Concurrent engineering

EDIT BY Er. SHAKTI PRASAD MOHAPATRA
INTRODUCTION
A Over the past decade industries in almost all markets have been facing a
boosting level of competitiveness. There are many reasons for this, but
most of them can be followed to some principal trends: shortening product
life cycles, globalization of the market, rapid technological changes,
environmental issues, and higher complexity of products, customers
demanding products with more features, higher quality, lower cost, and
demand for more and more customized products. Concurrent Engineering
is an integrated product development approach, CE emphasises the
response to customer expectations by producing better, cost effective and
much faster products. It also supports ultidisciplinary team values of
cooperation and trust; thus, sharing and exchanging required knowledge
and information in a manner that will enhance decision making processes
and also emphasis on simultaneous consideration during the design stage
and all the other Product Life Cycle (PLC) aspects of the product
development. One of the most salient means to reduce development time is
through the use of “concurrent engineering.” Concurrent engineering is
defined by the Institute for Defence Analysis (IDA) as: “the systematic
approach to the integrated concurrent design of products and related
processes, including manufacture and support. Thus, PLC management
confronts the need to balance fast response to changing consumer demands
with competitive pressure to seek cost reductions in sourcing,
manufacturing and distribution.

Types CE Multidisciplinary Teams
The CE applications depend on having a very well defined
multidisciplinary Team that is directed by the project leader or CE team
leader. The vital CE team members consist of various departments such as:
marketing, product engineering, manufacturing engineering, production
engineering, finance, quality, logistic control, systems engineering, services
and external consultancy or support teams as well as the customers and
brokers [3]. Some of the CE multidisciplinary team structures include:
Functional Team:
This type of multidisciplinary team very much relates to the orthodox over
the wall way of communication where each engineer works in his/her own
functional department. This team type should be avoided.
Lightweight Team:
This type of multidisciplinary CE team is mainly formed with members
from the same department. This CE team type is related to part of the
complete PLC.
Heavyweight Team:
This type of multidisciplinary CE team is a classical cross-functional CE
team. With this type of CE team, members work part-time aside their
original epartmental duties.
Autonomy Team:
This type of multidisciplinary CE team is also a classical cross-functional
team where members work full-time from their own offices and also used
the epartmental resources. With this type of CE team, regular meetings
take place among the CE team members.
Collocated Autonomy Team:
This type of multidisciplinary CE is much like the autonomy team type of
CE, just that, to enhance total dedication to the project as well as the
integration of the team, members are brought together in the same working
environment with the requisite resources to carry on their activities.
The Virtual Team:
This type of multidisciplinary CE team is a geographically distributed,
thus, employing information technologies (i.e. internet/intranet, as well as
telephone
conferences and videoconferences) for communication among members.

METHODOLOGY
It is rather hard to confine the report on Concurrent Engineering
(CE) to specific orders; the relevant material is spread out across various
journals. The criteria for choosing journal articles for the review are as
follows. First of all, the article must have been published in a peer-review
and/or archival journal. Secondly, to avoid never ending revision of the
report, 28th July, 2010 was selected as the cut-off date. Finally, only the
articles with „Concurrent Engineering‟ as a part of their title contents were
selected. The exceptions are those articles that are explicitly dealing with
„Concurrent Engineering‟ but for some reasons the authors decided not to
use „Concurrent Engineering‟ in the title. The inclusions of such articles
are inevitably unplanned. Consequently, it is possible that there exist more
of such articles, which are not surveyed in this report. No restrictions were
imposed on the field of the surveyed journals. This should allow a
comprehensive set of perspectives on Concurrent Engineering by different
fields. According to these criteria, a vigorous attempt has been made to
collate all the available journal articles. The effort to compile has been
carried out through exhaustive computer search, database search, internet
search, reference checking, most cited authors using Harzing‟s Publish or
Perish software, etc. However, it is always possible that some of the articles
are missing from this list. A Harzing‟s Publish or Perish software statistical
results for mostly cited authors in the field of Concurrent Engineering
between 2005 and 2010 is found in Table I above in a descending order:
CE PRODUCT LIFE-CYCLE (PLC)
Every product or service has a certain life cycle. Product life-cycle (PLC) is
the integrated, information-driven approach to all aspects of a product's
life, from concept to design, manufacturing, maintenance and removal
from the market, has become a strategic priority in many company's
boardrooms . The life cycle refers to the time from the product‟s first
launch into the market until its final withdrawal, and it is split up in
phases. During this time significant changes are made in the way that the
product is behaving into the market, i.e. its reflection in respect of sales to
the company that introduced it into the market. Since an increase in profits
is the major goal of a company that introduces a product into a market, the
product‟s life cycle management is very important. Certain companies use
strategic planning and others follow the basic rules of the different life
cycle phase. The understanding of a product‟s life cycle can help an

