Quality Function Deployment Process Research Articles

An integrated model for selecting bridge structural systems using quality function deployment and analytical hierarchy process

Selecting an efficient structural system during the conceptual design of bridge projects is an essential requirement for the project’s success and fulfilling stakeholders’ expectations. This process involves evaluating a broad range of objective and subjective requirements based on multiple technical criteria. Despite its importance, current literature lacks a structured methodology for assisting designers in the selection process of the bridge structural system. Therefore, this research aims to develop a selection model to facilitate the decision-making process, helping evaluate different bridge structural systems during the conceptual design phase. The primary goal is to choose the most optimal design that aligns with both the client’s needs and technical specifications. The proposed methodology begins by identifying client needs and finding their relative importance using an Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) questionnaire, followed by determining the technical requirements in bridge conceptual design. A Quality Function Deployment (QFD) model is developed to evaluate bridge structural systems. The main advantage of integrating QFD and AHP is that it reduces the inconsistency and uncertainty in the QFD inputs. The methodology is implemented in a real case study of a bridge project in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), demonstrating improved results in structural system selection compared to traditional methods. While this research focused on the conceptual design phase of bridge projects, future work could extend to other phases of design.

Data-driven supplier evaluation in complex product industry value chain for brand value co-creation

In the context of big data, it is an excellent challenge to evaluate suppliers under a brand value (BV) co-creation scenario due to the complexity of the BV co-creation process, as well as the nature of the multilayer complex network (MCN) relationships among suppliers in a complex product industrial value chain (CPIVC). To improve the BV satisfaction and accuracy of supplier evaluation results and to offer manufacturers effective decision-support in selecting suppliers that create BV, a data-driven supplier decision-making method comprising a two-stage model is proposed under BV orientation. In the first stage, the supplier relationship model is developed to elicit the autocorrelation importance based on MCN theory and supplier data. In the second stage, the supplier autocorrelation importance and industrial value chain data are integrated into the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) process to transform BV demands into value activities, and further into suppliers, with the purpose of calculating the importance of each supplier. Finally, the applicability and superiority of this method are illustrated by carrying out a case study using the real data collected from the air-conditioning industrial value chain. The proposed method takes into account the essence of MCN relationships among suppliers, making assessment results more accurate and realistic. It not only provides manufacturers with an effective decision-making tool to select suppliers for co-creating BV, and but also contributes to an innovative method for data-driven supplier evaluation of CPIVC.

Enhancing Quality Function Deployment Through the Integration of Rough Set and Ordinal Priority Approach: A Case Study in Electric Vehicle Manufacturing

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a widely used technique for translating customer requirements (CRs) into engineering characteristics (ECs) in product or service design. However, existing improved QFD methods suffer from several limitations, such as relying on precise experts' assessments, subjectivity in aggregating evaluation information, and excessive external information and parameters, which may increase the the complexity of QFD and hinder its practical application. To address these challenges, this article presents a novel rough set theory-based ordinal priority approach (OPA) methodology (OPA-R) to enhance traditional QFD. The proposed approach uses ordinal priorities provided by experts to evaluate CRs and the interrelations between CRs and ECs, eliminating the need for fuzzy linguistic variables, fuzzy numbers, or pairwise comparison matrices. Moreover, rough set theory is employed to aggregate the assessments of experts to generate rough ordinal priorities. An extended optimization model of traditional OPA is then developed to determine the ranking of CRs and ECs. The validity and advantages of the proposed model are demonstrated through a case study in the manufacturing of electric vehicles. The OPA-R method can simplify the process of QFD, reduce the reliance on precise assessments from experts, and avoid excessive external information and additional parameters.

