Social Computing: A Future Approach of Product Lifecycle Management

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1 Social Computing: A Future Approach of Product Lifecycle anagement Andrea Denger (Virtual Vehicle, Graz, Austria andrea.denger@v2c2.at) ichael aletz (Virtual Vehicle, Graz, Austria michael.maletz@v2c2.at) Denis Helic (Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria dhelic@tugraz.at) Abstract: ndustrial challenges in the automotive industry are more and more focused around the optimization of the development process which requires new integrated instruments of communication and collaboration. To face challenges of business communication and collaboration, the industrial multi-firm research project FuturePL applies a series of methodologies in industrial and scientific environments. First, relevant topics were elaborated within an expert panel followed by qualitative interviews to gather the industrial as-is situation of product development. Afterwards, scenario planning was applied to create possible pictures of product development in the future. The key is seen in the analysis of the gap between the asis situation and possible future scenarios. Some of these gaps include aspects such as the proposition to integrate Web 2.0 technologies in the daily business environment of product development (social networking, micro blogging, etc.), as well as the analysis of other upcoming topics with high relevance (e.g. complexity management, representation of data or implementation strategies). However, the major focus is the consideration of human behaviors. The goal is the identification of opportunities and threats, as well as the development of concepts and solution approaches to establish a sustainable strategy for future-oriented product development and Product Lifecycle anagement (PL). Keywords: Product Lifecycle anagement (PL), Social PL, Product Development Process, Scenario Planning, Corporate Social Computing, Knowledge anagement, Representing of Data and nformation Categories: H.4 1 ntroduction Future success in the automotive industry depends on the ability to reduce time to market and development costs. Current product development, where requirements and variety of products increase to satisfy more and more customers, requires sustainable methods for information and knowledge management. T support in the area of virtual product development is state of practice. Especially Product Data anagement (PD) represents a major backbone hereby. PD is a system used in product development to store and retrieve design data with the goal to ensure information consistency throughout the engineering design of a

2 product. The product life cycle describes the process from the idea of a product, through concept, design and manufacture, to service and disposal [Eigner, 09]. Product Lifecycle anagement (PL) in the scope of this paper is seen as a strategic approach for the management of the intellectual property of a product along its entire lifecycle. This concept includes methods, processes and organizational structures, as well as T systems. From today s point of view the role of the human/user in terms of dependencies between human, environment and tools is not considered sufficiently [Schleidt, 09]. Challenges in future product development include the effective management of the entire lifecycle of a product and the collaboration between different disciplines and cultures in globally distributed development locations. Especially the availability of integrated PL properties and services is a prerequisite for successful integration approaches [aletz, 08]. 2 The research project Future PL The multifirm research project FuturePL aims at overcoming above mentioned challenges. One of the research questions of the project is: What preconditions have to be created, and what competences and values are relevant for the involved people in order to use PL successful and efficient? Another aspect is to outline domain and company interdependencies that offer potential to improve cooperation and collaboration. n this paper we describe how the project handles the role of humans and potentials to integrate innovative Web 2.0 technologies the field of PL. The analysis of the strong correlation between PL functions, processes and methods to e.g. handle complexity and improve acceptance & understanding is important for PL implementations. The developed solution approaches are verified within future scenarios under the consideration of the industrial as-is situation and state of the art technologies [Schmeja, 10/2]. Summarizing, the goal of the project FuturePL is the development and verification of needed PL methodology s and a generic PL implementation strategy. 3 FuturePL project methodology To face the challenges of future-oriented PL several methodologies have been applied in industrial and scientific environments. First, an expert panel defined a scope with topics of most interest and industrial environments. As a next step, the industrial as-is situation of product development has been elaborated with a series of qualitative and quantitative interviews to capture the needs of individuals in all development phases. After that different possible future scenarios of product development have been generated. These scenarios outline how product development may change until the year Expert Panel: Future PL - Specific Needs of People and Organization n the course of the expert panel at [GSVF, 09] a series of topics in the field of product development in general and specifically PL has been generated and

3 discussed. Based on that, literature research and experience from other projects has been included in the development of a topic landscape. Figure 1 shows an overview of defined topics. t is seen that the human factor builds the center for all topics taken into consideration. Figure 1: Topics in the field of Future PL Among technical topics such as Web 2.0 technologies, representation of data and information, or handling of complexity, social and cultural topics are also taken into consideration. n particular, there is a strong agreement among project participants that PL needs to incorporate social computing. 3.2 ndustrial As-is Situation The industrial as-is situation has been elaborated with a series of quantitative and qualitative interviews [Schmeja, 10]. ndustrial partners in the research project come from the field of automotive tier 1, general supplier, and consulting of PL. nterviewees came from the field of engineering, sales and T. The goal of the interviews was to take the needs of individuals along the product lifecycle into consideration. Within the interviews the focus was laid on the different phases of the product development process (i.e. strategy finding, concept and serial development, production planning and after sales). n earlier phases, such as strategy or concept development, individuals need to participate in people-centric creative process of product design to determine product development targets. The success in this phase can be measured by the maturity of the developed concept, especially a clear risk analysis. The success is based upon experts networking in a multi-domain team. Following phases such as serial development, production planning, and after sales require a rigid and forced approach to verify the results of earlier product developing phases [Schäppi, 05]. A detailed analysis of all results and factors [Schmeja, 10/1] taken into consideration leads to the quintessence that there is a desire for a simple use of PL supporting systems. Further on a new people-oriented strategy in process and organizational planning is required. There is a need to elaborate, under which conditions e.g. a simultaneous engineering team works most efficient and how it can be supported by a refined sustainable PL process. Strategies for a more relaxed procurement of information in order to maximize the project result are required.

4 Research question 3.3 Scenario Planning Scenario planning is a strategic planning method used to make flexible long-term plans. t is a method for learning about the future by understanding the environment and impact of the most uncertain and important driving forces affecting the system in focus. The method is based on creating a series of 'different future scenarios' generated from a combination of known factors [Steinmüller, 03]. The scenario planning process starts by defining the scope of the scenario exercise. n this case it stands for the expanding information and process management in the field of heterogenic development environment that outline how product development may change by the year The goal is to create different views of the world by extrapolating these influencing driving factors (i.e. drivers and indicators). The ambition hereby was not to predict the future, but to show possible pictures that allow the project partners to prepare themselves for the future. Figure 2 outlines the method of scenario planning in the project FuturePL [Schmeja, 10/1]. Relevant megatrends Drivers & indicators incl. their dependency Developing the scenario script D D D S 1 S 2 S 3 Validation with a stakeholder analysis Figure 2: From megatrends to scenario scripts. [Schmeja, 10/1] summarizes the results of the scenario planning method. n short the first scenario informs about extreme globalization and why companies reach an enormous level of complexity ("globalization extreme"). The second scenario gives an account of the opposite of globalization "disconnecting". A third scenario focuses around data and information representation in highly cross-linked companies ("ride the information wave"). n the fourth scenario people are seen as the most important factor within product development ("people take center stages"). Summarized, it can be said that two scenarios inform about the possible tendency of employment of modern technologies in business communication and collaboration. n particular the third scenario deals with data and information exchange in strongly interconnected and dependent companies. Furthermore it deals with stronger product individualization and influence of customers into the development process. The fourth Scenario deals with modern working conditions in the field of product development and that the mutual trust within companies increases acceptance and understanding of PL. This is due to the deployment of new technologies (i.e. social networking, micro blogging), processes and organization forms in business environments.

5 4 Result of the Analysis of the Gap of the As-is Situation and Possible Future-oriented Scenarios of Product Development t is not essential to forecast the future, it is important to prepare for the future. (Perikles ca. 450 BC) Next to the results of the as-is situation and possible future scenarios, this paper describes a synthesis methodology how to prepare for the future by taking several aspects into consideration. For example continuing globalization and globally networked companies require new technologies and the necessity of enhanced but yet simple information and knowledge management concepts centered on real needs of people. An important step in this approach is to derive assumptions in order to be able to define, develop and verify potential responses to fill the gap between today s challenges and tomorrow s environment. On one side there are assumptions based on as-is situation and on the other side there are assumptions based on possible futureoriented scenarios [Schmeja, 10/01]. For the scope of this paper the assumptions for modern product development were subsumed to the following aspects: The engagement in human behavior will improve working conditions. New technologies (such as Web 2.0) and flexible organization forms will improve communication and collaboration. These illustrated assumptions indicate a proposition to integrate Web 2.0 technologies in the daily business environment of product development. Examples are social networking, micro blogging or Wikis in order to support the handling of upcoming topics with high relevance (e.g. complexity management, representation of data or implementation strategies). Basic elements of Web 2.0 technologies are services, content and community [Gissing, 07], the core of identified topics in the project FuturePL. Furthermore Web 2.0 facilitates interactive information sharing, user-centered design and the ability to co-operate [Hoegg, 06]. Although social computing will get a higher priority in the future business environment [Blumauer, 09] it is understood that proposed solution approaches will not solve all PL-relevant issues. However, the authors represent the opinion that mentioned aspects will be of enormous benefit to raise acceptance and manageability of PL supporting systems. Derived consequences are findings of environmental challenges and the identification of opportunities and threats to establish a necessary strategy for future-oriented product development. 5 Summary and Outlook The desire for a simple use of PL supporting systems in the future, as well as people-oriented implementation strategies from process and organizational perspectives were discussed in this paper. These was done by evaluating the industrial as-is situation of product development, evolve possible and consistent pictures of the future, and describe a methodology of how to close the gap between today s challenges and tomorrow s disputes. From the technology trend perspective a proposed solution approach could be the integration of Web 2.0 technologies and social computing in the daily business environment of product development.

6 Next steps include the development of concepts and solution approaches to close the gaps as discussed. Closing one gap may be done by an approach for better communication and collaboration supported by social computing techniques. The approach will be verified in form of use cases with industrial project partners. Acknowledgements The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support of the "COET K2 - Competence Centres for Excellent Technologies Programme" of the Austrian Federal inistry for Transport, nnovation and Technology (BVT), the Austrian Federal inistry of Economy, Family and Youth (BWFJ), the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG), the Province of Styria and the Styrian Business Promotion Agency (SFG). We would furthermore like to express our thanks to our supporting industrial and scientific project partners, namely AVL List GmbH, AGNA STEYR Fahrzeugtechnik Gmbh & Co KG, CSC Computer Science Consulting Austria GmbH, CSC Deutschland Solution GmbH, Vienna University of Technology, University of Kaiserslautern, and to the Graz University of Technology. References [Eigner, 09] Eigner,., Stelzer, R.: Product Lifecycle anagement: Ein Leitfaden für Product Development und Life Cycle anagement, Springer Verlag, [Schleidt, 09] Schleidt, B.: Kompetenzen für ngenieure in der unternehmensübergreifenden Virtuellen Produktentwicklung. PhD Thesis, Department of Virtual Product Development, University of Kaiserslautern, [aletz, 08] aletz,.: ntegrated Requirements odeling A Contribution towards the ntegration of Requirements into a holistic Product Lifecycle anagement Strategy. PhD Thesis, Department of Virtual Product Development, University of Kaiserslautern, [Schmeja, 10/1] Schmeja,.: Quo Vadis PL? Anforderungen an ein zukünftiges, erfolgreiches Product Lifecycle anagement, ProSTEP ivip Symposium, Berlin, [Schmeja, 10/2] Schmeja,.: FuturePL: Blick in die Zukunft, virtual vehicle magazine, No. 6, -2010, Kompetenzzentrum Das virtuelle Fahrzeug, Graz, page [GSVF, 09] Workshop: Future PL - New Demands on Collaboration and nformation Exchange, 2. Grazer Symposium Virtuelles Fahrzeug, Graz, [Schäppi, 05] Schäppi, B., et al.: Handbuch Produktentwicklung. HANSER Verlag, [Steinmüller, 03] Steinmüller, K., Schulz-ontag, K, B.: Szenarien nstrumente für nnovation und Strategiebildung, Z_punkt GmbH, Essen [Gissing, 07] Gissing, B., Tochtermann, K.: Corporate Web Web 2.0 und Unternehmen: Wie passt das zusammen? Shaker Verlag, [Hoegg, 06] Hoegg, R., et al.: Overview of business models for Web 2.0 communities, Proceedings of GeNee 2006, page 23-37, Dresden, [Blumauer, 09] Blumauer, A., Pellegrini, T.: Social Sematic Web, Web 2.0 Was nun?, Springer Verlag, 2009