industry to understand and realize when it is the time to market or
withdraw a product from a market, its position in the market compared to
competitors, and the product‟s success or failure feasibility. For a company
to fully understand the above and successfully manage a product‟s life
cycle, needs to develop strategies and methodologies . Industries should
manage their products carefully over time to ensure that they deliver
products that continue to meet customer needs. In this way industrial
organizations maintain a cash flow that covers the company‟s costs and
delivers s a profit to it. Without this profit very few industries cansurvive in
the longer term. The process of managing groups of brands and product
lines is called group planning. The life of a product is the period over which
it appeals to customers. The sales performance of any product rises from
nothing when the product is introduced to the market reaches a peak and
then declines to nothing again.
The classic product life cycle has five stages:
Development
 Growth
 Maturity
 Decline and
 Withdrawal
The Product Life Cycle of some products may last for hundreds of years
while for others it may be a few months. If a firm wants to prolong the life
cycle of its own distinct product it is essential to invest well in the
development of the product and the promotion of it. This may mean that a
lot of work is put into the product before it's launched. Once the product is
on the market it may be necessary to periodically inject new life into it.
This can be done in several ways, including:
 Product improvement
 Extending the product range
 Improved promotion etc.
The Product Life Cycle process is the mechanism through which products
are managed from inception to retirement. The Product Life Cycle does not
have to end. It can easily be prolonged by a range of marketing and
production innovations.
A. Development Stage
At the development Stage market size and growth is slim. It is
possible that substantial research and development costs have been
incurred in getting the product to this stage. In addition, marketing costs
may be high in order to test the market, undergo commencement
promotion and set up distribution outlets. It is highly unlikely that
industries will make profits on products at the development Stage.
Products at this stage have to be carefully monitored to ensure that they
start to grow and pick in the market. Otherwise, the best option may be to

withdraw or end the product. The need for immediate profit is not a
pressure as the lack of it is expected at this time. The product is promoted
to create awareness of the market. If the product has no or few
competitors, a skimming price strategy is employed to maximise profits.
Limited numbers of product will be available in few outlets of distribution.
The development stage encompasses a number of activities that will
include:
 Concept: Overview of the customer requirement that an opportunity
seeks to address, supported by evidence of market need.
 Definition: High-level definition of customer requirements and
analysis of a business opportunity.
 Design: Analysis of customer requirements creating project plan and
detailed product specification.
 Development: Data and software (CAD/CAM) development.
 Development Testing: Testing of the product against pre-defined test
schedules to ensure satisfactory performance against customer
requirements.
 Development of pricing: the market with very similar offerings.
Products become more profitable and companies form alliances,
joint ventures and take over each other. Hence cost on advertising
seems high and focuses upon building brand while market share
tends to stabilize in this respect.
 Development of user guide,
 Introduction of the product to the market (Time to Market).
etc.