A study on implementing QFD (quality function deployment) in the construction of a commercial business center

Purpose This study aims to demonstrate how the process of quality function deployment (QFD) is used to identify the basic requirements of the customers in designing and executing the commercial business center. Design/methodology/approach This study was considered with the aim of determining the approach of QFD methodology used in the planning and designing of commercial business centers. The methodology used in the study is a customer-driven process that includes customer requirements in each and every aspect of the planning and designing of the project. The main focus of this study is to understand the requirements of the customers and to design and execute a commercial business project. Findings This study illustrates the quality requirements of the projects that benefit from the QFD process to obtain customer requirements for the planning and designing of commercial business centers. A case study is used to demonstrate the use of QFD process. This helps to explain the effective application of QFD in the planning and designing of business centers and similar constructions. Research limitations/implications The planning and designing of the commercial business center using the QFD process were challenging and hence it is limited to the design part. The strategic objectives are not taken into account while performing QFD in this case study and the risk of market research is lacking. House of quality (HOQ) can be too complicated at times; hence, the adaptability in the traditional QFD is lacking. Most of the work in the HOQ matrix is done through subjective evaluation. Therefore, this research is mostly useful for a single party responsible for all phases of the planning and designing of the project. Originality/value In the construction industry, the use of the QFD process for project performance analysis and application is restricted. As a result of the scarcity of studies on the planning and design of construction projects, this study on the planning and design of a construction project was inspired.

Extending Quality Function Deployment and Analytic Hierarchy Process under Interval-Valued Fuzzy Environment for Evaluating Port Sustainability

To confront the related problems of environmental protection, energy saving, and carbon reduction, sustainability has been a prominent issue for enterprises seeking to meet the requirements of the Earth Summit’ sustainable development goals (SDGs). Basically, sustainability evaluation of enterprises must be considered from environmental, social, and economic perspectives, recognized as quality requirements. Numerous enterprises, especially for international ports, must pay attention to these requirements in expressing their corporate social responsibility (CSR) for decreasing marine pollution. Practically, the three requirements may be dependent under uncertain environments, and rationally evaluated by fuzzy multi-criteria decision-making (FMCDM) with dependent evaluation criteria (DEC). In other words, evaluating port sustainability, containing location expanding, should belong to FMCDM with DEC. For DEC under uncertain environments, fuzzy extension of the analytic network process (ANP) is a feasible solution to solve the above problems. However, fuzzy computations of ANP are heavily complicated; thus, we desire to combine quality function deployment (QFD) with the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) under the interval-valued fuzzy environment (IVFE) into a hybrid method for evaluating port sustainability. In numerous multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) efforts, AHP was often extended into FMCDM to encompass the imprecision and vagueness of data, but the extension was properly used for FMCDM with independent evaluation criteria (IDEC). Herein, QFD is utilized to express the dependent relationships between criteria, and thus transforms IDEC into DEC for the evaluation of port sustainability. Through the hybrid method, QFD is combined with AHP to replace ANP under IVFE, the complicated ties of ANP-corresponding interval-valued fuzzy numbers (IVFNs) are overcome, and the problem of evaluating port sustainability is rationally solved.

A novel belief-based QFD-AHP model in interval type-2 fuzzy environment for lean after-sales service in automotive industry

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to propose a novel lean management tool to provide a comprehensive and flexible evaluation model while converting customer voices into technical characteristics in lean implementations.Design/methodology/approachFor this purpose, the proposed model was constructed by belief space-evaluations, quality function deployment (QFD) and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) in interval type-2 fuzzy (IT2F) environment. This model involves three phases: determining the linguistic weights and belief-based relations with their IT2F-sets, processing information about IT2F-based belief-evaluations and ranking the technical characteristics using the defuzzified belief-based relative importance values.FindingsThe proposed model was applied to automotive after-sales service in Turkey to demonstrate its use in lean service-decisions. This model was compared with its classical and type-1 fuzzy versions. The ranking-results of the proposed model differed from those of the other versions. The reason is that the IT2F-environment offers a sensitive and flexible evaluation of the model’s linguistic scales.Research limitations/implicationsCalculations in the proposed model may be quite involved for practitioners. An Excel-dashboard was created to simplify the computational complexity.Practical implicationsResearchers/practitioners can apply this model to any lean manufacturing/service implementation.Social implicationsCompany managers/employees/customers can recognize their perception-mechanisms via belief space-evaluations and experience how uncertainty in the perception-mechanism affects their decisions.Originality/valueThe proposed model provides a new lean tool due to the Bayesian model combined with QFD-AHP in IT2F-environment. This model eliminates the ambiguity in conceptual change-based lean decisions.

