Design support methodology using quality function deployment with feature-based reasoning

Abstract

This paper reviews the benefits and short comings of Quality Function Deployment as a design support tool. It identifies the principal problem areas, considers briefly work which has already been done to address them, and then focusses on a proposed solution for one of these problem areas. It is suggested that a Feature-Based Reasoning approach would be a beneficial addition to the evaluation process to determine the relation between the WHATs and the HOWs, and that this would result in an improvement in the ease of use and robustness of this part of the QFD process.