(Introduction Stage (Input and Deliverables) - Product Life Cycle (PLC) - Input
and)
It is in this stage that Engineering Design team comes to the fore
and has its major contribution. The intention is ensure that the
new product:
 Meets all the customer requirements
 The design time is very much reduced as this leads to
 Shorter time to market for the product
 Shorter time to profitability for the new product
 Increase Return On Investment (ROI)
 Earlier payback of investment costs
B. Concurrent engineering workflow
Concurrent engineering (CE) is a workflow that, instead of
working chronologically through stages, carries out a number of
tasks in parallel.
For example: starting tool design before the detailed designs of
the product are finished, or starting on detail design solid models
before the concept design surface models are complete. Although
this does not necessarily reduce the amount of manpower
required for a project, it does drastically reduce lead times and
thus time to market. Feature-based CAD systems have for many
years allowed the simultaneous work on 3D solid model and the

2D drawing by means of two separate files, with the drawing
looking at the data in the model; when the model changes the
drawing will accordingly update. Some CAD packages also allow
associative copying of geometry between files. This allows, for
example, the copying of a part design into the files used by the
tooling designer. The manufacturing engineer can then start work
on tools before the final design freeze; when a design changes size
or shapes the tool geometry will then update. Concurrent
engineering also has the added benefit of providing better and
more immediate communication between departments, reducing
the chance
of costly, late design changes. It adopts a problem prevention
method as compared to the problem solving and re-designing
method of traditional sequential engineering.
C. Design in context
Individual components cannot be constructed in isolation.
Computer aided design - CAD; computer aided industrial design -
CAiD models of components are designed within the context of
part or the entire product being developed. This is achieved using
assembly modelling techniques. Other components‟ geometry can
be seen and referenced within the CAD tool being used. The other
components within the sub-assembly may or may not have been
constructed in the same system, their geometry being translated
from other collaborative product developments - CPD or
computer aided manufacture CAM formats. Some assembly
checking such as digital mock-up - DMU is also carried out using
Product visualization software.
D. Growth Stage
The Growth Stage consists of rapid growth in sales and profits
as the product or service is becoming established. Profits arise
due to an increase in output (economies of scale) and possibly
better prices for raw materials and manufactured components.
There may be fewer competitors, sales are growing and profit
margins are good. Now' is the time to work out how you can
reduce the costs of delivering the new product. At this stage, it is
cheaper for organizational industries to invest in increasing their
business market share as well as enjoying the overall growth of

the market. Accordingly, significant promotional resources are
usually invested in products that are firmly in the Growth Stage.
Competitors are attracted into the market with very similar
offerings. Products become more profitable and companies form
alliances, joint ventures and take over each other. Hence cost on
advertising seems high and focuses upon building brand while
market share tends to stabilize in this respect.
E. Maturity Stage
The Maturity Stage is, perhaps, the most common stage for all
markets. It is at this stage that competition is most intense as
companies fight to maintain their market share. Here, both
marketing and finance become key activities. Marketing spent has
to be monitored carefully, since any significant moves are likely to
be copied by competitors. The Maturity Stage is the time when
most profit is earned by the market as a whole. Any expenditure
on research and development is likely to be restricted to product
modification and improvement and perhaps to improve
production efficiency and quality. Sales growth will slow or even
stopped at this stage. Production and marketing costs may have
been reduced, but increased competition would drive down
prices. Hence, this moment is likely the best time to invest in a
new product introduction or development. Those products that
survive the earlier stages tend to spend longest in this phase. Sales
grow at a decreasing rate and then stabilize. Producers attempt to
differentiate products and brands, which are very essential to
this. Price wars and intense competition occur. At this point, the
market reaches saturation. Producers begin to leave the market
due to poor margins.
F. Decline Stage
Decline Stage, denotes that the market is shrinking, reducing
the overall amount of profit that can be shared among the
remaining competitors. At this stage, great care has to be taken to
manage the product carefully. It may be possible to take out some
production cost, to transfer production to a cheaper facility, sell
the product into other, cheaper markets, etc. Care should also be
taken to control the amount of stocks of the product. Ultimately,
depending on whether the product remains profitable, a company