Assessment of risk propagation during different stages of new product development process

New Product Development Process (NPD) is a key aspect of launching new and innovative products in the market. Many products fail in the market because of technical risks, financial risks and product development time risks. It is very important to understand the overall risk factors associated with different stages of product development so that risks can be mitigated effectively. This paper presents a methodology to understand the risk associated with the initial stages of NPD. Design flexibility is higher in initial design stages requiring minimum redesign efforts and costs. It is a great opportunity to deal with risk factors and uncertainties in initial design stages than the later design stages. Product development costs in initial stages are around 5 to 10 percent but impact is 70 to 80 percent so exploration assessment in initial stages of NPD can be hugely beneficial. Stage-wise risk assessment will also provide the details of risk associated with each stage, which will be helpful in implementing appropriate mitigation strategies. Since transition from one stage to another stage of NPD is independent of the previous stage, different NPD stages can be easily expressed by the transition state of the Markov process. In this paper, the Markov process has been used for the risk assessment of initial stages of NPD, keeping mitigation strategies in mind. The three initial stages of NPD considered in this study include the concept design, detailed design and integration & testing stages. This paper also explores a method by integration of quality function deployment (QFD) and Markov process, to understand risk patterns associated with several complete design solutions (CFDs). By using QFD, the mapping between customer requirements can be reflected into risk assessment of complete design solutions (CFDs). This methodology has been demonstrated by a case study on Coffee Maker.

Strategies for improving the quality of the ground coffee product: a case study at SMEs X Malang, Indonesia

SMEs X is one of the SMEs in Malang City that produces ground coffee. The increasing number of ground coffee producers in Malang City make SMEs X must be able to survive in the competition so that SMEs X needs to improve the quality of ground coffee products. The methods used are Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP). The results show that five essential attributes for consumers to improve the quality of ground coffee include unique packaging forms, packaging materials that can maintain quality, attractive packaging colours, convenience for consumers to reach sales locations, and convenience for consumers to get products. Strategies that can be used to improve the quality of ground coffee include redesigning the packaging, improving the ground coffee production process, selecting good quality coffee beans, resetting the selling price of the product, increasing marketing effectiveness, and applying for a permit from the national drug and food agency.

A Quality Function Deployment Approach Through Management and Technology Development

Corrugated paper industry is an indispensable industry and it has been developed for more than fifty years. Hence, it is important for a firm to find its core competence, study effective business strategies, and form a long-term competitive advantage. However, few researchers focus on the harmonizing between the operational problems and solutions from customers’ and suppliers’ angles. The purposes of this research are to analyze frequently encountered problems and to find appropriate solutions to upgrade production efficiency and business performance for the corrugated paper industry in Taiwan. This study mixes Quality Function Deployment and Analytic Hierarchy Process approach to find some operational problems and provide the solutions based on experts' experience. The findings are projected to deliver some significant contributions; academically, by professionally conducting further theoretical validation and by adopting suitable strategies to fit the needs of customers.

