Supporting management and analysis of quotations in a design automation approach to customization

Abstract

A business strategy based on customized products with a high level of variety requires systems for efficient generation of product variants. An area identified in near collaboration with five industrial partners that has not been subject for extensive research is how to support management of different application domains, projects, task knowledge and design information together with the possibility to perform detailed analyses on the data generated by a design automation system implementation. Initially, a number of success criteria were identified and the functionality of a database was perceived as a promising approach. Explorative work was conducted for the purpose to reveal the conceptual model and the principles that a system would reside upon. The work has resulted in an approach, consisting of an information model and underlying principles, presented in this paper to be used when developing a design automation system for quotation preparation. The functionality and usefulness has been demonstrated and validated by a system implementation developed in collaboration with an industry partner. It can be concluded that a system founded on the presented approach supports management and analysis of quotations and product variants. © 2010 Springer-Verlag London Limited.