization of lessons learned or module information can contribute to sustainable success.

A Review on Test Automation for Test Cases Generation using NLP Techniques

In the process of product development, stakeholders and top management summarize the concept and document the requirements in natural language. These ideas and descriptions documented as software requirements by the technical department. Developers develop software following this software requirement document. For testing this developed software, they derive test cases from natural language requirements and then do the testing process to find the bugs. This process involves understanding requirements and derives test cases that are used to understand by developers and testers. Due to increasing the advanced features, deriving the test cases is monotonous and takes more time. This research article shows a method to automate this process which is deriving test cases from requirements using NLP algorithms. This approach useful to reduce the time and cost of software development.

Implementing TRIZ with Supply Chain Management in New Product Development for Small and Medium Enterprises

Due to the impact of globalization, the competition between enterprises has become fierce and led the supply chains of many industries to be reorganized. One of the consequences is that the operation of many small and medium enterprises (SMs) had become very difficult. Hence, many of SMEs in Taiwan have gone bankrupt and some of them have moved to other places where they have lower production costs, in order to survive; this not only hollowed out the industries but also disconnected the supply chains in their mother countries. Because Taiwan’s SMEs are generally poor in innovation, this study explored the implementation of the theory of inventive problem-solving (TRIZ) with alignment of new product development (NPD) and supply chain management (SCM) to strengthen the innovation and productivity of new products, so that SMEs can refer to its use to aid sustainable business operation. We considered an SME in Taiwan as a case to study and investigate the strategies that it employed to achieve survival and sustainability. By examining the practical applications of the NPD of the case company, which was based on the TRIZ and NPD SCM alignment, we found that value-added products may be created despite unfavorable industry environments, by implementing and coordinating the TRIZ and three product-related variables, namely innovating, modularity, and variety. This study explored practical alternatives for SMEs to develop various value-added products that meet customers’ changing requirements and succeed in competitive markets to achieve a sustainable business operation. Considering SMEs are crucially important to the economic equality and development of countries and that SMEs may only survive for a short time when operating in changing supply chain environments, this study can be used as a reference for the management of SMEs and future academic research in related fields.

The journey towards sustainable product development: why are some manufacturing companies better than others at product innovation?

Although there has already been some debate over the role of sustainable product innovation in creating a more sustainable society, it is important to further investigate management methods and factors that influence sustainable innovation capacity. Drawing on the concept of complementarity/the complementary effects perspective, this study aims to analyze the influence of management methods (project management and product development processes) on the development of sustainable product innovation. For this purpose, a survey was carried out with automotive metal mechanical organizations in Brazil, involving a total of 1025 enterprises. This research analyzes the dependency relations between the constructs of Project Management Maturity, Product Development Process Maturity, Product Innovation and Sustainable Product Performance, using the multivariate statistical techniques of Cluster Analysis, Exploratory Factor Analysis and Structural Equation Modeling. The results show a mixture of expected and unexpected findings, which can be summarized as follows: i) the most innovative companies utilize the Project Management Maturity and Product Development Process Maturity constructs more effectively; ii) a combination of complementary management methods enhances the use of resources; iii) companies that take advantage of complementary effects become more innovative and achieve better results in terms of sustainable innovation. Implications for end-users and for theory are also presented.

The culture of product development in student organisations

Product development in a multidisciplinary student organisation brings many challenges; varyingexperience, adaptation and involvement of members. This article will discuss how a multidisciplinarystudent project maintains a learning culture for product development and project management.The identified factors for a learning culture; 1) define product specifications, 2) involvealumnis, 3) facilitate an open minded culture for failure and learning and 4) collect experience andadapt an agile framework suitable for the project. These are factors that should be an implementedpart to increase the chances of maintaining a learning culture.Align Racing UiA, the case of this study, is a student organisation with over 60 engaged studentsin multi-disciplinary challenges. The common team goal is to produce one race car a year and competein Formula Student. The rules for the technical side of the project are substantial, resulting inconcrete boundaries to realize the project. However, every piece of the car is designed, producedand assembled by the members. Looking at the first year of Align Racing UiA, the initial projectmanagement was not optimal for a student project of this scale. Consequently, it was realized thata strong emphasis on project management, agile development method and communication wouldbe key to a more efficient product development and project management.

Big Data, Marketing Analytics, and Firm Marketing Capabilities

ABSTRACT While big data, marketing analytics, and firm marketing capabilities are all potential drivers of competitive advantage, there is limited research that investigates the interrelationship between them. This study aims to address this gap by examining the mechanisms through which big data and marketing analytics can be used to enhance firm marketing capabilities. Drawing on the dynamic capability view, a research model is developed and tested based on an analysis of 316 survey responses. The findings demonstrate positive effects of the use of big data on the use of marketing analytics, and the latter’s effect on firm marketing planning, marketing implementation, brand management, customer relationship management, and product development management. This study helps advance our understanding of firm marketing capability-enhancing processes through the use of big data and marketing analytics. It also provides practical implications to guide firms in using big data and marketing analytics to improve their marketing capabilities.

