Value Creation In Collaborative Analysis Model Development Processes

Integration and coordination of engineering analysis model is a vast development field in the context of complex product development. Engineers' siloed way of working in combination with lack of efficiency in current model development process may cause inconsistency based on model interfaces, human errors, miscommunication between teams and misinterpretations. In lean terms, this may create multiple wastes, including waiting, overproduction leading to excess inventory, unnecessary processing and may be the most harmful: defects (e.g., incorrect models) with rework consequences. Hence, product manufacturing companies must establish effective processes to add value throughout the multidisciplinary distributed modeling environment. The goal of this paper is to propose a pull-control model development process, providing model architecture integration and coherent control in early design phase. This paper proposes also an appropriate reuse strategy; this allows for utilizing plug-and-play type modular product models managed through a single-source of authority concept. A pull-control development process helps prevent potential rework arising from inconsistencies related to definitions, know-how and stakeholders communication at an early stage of the design process. Also, the proposed black box models reuse strategy helps reduce human-related error such as lack of domain knowledge, experience and misinterpretations. The proposed method is used to identify and visualize potential improvement in terms of increased model transparency and reuse when transforming from the present to the suggested future modeling strategy. The research has been conducted by synthesizing findings from a literature review, in combination with observations and analysis of current analysis model development practices within the automotive OEM Renault in France.