Organisation and Communication Problems in Automotive Requirements Engineering

Project success in the automotive industry is highly influenced by Requirements Engineering (RE), for which communication and organisation structure play a major role, much due to the scale and distribution of these projects. However, empirical research is scarce on these aspects of automotive RE and warrants closer examination. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to identify problems or challenges in automotive RE with respect to communication and organisation structure. Using a multiple-case study approach, we collected data via 14 semi-structured interviews at one car manufacturer and one supplier. We tested our findings from the case study with a questionnaire distributed to practitioners in the automotive industry. Our results indicate that it is difficult but increasingly important to establish communication channels outside the fixed organisation structure and that responsibilities are often unclear. Product knowledge during early requirements elicitation and context knowledge later on is lacking. Furthermore, abstraction gaps between requirements on different abstraction levels leads to inconsistencies. For academia, we formulate a concrete agenda for future research. Practitioners can use the findings to broaden their understanding of how the problems manifest and to improve their organisations

Model-Based Requirements Engineering in the Automotive Industry: Challenges and Opportunities

Context:The automotive industry is faced with rapid increases in size and complexity of their software engineering efforts, which makes successful Requirements Engineering essential. Model-Based Engineering has been suggested as a method to handle increasing complexity on a higher level of abstraction. Using models already during Requirements Engineering could offer several benefits, as changes are quick and cheap to implement. However, due to the high level of uncertainty and abstraction from implementation, it is unclear whether models can be used in the same way during Requirements Engineering as during later project stages.Objective:The overall aim of this PhD project is to simplify the introduction of Model-Based Requirements Engineering in an automotive environment, based on objective guidelines. These guidelines should enable engineers and decision makers to decide on important factors such as the point of time or appropriate abstraction levels for requirement models. As a first step in this direction, the contribution of this thesis is an overview of the current industrial practice of Model-Based Engineering and Requirements Engineering in the automotive industry and initial results on how automotive requirements models can be created and exploited for testing purposes.Method:Results of this thesis are obtained using the three empirical strategies case study, controlled experiment and survey. Additionally, improvements are suggested using one study following the engineering paradigm, proposing and evaluating improvements to existing solutions.Results and Conclusions:The thesis outlines the general feasibility of models during automotive Requirements Engineering. Findings are that Model-Based Engineering is widespread in the automotive domain and used for Requirements Engineering by some practitioners. However, several problems exist in the Requirements Engineering practices of automotive companies. As a part of these, we report problems with respect to communication and organisation structure. We show that behaviour requirements from an emission standard draft can be formalised as models and used as test oracles. Furthermore, we compare two notations for formalising behaviour of an automotive requirements specification. The results indicate that languages can be chosen based on other factors than the notation, such as tool support or experience.Future Work:There are several directions for future work. For example, high-level requirements can be re-used as test oracles on different abstraction and testing levels. Additionally, communication in Requirements Engineering could be improved by using existing model-based requirements specifications and ownership relations between requirements and stakeholders

The reality of design process planning

Most companies struggle with the efficiency of their processes. One contributory factor is the lack of efficient process planning. This paper describes current planning practise in industry, which uses a multitude of different plans in parallel. The units of planning and their resulting plans roughly fall into product plans considering cost, bill of material and procurement considerations; process plans including different milestone, task and activity plans and quality plans. This paper maps out the ownership of these plans, and establishes that organisations work because individuals use more then one plan and have a tacit understanding of the relationships between these plans. The lack of effective plans affects the company through a lack of understanding of process connectivity and in consequence bad communication

Networking Innovation in the European Car Industry : Does the Open Innovation Model Fit?

The automobile industry is has entered an innovation race. Uncertain technological trends, long development cycles, highly capital intensive product development, saturated markets, and environmental and safety regulations have subjected the sector to major transformations. The technological and organizational innovations related to these transformations necessitate research that can enhance our understanding of the characteristics of the new systems and extrapolate the implications for companies as well as for the wider economy. Is the industry ready to change and accelerate the pace of its innovation and adaptability? Have the traditional supply chains transformed into supply networks and regional automobile ecosystems? The study investigates the applicability of the Open Innovation concept to a mature capital-intensive asset-based industry, which is preparing for a radical technological discontinuity - the European automobile industry - through interviewing purposely selected knowledgeable respondents across seven European countries. The findings contribute to the understanding of the OI concept by identifying key obstacles to the wider adoption of the OI model, and signalling the importance of intermediaries and large incumbents for driving network development and OI practices as well as the need of new competencies to be developed by all players.Peer reviewe

Factors influencing employee perceptions in lean transformations

The purpose of the study was to investigate employee perceptions during a lean transformation1. The combination of case study and survey methodologies was used to define elements influencing the perceived lean success of shop floor employees. According to our findings, belief, commitment, work method and communication all have a considerable direct impact on workers’ perceptions of lean success. However, their effects are very different based on the scope and focus of changes that is influenced by process characteristics. Perceptions regarding successful lean transformation during a moderate reorganisation of the company’s welding plant, where mainly males work, are affected only by commitment and work method, whereas the deep reorganisation of the sewing plant (populated by female employees) is only influenced by belief and communication