may decide to end the product. At this point, forward there is a
downturn in the market. For example, more innovative products
are introduced or consumer tastes have changed. There is intense
price-cutting and many more products are withdrawn from the
market. Profits can be improved by reducing marketing spend
and cost cutting.
G. Withdrawal stage
In this stage product retirement takes place and a migration
plan for the company products and markets will be established to
support customers and partners. It is within this stage of the
product life cycle that the recycling and final disposals of
constituent components have to be addressed. It is of prime
importance that this stage of the Product Life Cycle has to be
fully considered during the product development stage. The Fig.
1, above illustrates the process involved in the Product Life Cycle.
H. Issues with Product Life Cycle (PLC)
In reality, very few products follow such a prescriptive cycle. The
length of each stage varies enormously. The decisions of
marketers can change the stage, for example, from maturity to
decline by price-cutting. Not all products go through each stage.
Some go from the introduction to decline. It is not easy to tell
which stage the product is in. Remember that Product life Cycle
is like all other tools. Use it to inform your gut feeling. The
Product Life Cycle with profit and loss was shown previously in
the graphs and has two lines - one to show the level of profit, and
other to show the level of sales. Industries will often try to use
extension strategies to try to delay the decline stage of the product
life cycle. The maturity stage is a good stage for the company in
terms of generating cash. The costs of developing the product and
establishing it in the market are paid, and it ends to then be at a
profitable stage. The longer the company can extend this stage the
better it will be for them. New products and services are the
lifeblood of all industrial and organizational businesses. Investing
in their development isn't an optional extra - it is crucial to
business growth and profitability. However, embarking on the
development process is risky. It needs considerable planning and
organisation. Identifying where products or services are in their

life cycle is central to business profitability. Effective research
into industrial markets and competitors will help to do this.
Industries can extend the life-cycle of a product or service by
investing in an "extension strategy" by:
 Increases to promotional spend.
 Introduce minor innovations - perhaps by adding extra
features or updating the design
 Seek new markets
CE TRENDS AND PERSPECTIVES
According to Tennant, C., and Roberts, P., (2000), an effective New
Product Introduction (NPI) process, which is concurrent, can enhance an
organisation‟s competitiveness by compressing product development
leadtimes, and enabling upstream and downstream processes to be
considered when taking decisions at the product concept phase. The
application of Concurrent Engineering (CE) (or Integrated Product

Development [IPD]) is gradually becoming the norm for developing and
introducing new products to the market place [2]. However, the degree to
which companies have implemented it and the amount of success varies
([2]; [9]). Many of the companies competing today in international markets
consider new product development (NPD) as an important factor for
achieving sustainable competitive advantages. Both researchers and
managers are constantly searching for methods and practices that will
allow them to improve the organization and management of their NPD
processes and boost their effectiveness or success the average success rate
of NPD projects today is approximately 60% The test; is to achieve
distinction in three specific objectives:
1. shorter new product development times
2. more efficient developments
3. superior products.
On the above note, manufacturing companies have re-systematized their
NPD processes and have moved from a sequential path, in which there is a
negligible interaction among the departments involved and the activities
required to develop the product which is carried out sequentially, towards
an integrated path, known as concurrent engineering (CE), in which the
activities overlap and all the departments collaborate from the beginning.
This new organizational design has helped companies improve their
performance by leading to lower costs, higher quality, major knowledge
creation and shorter product development times ([10]; [70]), all of which, in
turn, has raised their competitive skills. Hence, the aim is to avoid
continuous setbacks and the other problems that arise with the traditional
approach, improving NPD performance. This new practice, named CE,
tries to speed up the process, increasing flexibility, adopting a more
strategic perspective with more sensitivity to change in the environment,
solving problems through teamwork, developing diverse skills, and
improving internal communication. To achieve the above-mentioned
objectives, CE is based on three basic elements :
1. Concurrent work-flow,
2. Early involvement of all participants and groups contributing to
product development, and
3. Team work. In other words, CE is the early involvement of a
crossfunctional team to simultaneously plan product, process and

manufacturing activities and mentioned earlier in the previous
paragraphs.
REVIEW OF THE JOURNAL ARTICLES
In this section, is a brief aggregate summary of the journal articles used in
this report is provided in the following tables below. It is not intended to
provide a detail description of each article and references of major topics
and sub topics used in this review report. Hence, an attempt to draw a
collective summary report is made in this section.

Table IV shows main topics and major research areas used in the journal
article includes in this review report. A comprehensive table containing
main topic areas and their classified references for each topic is provided in
Table IV below. There is no particular sequence among the references
listed in the table. It is unavoidable to have an article that is relevant to
more than one topic. For example, an article may address implementation
issues but provide general information or extension/trends and perspective
on CE. In such a case, more credence topics are chosen to classify the
article according to the reporter‟s judgment. Listing an article under more
than one topic was hereby allowed.

CE Implementation
The effective New Product Introduction (NPI) process, which is
concurrent, can enhance an organisation‟s competitiveness by compressing
product development lead-times, and enabling upstream and downstream
processes to be considered when taking decisions at the product concept
phase. This approach is typically described as Concurrent Engineering
(CE). Hence, CE in an organization signifies the ability of the organization
to embrace product development as a series of overlapping stages, which
provides customer satisfaction and also the right price by delivering
products on time. This effectively accomplished by employing numerous
engineering tools and system techniques during the project management of
design product development. Analysis of references: major topics used in
this review report
CE Uses / Values
Some of the most notable values and uses of concurrent engineering in
recent times are to achieve excellence among other organizational
objectives, including: shorter new product development times, more
efficiency in development activities or system techniques and superior
products with the estimated design time frame. On this note, industries
have reorganized their new product introduction and development (NPI/D)
processes and have subsequently moved from a sequential path, which
means minimal communication among the concurrent departments
involved and the subsequent activities required in developing a new
product. Thus, all the departments collaborate from the beginning, by
carrying out the product development sequentially towards an integrated
path known as concurrent engineering (CE). With this approach, the
activities overlap and hence, all the departments involved collaborating
from the beginning. This new organizational design approach has helped
industries to improve their performance by leading to lower cost, higher
quality, major knowledge creation and shorter product development times
all of which increases the organizational competitive skills.
CE Extension/Trends and Perspective
According to, Information and communication technologies (ICT) have
altered the balance of cost between activities within a firm and activities
between firms. Easier co-operation allows companies to focus on their core
strengths, while forming relations with other firms to supply the other
needed skills to bring a product to market. Design, in one firm or in a
consortium, is iterative and does require a change. The ability of companies
to better manage engineering changes (ECs) during product development
can decrease cost, shorten development time, and produce higher quality
products. Although organisational aspects of change management have
received much attention, relatively little research has addressed
engineering change (EC) support in manufacturing companies related to

product development. Industrial manufacturing company endeavor to
create an advanced core system analytical solution integration process
across their industrial manufacturing processes, This will therefore,
enhance industrial efforts and processes by reducing lead-time variability
and also reduce the transition times to achieve performance consistency
proposed a new information technology platform based on software
collaborative services supporting different CE processes, which would be
among the first of its kind to attempt to apply collaborative reference
architecture to support CE in manufacturing industries. According to
service-oriented architecture (SOA) seems to be a most suitable system
application platform for the integration and collaboration of engineering
product design and development. Thus, the extensive applications of
computer aided engineering (CAE) technologies are essential to enhancing
the maximum engineering design
efficiency and effectiveness.

ANALYSIS
CE has seen some relatively drastic decline over a decade. Fig. 2.
Below and the data table beside it, shows the number of journal articles
published from 2000, which has somehow seen some drastic decline
fluctuation in the trend over time. The significant declines over these recent
years are clearly plotted in Fig. 2. below. Earlier journal articles in the field
of CE started appearing in the late 1980s, early 1990s through the 2000s
where it gained significant research interests from many industrial
organizations and researchers in a short period of time between the 1990s
through the early 2000s. From the analysis deduced from the Tables III
and IV above: CE implementation and related journal articles surveyed
are about 47.5%; journal articles surveyed on CE uses and/or values
formed about 21.3% and finally CE extension/trends and perspective and
related journal articles formed 31.3% of the journal articles surveyed.
From the data in Table IV above from which the statistical data in Table V
is deduced; a conclusive analysis could be drawn on the fact that the
number of journal articles published on the topics such as CE Uses and/or
Values and CE Extension / Trends and Perspective are areas, which are
lacking in CE research and development, which can be verified in Tables
IV and V above. From the data deduced as well as the findings from this
report‟s analysis in Tables IV and V above: Percentage analysis on CE
Uses/Values constitutes 21.3% as well as CE Extension/Trends and
Perspective, which are also 31.3%. These are the two averagely under
researched and developed areas according to the findings in this review
report, which requires further research and development to enhance
competitiveness in industrial organizations.