Smart Cane Developed with DFSS, QFD, and SDE for the Visually Impaired

This study shows an application of the Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) Methodology in the field of medical engineering. This research aims to demonstrate the application of a systematic design approach in the development of the “Ocane”, an innovative concept of smart cane for visually impaired patients which was thought of in answer to the end user’s needs, deploying an easy to transport, locate, and adjust element with ultrasonic sensors and tactile feedback. DFSS is an analytical design methodology meant to organize project workflow in a sequence of specific steps. Other standardized design procedures such as Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Stylistic Design Engineering (SDE) have been used to support DFSS in terms of targeting customer requirements and focusing on aesthetics for ergonomics analysis, respectively. First, the QFD process is introduced and applied to gather the final customer needs, completing the analysis with benchmarking and similar-thought products on the market. Afterwards, a description of the DFSS methodology and application to the case study was deployed. Thereafter, the SDE procedure is exposed by identifying the “Ocane” concept and development, and moving towards the completion of an inventive product with a creative design and careful attention to visually impaired clients’ requirements.

A Quality Function Deployment Approach Through Management and Technology Development

Corrugated paper industry is an indispensable industry and it has been developed for more than fifty years. Hence, it is important for a firm to find its core competence, study effective business strategies, and form a long-term competitive advantage. However, few researchers focus on the harmonizing between the operational problems and solutions from customers’ and suppliers’ angles. The purposes of this research are to analyze frequently encountered problems and to find appropriate solutions to upgrade production efficiency and business performance for the corrugated paper industry in Taiwan. This study mixes Quality Function Deployment and Analytic Hierarchy Process approach to find some operational problems and provide the solutions based on experts' experience. The findings are projected to deliver some significant contributions; academically, by professionally conducting further theoretical validation and by adopting suitable strategies to fit the needs of customers.

Developing physical resilience strategies in passive defense according to identification of endangered areas of urban environments (case study: Ahvaz city)

PurposeThis paper aims to focus on reducing the vulnerability of Ahvaz city against urban disasters and lowering the number of casualties and amount of financial losses using modern approaches to develop resilience strategies that can increase urban safety to an acceptable level. The strategic situation of Ahvaz city, because of its abundant resources, the war experience and its location on the boundary regions of Iran, highlights its significance. Ahvaz has a high population and an extended texture, and the existence of extraordinary constructions increases the importance of physical resilience in this city.Design/methodology/approachThe present study investigates built environment aspects such as the urban structure, the urban form, land-use proximity pattern, urban road network and crucial and vulnerable centres in Ahvaz, using a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. Hence, the areas at risk in Ahvaz were identified and illustrated in a comprehensive risk assessment map, and then, by using the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats technique and finally by using the Delphi method, some strategies and plans were presented to reduce the level of vulnerability in Ahvaz. Then, these strategies are prioritized by applying quality function deployment (QFD) technique.FindingsThe risk assessment result shows that most parts of Ahvaz’s urban areas are highly at risk. The central and northern parts of Ahvaz have the highest vulnerability at a time of crisis. These zones include district 1 (city centre) and districts 2, 3 and 7 at the city’s margins. The result of QFD process showed that the essential urban resilience strategy is to positively consider the passive defence studies with a physical resilience approach. Also, the proper distribution of strategic points in the city, moving the industrial and oil companies from the peripheral area, and facilitating access to vital, crucial centres to support urban regions are considered the most effective strategic plans.Originality/valueThis paper, with an integrated approach, examines and prioritizes the main physical problems of Ahvaz city based on the spatial analysis and opinions of experts. The physical strategies presented in this paper can significantly reduce the risks and increase the urban resilience of Ahvaz city in the face of crisis.

Application of Quality Function Deployment for Product Design Concept Selection

For business-to-business (B2B) companies, selecting new product concepts is vital to new product development (NPD), since it significantly contributes to the ultimate success and reputation of the product in terms of quality and function. The research problem is defining the best solution of new product’s design concept selection within high competition and resources’ limitation by mathematical approaches. The main objective of this study is developing an integrated analytical approach, combining quality function deployment (QFD) and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) approach, and data envelopment analysis (DEA) to enhance the effectiveness of design product decisions. The proposed approach focuses on mathematical methods to comprehensively evaluate and strategically select the best new product concept while considering the features of the B2B product and the available information during concept selection. The best new concept is selected by the combined scores derived from the concept competitiveness (quality function deployment—analytic hierarchy process) and the design development efficiency (data envelopment analysis). Finally, the design alternatives are classified into four categories by quadrant analysis for design concept management. The benefit of this approach—combining three mathematical models together for the best concept’s solution.

