Knowledge Management Environment for Collaborative Design in Product Development

Abstract

Knowledge management environments are being developed for product development activities to help companies reuse their knowledge. This trend has been identified in manufacturing companies, which operate product design departments at various locations. Investigating how these companies can configure their knowledge management environments to fulfil engineers’ knowledge needs in design activities opens up a research topic for us. A well configured knowledge management environment (KME) will require a clear understanding of what key features the KME shall have. The research focuses on the structures and operations of knowledge sharing for product development. A case study of four manufacturing companies was conducted to understand their KMEs. The study contributes to theory by providing an understanding of the structure of KMEs in companies. Researchers in the domain of knowledge management can develop a good understanding of how engineers interact with KMEs so that researchers can propose knowledge management systems or methods that make tangible improvements. Chief engineers or managers in companies who are in charge of knowledge management can benefit from the understanding of their own KMEs.