As a leading global supplier of quality assurance systems for the web-processing industries, the company not only strives for first-class product quality, but also for excellent development efficiency. Following a Smart Development Assessment, one of seven initiatives was launched to establish a missing, interdisciplinary, harmonised product development process. The aim was to develop a customisable process model that systematically maps both the classic product development and solution business, thereby improving the quality and transparency of project work in the long term.

Structure for better product development

Cross-functional process ensures quality and efficiency

The company is one of the world's leading full-service providers of quality assurance systems for the web-processing industries. The systems not only ensure consistently first-class results in roll-to-roll production, but also make a significant contribution to speeding up processes and sustainably increasing productivity.

The initiative was implemented as one of a total of 7 initiatives following a Smart Development Assessment. The company did not yet have a fully described interdisciplinary product development process. The quality of the project work was largely determined by the personal knowledge and experience of the project managers. An additional challenge was to map both the product development and solution business with a process model using a configuration option.

Procedure

  • Definition of phases and quality gates (vertical structure)
  • Defining the project team structure and roles
  • Definition of the sample stages for the product and the components
  • Defining the sub-processes (horizontal structure)
  • Integration of the V-model
  • Description of all synchronisation points with delivery results and responsibilities
  • Definition of process configurations for different project types (tailoring)
  • Deriving the gate checklists

The company benefits from the following advantages

  • Establishing early and consistent interdisciplinary collaboration
  • Clarity on all delivery results and responsibilities
  • VImproved requirements management involving purchasing, operations and service
  • More intensive planning and conceptual collaboration in the early phases of product development (frontloading)
  • Reduction of unnecessary corrective changes (right-first-time)
  • Low-friction production start-up
  • Achieving higher product creation quality