Koren Y. The Global Manufacturing Revolution: Product-Process-Business Integration and Reconfigurable Systems
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3.3.3 Vehicle Personalization at Ford Motor Company
In 1999, Ford Motor Company began “Vehicle Personalization” on their products.
Ford’s Mass Customization Department runs the vehicle personalization program.
This indicates some confusion in industry between the two terms. By our definition,
Ford’s personalized vehicles are actually mass-customized vehicles that are more
differentiated than other Ford vehicles. Vehicles involved in Ford’s 2002 vehicle
personalization program included the Mondeo, Focus, and Mustang. Ford utilized
their assembly plants or “modification centers” next to the plants to install “packages”
of unique trim and accessor ies. Examples of personalization features on these Ford
vehicles were unique interior and exterior color as well as trim, body styling, in-car
entertainment systems, and special paint. In 2002, Ford’s personalized vehicle order-
to-delivery time was between 3 and 6 months!
At that time, Ford also offered “per sonalization by dealer installation,” which
included: luggage racks, rear window, spoilers, remote start, fog lamps, projector
beam headlamps, rocker panel molding, front and rear bumper balance, hitch mount
bike rack, hands-free cell phone, rear seat TV, and wheels and tires.
Below is an excerpt of a speech that was delivered by Ms. Christine Feuell,
Manager of Ford Vehicle Personalization, at the 40th annual Specialty Equipm ent
Market Association (SEMA) show in October 2006.
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“Ford’s Vehicle Personalization business is growing faster ... as customers
demand more choice. Truck owners are some of the biggest customizers. Seventy
percent of them personalize their vehicles within a year of purch ase, spending an
average of more than $1500. Last year, we introduced a mobile office concept for
Ford trucks. Based on the great reception it received, it is now on sale across the
country.
People are turned on by what looks cool and different, and if they can make their
vehicles look different even by just changing a headlamp or putting on a different
grille, then it’s a pretty cost-effective way to make their vehicle more theirs. And
that’s really what personalization is all about.”
3.3.4 Personalization of Vehicle Interior
We predict that, by 2020, customers will be offered the opportunity to design the
interior of their new cars in Europe and the United States in a way similar to that of
airplanes. Th is will be an alternative to buying conventional options packages. There
will be a set of modules (e.g., different car seats, storage, entertainment equipment,
microwaves, small refrigerators, cloth hangers, armchairs, etc.) that the customers
could select from and compose according to their preferences, subject to safety and
manufacturing constraints. As a result, the interior of cars of the exact same model will
look very different from one another.
PERSONALIZED PRODUCTS 81
The requirements of a parent, with two small children sitting in the back of the car,
driving in the city are different than those of salesperson going on long trips and who
would like a small fridge within reach. An elderly person, who usually sits in the back,
may prefer a more comfortable seat in place of a three-passenger bench. A short
person would like a different instrument panel arrangement (selected from a set of
given modules) from a tall one that can reach further. Some people may prefer to have
a car seat with a folding shelf, like in airplanes, so they can work with a laptop during
long trips while somebody else is driving.
The interior of the car will be an open space. The customers will look at a computer
monitor and design the interior of their car (see an example in Figure 3.4). The input
will be some physical dimensions, such as the length of the hand and the driver’s
effective reach. The computer will show the virtual interior space, and lead the
customer through a step-by-step selection of desired modules from a given database
(seats, computer monitors, cabinets, dog baskets, exercise equipment, etc.).
Similar to the software and open computer architecture that allows adding and
swapping components on PCs, car manufacturers will develop an open architecture
platform for auto interior (e.g., installing rails to which components can be safely
attached and defining the space between bolts where modules may be attached).
The open architecture platform will define the mechanical, electrical and infor-
mation interfaces for compatibility of modules. The car manufacturer will also
Figure 3.4 A design of car interior.
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CUSTOMIZED, PERSONALIZED AND RECONFIGURABLE PRODUCTS
create the module database and a set of allowed usage constraints. These constraints
are of three types: safety (such as unsafe seat position), design confl icts that may be
either functional (such as not enough electric power to support com bination of
devices), or geometry (such as not enough leg room), as well as manufacturing
constraints.
In addition to established auto suppliers, numerous new small companies will
invent and supply modules designed to be com patible with the open automobile
platform. Th e interior integration will be done by the original car manufacturer or by
licensed module installer.
Customers will be able to design the interior of their cars with the aid of a new
Interactive Design System (IDS), as depicted in Figure 3.5.
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The IDS will allow a
customer to design the interior of their automobile before purchasing it, such that it is
tailored exactly to the buyer’s personal preferences, yet conforms to predefined safety
and vehicular constraints.
The IDS will allow customers to select a car model and its displayed interior space.
The customers will generate their personalized car design by selecting components
from the database and placing them around the interior of the automobile in a
preferred location and arrangement. A fit to the buyer’s physical attributes is also
tested (physiology feedback).
The buyer will be able to view the results in both stationary and in simulated motion
environments (virtual reality). This design process is repeated until the buyer’s final
approval is achieved. The final design is then stored digitally and sent to the
manufacturer where it is used to assemble the vehicle.
Figure 3.5 A interactive design system to assist in interior module arrangement.
PERSONALIZED PRODUCTS 83
At first, the interiors of each person’s ideal vehicle may not look much different
from one to the next but as the culture changes and people become accustomed to the
idea, difference may vary in surprising ways. In either case, the customers will have
the perception they have designed their own vehicles. Perception counts, and will be
a driver for the sale of personalized products.
Society’s perception of automobiles will be revolutionized. The automobile’s
interior will be able to change to fit the customer’s evolving life style. For example
when the customer’s children grow up, they may swap modules to fit their new
transportation needs. Replacing a car seat with a small fridge for long trips in hot days
may become the norm instead of a fantasy. And trading of used cars will be partially
replaced by trading used modules on e-Bay.
We can vividly see how the car interior design will create whole new industries of
module producers, module installers, and module trading markets. Because the car
delivery time must be short (transshipment alone takes months by containership), the
final assembly will probably always be done in proximity to the sale location, no
matter what the prices of cars produced overseas. This will, therefore, create new
domestic jobs.
To summarize, trends in the interior design of the auto industry will be towards:
.
Products tailored exactly to customer needs and preferences
.
Open-ended products that can be reconfigurable by users
3.3.5 Personalized Shoes
Paradigm shifts are also taking place in industries that produce less complex products.
Take, for example, the shoe and footwear industry. Th e shoe industry has gone
through the same market history as other products: from a work-of-art manufacturing
model—all hand-made—to machine-aided and mass production in the 1960s.
Because shoe manufacturing still requires a high degree of handwork, particularly
in the final asse mbly, the mass production paradigm that existed in this industry until
the 1980s pushed a de-localization of shoe manufacturing to low-wage countries.
In order to protect their world market position, by the middle of the 1990s the
Italian shoe industry has developed production systems composed of innovative
machines with increased flexibility that could produce small lot sizes, but with limited
product variety that still did not attract wealthier customers.
By the late 1990s, the personalization paradigm started to take hold of the Italian
shoe industry. Developing the knowledge-embedded software that enabled to design
shoes for consumers’ individual needs became the center of the footwear sector’s
research activities. Highly flexible and reconfigurable machines and production
systems were also developed at this time.
*4
*
Personalized shoes are made according to the very specific shape of the customer’s feet. The customer’s
feet are first scanned digitally for measurements using a laser optical scanner. Based on the scans, 3-D
models of the customer’s feet are constructed, and utilized to produce the personalized shoes.
84 CUSTOMIZED, PERSONALIZED AND RECONFIGURABLE PRODUCTS
As a result, Senora DaVinci can go today to an experimental shoe factory at
Vigevano, Italy, to buy a pair of personal ized shoes. The weight of her foot is measured
while standing, as well as her foot dimensions. She selects the color, style, and
material from a variety of options. Within a couple of hours her personalized fitted
shoes are ready (Figure 3.6). This short turnaround time, from personalized order to
delivery, is a competitive advantage that will return portions of the shoe industry from
the Far East back to Italy.
A schematic layout of the personalized shoe factory in Vigevano is shown in
Figure 3.7. It shows the part flow and return paths of the production system. A square
box represents each machin e (three to five machines around each index table). The
curved line shows the shoe-making path through the factory. The shoes are delivered
to Senora DaVinci, and the shoe fixtures are returned to the warehouse through the
“return path.”
3.3.6 Mr. Johnson Needs This Fridge
How might refrigerators be ordered in the personalized production paradigm? We
made a small survey among married men, and 80% of them wanted to see swivel,
“Lazy-Susan” type shelves in their refrigerators, so they could reach the stuff behind
the milk. Why not design the inside architecture of refrigerators according to the
customer’s need?
Figure 3.6 Personalized shoes.
Figure 3.7 A schematic layout of a shoe factory.
PERSONALIZED PRODUCTS 85
Imagine the following scenario: The customer, Mr. Johnson, comes to the store to
buy a new fridge. He selects the refrigerator volume (cubic ft), and then looks at a
computer monitor to design the interior of his fridge. The computer shows him a
virtual reality image of the interior compartment of the model that he has just selected.
Within the given interior compartment, Mr. Johnson can specify: the spacing between
shelves and their width, the size and shape of the container bins on the door, the
location of the egg box, the number of drawers and shelves, and the Lazy-Susan
carousel diameter (Figure 3.8).
Now the computer displays a virtual image of his new fridge with the eggs in their
special chamber, some fruit, and a few beer bottles and a jug of milk on the Lazy-
Susan shelf. Mr. Johnson is able to “rotate” the Lazy Susan and find his beer behind the
milk (although he will not be able to drink the virtual beer). He can even change the
location of the door shelves and adapt them to his particular needs. A week later,
Mr. Johnson’s new personalized fridge is delivered to his home from a plant that began
working on his order as soon as he placed it.
3.3.7 Personalized Medicines
In fact, the personalized production model will extend beyond mere consumer
products to whole regimes of human behavior. For instance, a recent customization
Figure 3.8 Personalized refrigerator.
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CUSTOMIZED, PERSONALIZED AND RECONFIGURABLE PRODUCTS
trend is to produce customized pharmaceutical products. Researchers have discov-
ered therapeutic advantages in customizing med icinal formulas or food supplement
compositions so that they are tailored to each individual patient. An article by
Samantha Levine titled “Tailor-made Treatments” (U.S. News & World Report,
November 16, 2002) elaborates on the applied research that aimed at solving the
problems that women suffer at menopause.
Menopause, the article says, “has at least 32 million ways to experience it. That is
how many women in the United States are between the ages of 45 and 64—the years
when, for most women, menopause becomes keenly felt. In every one of these people,
the nagging issues associated with menopause vary.” A woman may suffer from a
severe hot flash or a mild flush. A woman’s night sweats may keep her awake. A
woman may forget her ATM password. And other women may develop heart disease.
Despite the wide spectrum of symptoms and risks, the traditional therapy has been to
reach for one prescription—Prempro, a standard, two-hormone pill. Today, the article
says, the medical community is changing its thinki ng. The main conclusion of the
article is:
One-size-fits-all therapy is not working for menopause-related problems.
Individualized care must be the new treatment trend.
Since early 2004, the FDA has begun to support the principles of personalized
medicine. The era of blockbuster drugs that can generate annual sales of $1 billion or
more are almost over. “Large pharmaceutical companies have little choice but to
change. Those that stick with blockbuster mode ls face a future of declining sales
and profits.”
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However, there is a major gap between knowing the optimal medical
composition in a personalized pill and the manufacturing of individual pills at
affordable price. A major challenge that the pharmaceutical industry is facing is
how to cost-effectively manufacture individual pills. As always, the product design
challenge and its cost-effective manufacturing challenge must be addressed
simultaneously.
PERSONALIZED PRODUCTS 87
3.4 PRODUCT MODULARITY
Product modularity is an enabler of customizable products that is the core of mass
customization and personalized production. Modularity arises from the division of
a product into modules or components. The utilization of standardized modules to
assemble different products allows a company to create product variety at lower cost.
The design of modular architecture follows principles that enable the low-cost
manufacturing of products.
3.4.1 Product Architecture
Any product design study should start with an analysis of the product architecture,
which is defined as follows:
The architecture of a product is the scheme by which the physical elements
interact to achieve the desired operations and performance.
The physical elements are the architectural building blocks of the product. The two
common types of product architectures are:
1. Integral Architecture: The product functions are all contained in a single
structure, or in a very small number of physical units, each implementing
multiple functions, with rigid connections among units, such that the bound-
aries between the units are not distinguishable . That means that each
physical unit, or element, performs a large number of functions. Integral
product architectures are cost-effective for very high volume products, where
the cost of the product can be reduced by economies of scale.
2. Modular Architecture: The product consists of interchangeable elements, or
modules, to create and/or alter product functions, where each module imple-
ments one or only a few functions. The interfaces between modules are well
defined and simple. Interfaces may be mechanical, hydraulic, electrical,
information, and control signals.
For example, if the engine and transmission of an automobile powertrain system
were implemented as a single phy sical unit (as is done in many motorcycles), then
the powertrain architecture would be an integral architecture.
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Another example of a
modular architecture is a computer, display, and keyboard that are sold as separate
components. An integral architecture exists in laptops, in which the keyboard, display,
and computer are integrated into a single unit.
Modular architectures are typically more complex and expensive than integrated
architectures, but they enable mass customization and personalized production as
well as product upgrade, and ease of reuse. The manufacturer of mas s-customized
products should invest in developing versatile modules and components to be utilized
88 CUSTOMIZED, PERSONALIZED AND RECONFIGURABLE PRODUCTS
in many products. The distinctive characteristic of a modular architecture is the
well-defined interactions and interfaces between the modules that enable the rapid
integration of the product. We call this characteristic Integrability.
3.4.2 Principles of Design-for-Modularity
The components from which modu lar products (that belong to the same product
family) are composed may be categorized as either differentiating components or base
components.
Base components: are those gener ic parts that provide function or structure
without differentiating or influencing the product’s uniqueness (special func-
tions, quality, etc.).
Differentiating components: are specifically designed for the product and
directly contribute to the product’s performance, features, safety, esthetic
appeal, or reliability.
A product platform: consist s of the base components common to the whole
product family.
A product variant: incorporates the product platform with a selected set of
differentiating components (also called instances).
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Three principles guide the Design-for-Modularity:
1. Similarity between physical and functional elements
The functionally of a product can be described as a collection of functional
elements linked together by exchange of signals, power, or mec hanism. In a
good modular architecture, the physical elements and the functions correspond,
and are often the mirror image of each other. An ideal modular design embodies
a one-to-one correspondence between each physical component and a func-
tional element.
2. Minimization of the interactions between physical modules
To the highest degree possible, the functional elements of modules should
remain inside the module. The designer should minimize the functional
interactions between physical modules and limit them to only those interactions
that are critical to the function of the whole product. Applying this principle
reduces the number of interfaces and facilitates the product as a whole. The
reduction in interfaces should apply to all three types of interfaces: mechanical,
power, and communications.
3. Maximize the number of base components shared across the product family
Maximizing the number of base components that are shared across the product
family reduces the production cost. However, an abundance of standar d
components can make differentiating between variants difficult, even if they
are meant to appeal to different groups of consumers. In other words, the
designer should pay attention to avoid excessive product similarity (with too
PRODUCT MODULARITY 89
many base components). It is therefore advisable that the differentiating
components be those most visible to the consumer.
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3.4.3 Design of a Product Family with Modular Architecture
To reduce the overall cost (R&D, engineering, and manufacturing), each manufac-
turer has to strike the balance between maximizing component commonality while
maintaining the right level of differentiation between product variants. The design of
a product family requires (1) the determination of the product’s platfo rm, i.e., the
base components of the product family, (2) the formulation of product variants that
consist of base modules and differentiating modules, and (3) the economic selection
of product variants that will be produced. We elaborate below on these three
requirements.
1. Product platform design involves a balance between a high degree of com po-
nent commonality and a sufficient performance differentiation among the
product variants of the product family. An iterative procedure in which base
modules are defined and the performance of individual product variants are
measured against the targets for each market segment may be used to determine
the optimal product platform. The product commonality index (PCI)
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measures
the degree of component commonality in the product family.
PCI ¼ 1
umax p
j
X
v
n
j¼1
p
j
max p
j
ð3:1Þ
where u is the number of unique parts, p
j
is the number of parts in product
variant j, and v
n
is the final number of product variants offered.
2. Product variants are derived from the product’s platform and at least one
alternative (called an instance) of each differentiating component. Figure 3.9
shows the product family architecture of an office chair and two product
variants that can be achieved from this architecture. As shown in the product
family architecture, the differentiating components are the arms, wheels, and
lumbar support. The remaining components constitute the office chair’s product
platform. Each differentiating component shown has two alternatives, to
include or not include the differentiating component. One possible product
variant of the office chair would have arms and wheels but no lumbar, while the
other product variant has a lumbar but no arms or wheels. In general, if a product
architecture has n differentiating modules and each differentiating module
has d
i
alternatives (instances), the total number of possible product variants (v
n
)
is compute d by:
v
n
¼
Y
n
i¼1
d
i
ð3:2Þ
90 CUSTOMIZED, PERSONALIZED AND RECONFIGURABLE PRODUCTS