Agile-Stage-Gate Approach: Exploratory Research on the Structure, Roles, and Responsibilities

One of the most prominent methodologies gaining recognition in recent years is the Agile-Stage-Gate approach. The relatively new hybrid model is a combination of the Stage-Gate and the Agile-Scrum models. Several companies already using the Stage-Gate process have recently adopted the Agile-Stage-Gate approach to improve product development and project management. However, each of these companies has added their adjustments and modifications to the new approach in order to accommodate their specialized needs and to achieve the goals that are unique to their company. Therefore, no fixed structure or standardized features have been explicitly assigned to this hybrid approach. Instead, each company has added on different features and manipulated the new approach to fit whatever needs arise from moment to moment. This ambiguity leads to the question of whether the structure, roles, and responsibilities of this new approach can be defined and if so, how these clear and consistent definitions can improve productivity, efficiency, communication and market response time. The purpose of this study is to explore the structure, roles, and responsibilities within this new approach and to identify patterns that emerge during the product development and project management processes. The research questions presented were administered and examined through a qualitative survey. Fifty-two complete responses were collected from experienced individuals who have varying degrees of experience with the Agile-Stage-Gate approach. These findings revealed many similarities and differences between the structure, roles, and responsibilities of this approach, which were also dependent on the product and project type being considered. The most apparent similarities between roles and responsibilities were found in the case of software products and new product development projects. The Agile-Stage-Gate approach has also had a significant and undeniable impact on team communication and performance and was shown to improve overall quality and productivity. Keywords: agile, stage-gate, customer, scrum, sprint, hybrid, ideation, combination products, backlog, retrospective

The Influence of Dynamic and Adaptive Marketing Capabilities on the Performance of Portuguese SMEs in the B2B International Market

The present investigation aims study the sustainability of the business model of the Portuguese SMEs operating in the B2B International market analyzing the influence of dynamic marketing capabilities and adaptive marketing capabilities in their international marketing performance. It will also analyze the moderating effects of Competitive Intensity within this international scenario. A quantitative study was developed, using a questionnaire as a research method. In total, 335 valid responses were collected from Portuguese SMEs in June 2020. To test the hypotheses, multiple hierarchical regressions were performed. As for the analyzes involving Competitive Intensity environments, namely low and high intensity, dummies were developed to evaluate the different effects produced by the capacities in the International Marketing Performance. This study shows the positive impact of the dynamic marketing capabilities and adaptive marketing capabilities on the international marketing performance of the surveyed companies, essentially from the product development management, supply chain management, vigilant market learning and open marketing. when in a low competitive intensity environment only dynamic marketing capabilities had a positive effect on performance, but in a high, competitive, intensity environment both dynamic marketing capabilities and adaptive marketing capabilities showed positive effects in relation to performance. This study innovates by bringing international marketing, through two marketing capacities, from the perspective of SMEs that perform B2B activities.

Competence measurement of production enterprises in product innovations for technological and marketing strategies

Aim/purpose – This paper attempts to arrange and present the methods of measuring the competences of production enterprises in the field of product innovations. Design/methodology/approach – The method used in this paper is a literature review, in the area of new product development management. The author assumes that the r e- view and conceptual nature of this research is dominant. Findings – The obtained results indicate the importance of measurement in product innovation competencies and provide various metrics in this field. The author proposes new indicators to measure competencies in this area, i.e., the intensity of competition on new products market. Research implications/limitations – The results provide a basis for improving efforts of production enterprises in the field of product innovations. The limitations of the study include a complex character of considered theoretical constructs. Sets of measures must be adapted to the information needs of a specific enterprise. Originality/value/contribution – The values of these indicators reflect the directions of industrial enterprises’ conduct in the process of developing new products and technolo- gies. Moreover, these indicators show the strength of linking technology with the effec- tiveness of new product development, and consequently with the enterprise marketing, economic and financial efficiency. The contribution of research to the development of management sciences primarily includes the formulation of a set of indicators whose level determines product innovation competencies in industrial companies. Keywords: competence measurement, product innovation, production enterprise, new product, technical and marketing strategy. JEL Classification: O31, O32, M21.

A conceptual framework to integrate new product development and supply chain management with organisational business flow in an extended environment

In recent times, academic findings showcased different phases of new product development (NPD) and explained that during this time, different factors influenced supply chain, in which cost plays the most important role as NPD phases used time and cost together. Moreover different findings in research suggested that if the supplier gets involved at initial stages of developing product it actually adds value in a complete extended enterprise. So basically this is a necessity for an enterprise to explore any opportunity that can arise after implementing the framework, which in literature is scarce. The secondary advantage which they can achieve by implementing this framework that industry can check the viability of concurrent engineering in integrated supply chain. Therefore this paper will help industries to explore the initial framework which integrate new product development and supply chain within their domain of either manufacturing or within the fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector.

Statistical Foundations of Actuarial Learning and its Applications

The aim of this manuscript is to provide the mathematical and statistical foundations of actuarial learning. This is key to most actuarial tasks like insurance pricing, product development, claims reserving and risk management. The basic approach to these tasks is regression modeling. This manuscript describes the exponential dispersion family which is the most commonly used family of distributions in actuarial modeling. It discusses model fitting and parameter estimation using classical tools from mathematical statistics. It then introduces the crucial tools for prediction and forecast evaluation. Based on these statistical concepts various regression models are studied such as generalized linear models, mixture models and neural network regression models. We explore these modeling approaches from a theoretical and a practical viewpoint on publicly available data and we discuss their applications to insurance modeling. This involves model fitting using Fisher's scoring method, gradient descent algorithms or the expectation-maximization algorithm, model selection, parameter selection, regularization, etc.

A conceptual framework to integrate new product development and supply chain management with organisational business flow in an extended environment

In recent times, academic findings showcased different phases of new product development (NPD) and explained that during this time, different factors influenced supply chain, in which cost plays the most important role as NPD phases used time and cost together. Moreover different findings in research suggested that if the supplier gets involved at initial stages of developing product it actually adds value in a complete extended enterprise. So basically this is a necessity for an enterprise to explore any opportunity that can arise after implementing the framework, which in literature is scarce. The secondary advantage which they can achieve by implementing this framework that industry can check the viability of concurrent engineering in integrated supply chain. Therefore this paper will help industries to explore the initial framework which integrate new product development and supply chain within their domain of either manufacturing or within the fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector.