Product Architecture Definition and Analysis Using Matrix-Based Multiple-Domain Approaches

Design Synthesis is most commonly supported by creativity methods based on functional product representations. As the design of a new product is in most cases following a predecessor, designers do not start from scratch. The mentioned circumstances enable the support of design synthesis by application of design rules or grammars. The use of rules by automated algorithms allows for the systematical derivation of variations of a product. Algorithms are meant to enable innovative solutions by recommending a great variety of variants to give the designers new impulses for product design. As a downside, the rules for the algorithms have to be described in advance, and thus are inheriting known components and functional structures. The identification of potentials and constraints for improvement of a product’s architecture requires detailed analysis. New solutions are often depending on novelties on different levels of abstraction (for example system, subsystem or component level). Algorithmic procedures usually are not able to allow for this comprehensive task. Thus, automatized mechanisms can only deliver limited innovative solutions. Common methods for the definition of innovative solutions, such as functional modeling methods, the TRIZ methodology, or the Morphological Matrix require accompanying analysis and the fixation onto one level of detail as well. To solve this dilemma, we propose an approach combining powerful analysis methods, required for the identification of potentials and constraints within product architectures on the one hand and the systematic definition of new solutions by systematic and partially automatized methods on the other hand. Exhaustive literature research has pointed out several methods, whose application can benefit a comprehensive approach. Amongst them is the definition of functional models, design synthesis by automatized system definition as well as the analysis of product architectures by the use of Design Structure Matrix and Multiple-Domain Matrix Approaches. The proposed approach should allow for the support of radical innovations by considering the overall product structure. Goal of the approach is the consideration of different levels of detail and the analysis of a comprehensive solution space compared to the definition of discrete solutions delivered by common methods. As a result, the approach is applied to different products on different levels of detail and the publication points out the potential and outcome: the systematic definition of a comprehensive solution space, new solutions as a result of comparison and evaluation of the solution space, the widening of the solution space, and a comprehensive evaluation of results.