Developing Pandemic Prevention and Control by ANP-QFD Approach: A Case Study on Urban Furniture Design in China Communities.

Background: An infectious disease can affect human beings at an alarming speed in modern society, where Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has led to a worldwide pandemic, posing grave threats to public security and the social economies. However, as one of the closest attachments of urban dwellers, urban furniture hardly contributes to pandemic prevention and control. Methods: Given this critical challenge, this article aims to propose a feasible solution to coping with pandemic situations through urban furniture design, using an integrated method of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Analytic Network Process (ANP). Eight communities in China are selected as the research sites, since people working and living in these places have successful experience preventing and containing pandemics. Results: Three user requirements (URs), namely, usability and easy access, sanitation, and health and emotional pleasure, are determined. Meanwhile, seven design requirements (DRs) are identified, including contact reduction, effective disinfection, good appearance, social and cultural symbols, ergonomics, smart system and technology and sustainability. The overall priorities of URs and DRs and their inner dependencies are subsequently determined through the ANP-QFD method, comprising the House of Quality (HQQ). According to the theoretical results, we propose five design strategies for pandemic prevention and control. Conclusion: It is demonstrated that the incorporated method of ANP-QFD has applicability and effectiveness in the conceptual product design process. This article can also provide a new perspective for pandemic prevention and control in densely populated communities in terms of product design and development.

Analysis of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Analytical Network Process (ANP) Methods at PT. XYZ

The product under study is a mattress product. The problem at hand is a mismatch with consumer desires. To minimize this mismatch, an analysis was carried out using the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Analytical Network Process (ANP) methods. Where QFD is used to determine customer technical desires and then weighting is carried out using the ANP method. From the calculation results, the highest to the lowest technical characteristics are cutting speed, cutting accuracy, product dimensions, component composition, machine capacity, and durability. The value of the difficulty level of cutting speed is 4 and the importance level is 23% and the estimated cost is 20%. Then from these results, the company must pay more attention to these characteristics because it can have a direct effect on the product. The wrong cutting speed will result in reject products so that it can reduce profits for the company or harm the company.

Value Analysis and Quality Function Deployment of Some Competing Food Products

In today’s world, and for virtually any product or service; the customer is the king. The world is now different no doubt. Companies must ensure that their products continue to satisfy the consumer while remaining profitable. Most times, companies are faced with competitor(s), thriving to get a larger share of the market, or even sink their competitors, with strategies set in place. Four of the top competitive food products facing this problem in Nigeria were selected for the research work. The study is aimed at the utilization of Value Analysis (VA) and Quality Function Deployment (QFD) to critically analyze selected products with the intent of identifying ways of improvement, reducing the risk of shrinking market share, scheduling improvements and presenting these proposed improvements for implementation. The product ingredients as well as their functions were identified. Consumer needs were determined using questionnaires. Analysis involved combining Statistical Packages for the Social Sciences and Microsoft Excel and utilization of the principles of value analysis. Quality Function Deployment (QFD) was adopted at the creative stage of Value Analysis to further analyze consumer needs by linking them to the ingredients that meet such needs. The results indicate that for each competitive pair of products analyzed, a particular product seemed to be gradually taking the other off the market with a larger percentage of consumers being drawn to the superior product. With the focus on improving the less preferred products, using the House of Quality (HoQ) development and the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) process, implementation strategies were reviewed. From the study, it can be deduced that for the products to be successful in the market. The ingredients with the higher relative weights are to be given more emphasis. Also, it is essential that the voice of the customer is obtained at intervals to ensure that the products satisfy them at any point in time. Methods for enhancing the products based on the need of consumers were recommended.