RESEARCH GAPS; FINDINGS AND CONTRIBUTIONS FOR FUTURE
RESEARCH
Analysis and findings, from the above data in Tables IV and V as well as
the trend of data analysis in Fig. 2. and its subsequent percentage data
analysis; the survey finds were that, not enough research has been
conducted in the areas of CE uses/ values as well as CE extension/trends
and perspective, hence their percentage scope of research was well below
average. Therefore, this review report has identified that there are research
gaps in these very essential areas which need to be addressed for the
common good and achievement industrial competitiveness as these areas
forms part of the key drivers CE maturity in this modern era. Thus, this
review report seeks to propose further research into these CE areas with
more interest and focus on the area of CE extension/trends and perspective
as CE is entering its maturity era in this age or ICT industrial
manufacturing efficiency and competitiveness. Collaboration of CE with
suitable system application processes in this review report, service-oriented
architecture (SOA) seems to be a most suitable system application platform
for the integration and collaboration of engineering product design and
development, which needs to be further researched to prove its suitability.

CONCLUSION
CE approach as an industrial manufacturing organization‟s
competitive methodology or „best practice‟ way of working, in a way, CE
seems to be maturing from its original or orthodox methodology into some
kind of extension, that is, by collaboration with some engineering ICT
technologies for a better efficient and effective industrial competitiveness.
This review report in its CE journal article survey has help to identify some
suitable collaborative engineering ICT technology platforms such as SOA
to enhance the collaborative effectiveness and efficiencies. This report in its
findings also identified that, not much research has been conducted in the
area of CE literature review as well as CE uses/values and CE
extension/trends and perspectives; in that, over a decade (2000-2010) as
reviewed and surveyed by this report its only just over 80 CE journal
articles has been researched in the field of CE. Thus, on this note, it might
be a time for industrial manufacturing organizations and scholars or the
academia to reflect on their experiences and begin publishing for common
good and also for industrial competitive advantage.

REFERENCE
1. Ainscough, M.,Neailey,K.,Tennant,C.,(2003), „A self-assessment tool
for implementing concurrent engineering through change
management‟. International Journal of Project Management. Vol. 21,
pp. 425–431.
2. Ainscough, M., and Yazdani, B., (2000). „Concurrent engineering
within British industry. Concurrent Engineering: Research and
Applications‟. Vol. 8, No. 1, pp. 2–11.
3. Al-Ashaab, A., and Molina, A., (2000), „Concurrent Engineering
Framework: A Mexican Perspective‟. Concurrent Engineering
Research Group. International Conference of Concurrent
Engineering (CE 99), Bath-England.
4. Andrade, L., and Forcellini, F., (2007), „Interface design of a
potential agent for concurrent engineering environment‟. Springer.
5. Aderson, D., M., (2008), “Design For Manufacturing & Concurrent
Engineering”. CIM Press, Cambria, California 93428-0100. USA
6. Anumba, C., J., et al., (2000), „Integrating Concurrent Engineering
Concepts in a Steelwork Construction Project‟. Technomic
Publishing Co., Inc. Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 119-212.
7. Baker, T., (2005), „Attribution standardization for Integrated
Concurrent Engineering‟. MSc.Thesis, Department of Mechanical
Engineering Brigham Young University.
8. Balakrishnan, A., and Thomson, V., (2000), „Concurrent Engineering
Models‟. Proceedings of the 7th ISPE International Conference on

Concurrent Engineering: Research and Applications, Lyon, France,
July, p152-156.
9. Balbontin, A., et al., (2000). „New product development practices in
American and British firms. Technovation. Vol. 20, pp. 257–274.

Concurrent engineering

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