Decision Model of Design for Elderly Wearable Health Monitoring Products Based on Quality Function Deployment and Analytic Network Process

Facing the current situation of aging society, the health of the elderly has once again become an important issue related to people's livelihood. Aiming at the health problems of the elderly, with the improvement of science and technology, a series of wearable health monitoring products targeted at the elderly have gradually appeared. In order to accurately provide the elderly with a good experience in the interaction of wearable health monitoring products, this article obtains the needs of the elderly according to the research content of ergonomics, and addresses the needs of the elderly from their physical, psychological and Three angles of interaction were classified; then based on the demand, a Quality Function Deployment (QFD) method was used to build a house of quality model, which transformed the needs of the elderly into design requirements, and combined with Analytic Network Process (ANP) to build a model evaluation index system. Combining the house of quality model with the network analysis method, so that the advantages of the ANP method can be fully utilized, the shortcomings of the QFD method can be overcome, and the degree of interaction between factors in the index system can be better reflected, so that the attribute weights given are more reasonable. Finally, a fuzzy QFDANP method model for the selection and modification of such product design schemes is constructed, which not only avoids the subjective and unreasonable factors of the initial requirements acquisition of the product design, but also can target the applicability requirements of the product functions and structure Modifications provide clear goals for the design and selection of design options for such products. The validity and practicability of the method are verified by examples.

Quality Function Deployment and Analytic Hierarchy Process: A literature review of their joint application

The aim of this paper is to review the literature on the combined use of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) methodologies and to apply a comprehensive analysis over the resulting publications. The paper seeks to classify the articles with regard to their variations and extensions, and application areas. The articles are mostly applied in manufacturing, supply chain, higher education, strategy, service and sustainability. This review is characterized by a quantitative and qualitative approach of a non-probabilistic intentional sample composed of 100 academic papers – 98 articles and 2 reviews. For this purpose, the Scopus database was selected as a means to undertake a systematic investigation with a longitudinal cut from 1994 to 2015. The aim of this paper also contributes toward complementing Ho and Mehrjerdi revisions on deepening the QFD-AHP joint application. The limitation is related to the sample of works focus of this review, restricted to the Scopus database, thereby not characterizing the literature universe. A proposal for further investigations is to expand the search scope to other databases and to carry out a deeper analysis on each application area presented.

An Integrated of AHP–QFD Methodology For Poduct Design: A Review

Many methods, rules, and techniques are used by some manufacturing companies to enhance product competitiveness by fulfilling customer needs and satisfaction possible by improving product design quality. Many researchers suggest a variety of design tools that were implemented early in the design process. Quality function deployment and Analytical hierarchy process methods are one of them. Some researchers have studied in-depth incorporating these two design techniques in product design and development by focusing on translating the consumers' desire into product design. This paper presents the review, investigates analysis, and discussion of some literature on the QFD combined AHP, which is used for product design, either re-designing existing products or designing new products. Several international journal articles have been selected, collected, and analyzed through several relevant scientific publications published in 2010-2016. An in-depth analysis has been carried out on this paper on the benefit, and drawbacks of the integration method on previous research. This paper provides suggestions based on the analysis of the development of the integration method. Hope this paper could be a reference for researchers and other manufacturing companies to implement QFD-AHP integration method in designing product

Integration of Quality Function Deployment and Analytical Hierarchy Process in Developing Digital Application Features

The development of digital technology is increasingly developing along with the emergence of the industrial concept 4.0. Indirectly, this creates opportunities for the macro and micro industries located in cities and villages. Analysis of visitor needs and application feature priorities were carried out in this study for the development of android applications in the “Ponggok Village” and “Cikoromoy Village”. The purpose of this study is to make it easier for visitors to know the tourism objects in the village. Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) are used as a basis for designing digital application designs. Identification of visitor needs is obtained by using QFD methods and ranking of application features is obtained by using methods. Finally, two villages were compared in order to developing an integrated digital application.