Implementing sustainability in product portfolio development through digitalization and a game-based approach

The aim of this research is to explore if and how digitalization and a game-based approach can improve the usability and implementation of sustainable design methods and tools in a product development process. Based on semi-systematic literature review, advantages and limitations of digitalization and game-based approaches in this context were identified. A previously developed method that guides the implementation of a strategic sustainability perspective in product portfolio development, was then selected and elements of digitalization and game-based approaches were incorporated in its four building blocks: double-flow scenario modeling, sustainability assessment, market success assessment, and portfolio development. The resulting prototype of this method was further adapted after feedback gathered through expert interviews and then tested in workshops with industry and academia. It was found that digitalization was especially useful for the scenario simulation, data management, and automatic visualization of results, while the benefits of the game-based approach were enhanced motivation, collaboration, and co-design of results and solutions. At the same time, drawbacks were discovered, for example related to decreased transparency of how results are calculated, overuse of visualization and extrinsic rewards, leading to lack of clarity and trust in the results. In conclusion, there are synergies between digitalization and game-based approaches that can improve the usability of sustainable design methods and tools, but extensive testing is recommended to avoid pitfalls that can lead to opposite effects. Moreover, recommendations were identified for how to include digitalization and a game-based approach, for example, to enable integration with other tools, maintenance and constant update, to explore the benefits of team-based assessments and collaboration, to add diversity and customization, and to link the game to the user\u27s context, application, expectations and requirements

IMPLICATIONS OF EU INSTRUMENTS ON COMPANY CAPABILITIES TO DESIGN MORE SUSTAINABLE SOLUTIONS-PRODUCT ENVIRONMENTAL FOOTPRINT AND DIGITAL PRODUCT PASSPORT

In the EU, initiatives with concrete instruments for measuring and storing sustainability-related product data are now introduced in legislation. Based on literature review and semi-structured interviews, this study investigates two EU instruments, the Product Environmental Footprint method and Digital Product Passports, and their potential implications for company capabilities to design and select more sustainable solutions in a strategic way. The results show that these instruments can lead to increased transparency and traceability in the design and comparison of solutions, allowing for more effective collaboration across the value chain. By applying a strategic sustainability perspective, it was found that these EU instruments have major limitations as they lack a systems perspective, do not include a full socio-ecological sustainability perspective, and do not support strategic decision-making. This results in risks for suboptimization and the design of solutions that turn out to be costly dead-ends on the way towards a sustainable society. Research is therefore recommended to investigate how these instruments can facilitate a strategic development of sustainable solutions

Industry Trends to 2040

The engineering design community needs to development tools and methods now to support emerging technological and societal trends. While many forecasts exist for technological and societal changes, this paper reports on the findings of a workshop, which addressed trends in engineering design to 2040. The paper summarises the key findings from the six themes of the workshop: societal trends, ways of working, lifelong learning, technology, modelling and simulation and digitisation; and points to the challenge of understanding how these trends affect each othe

Digitalisation, sustainability and servitisation: Consequences on product development capabilities in manufacturing firms

This paper investigates the impact of the three mega-trends (1) digitalisation (2) sustainability and (3) servitisation on design and development capabilities in manufacturing companies. First, technological advancements have created both product opportunities, and new aids, captured in e.g. the Industry 4.0 paradigm, and intensively driving digitalisation of businesses, that, besides the technological challenges, cause new challenges and problem areas, such as information ownership and shared long-term responsibilities. Second, the need for sustainable solutions increases the focus on the design of circular, resource efficient and radically new technological solutions to be designed with a total life cycle perspective in mind, through use phase, repair and overhaul, until recycling and end-of-life. Third, and finally, the classical roles for suppliers, integrators and users are being changed as servitisation and Product-Service Systems (PSS) offerings affect both products and businesses, and ultimately entire value networks with new constellations of business partners contributing to the realization of solutions for customers.This paper builds on a conceptual literature review to identify relevant information about the three trends regarding their impact on design and societal development. In addition, a semi-structured interview study was conducted to investigate possibilities and challenges that four different types of manufacturing companies perceive today with respect to the mega-trends, and more specifically how these trends impact the design and development capabilities in the studied companies. Results from this empirical study show that digitalisation is viewed as an opportunity to find new solutions to meet customer needs and be competitive at the future market. Sustainable Product Development (SPD) was instead primarily to fulfil requirements and legislation. However, it was clear that some manufacturers start to see market forces as a driver. PSS can be seen as a means to create new solutions, often with digital tools as facilitator. Altogether, the literature study and the empirical data show that increasingly, designers are expected to design entire solutions, as opposed to merely artefacts. This implies that designers need to consider not only the product performance and cost, but products’ and solutions’ behaviour and impact over complete life cycles, developed and organized by business networks together with several suppliers and other partners with different capabilities. The basis for the designer is a technology mix comprising services, software, electronics and hardware, bundled into offerings in new business models, interlinked with new digital opportunities. Moreover, it is clear that the three trends do not represent stand-alone perspectives but affect one another in an intertwined way. To achieve long-term effects, the sustainability issues need to be integrated with many other subject areas, and implemented simultaneously as digital solutions, e.g. digital twins to physical artefacts are conceived, and value creating networks are being built up. Obviously, these three trends affect the need for change in product design capabilities and escalate the challenges of the integrated product development viewpoint, in a way that is difficult to master for individual engineers. Support for design and development work is needed that takes into account the mega-trends digitalisation, sustainability, and servitisation

Value assessment of sustainability hotspots in conceptual design : an aerospace study.

Nowadays, when designing structural aero-engine components, the engineering team does not only deal with aerodynamics and structural mechanics criteria. Rather, it needs to make more informed decisions based on the value and sustainability contribution of a design concept. This paper proposes a novel approach that combines qualitative sustainability assessment techniques, which are Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Strategic Sustainability Assessment (SSA), with Net Present Value (NPV) analysis to facilitate early stage decision-making in design. A case study, related to the development of a new high-temperature aero-engine component, illustrates how EIA and SSA identify sustainability hotspots for a new product technology, and how NPV is used to assess alternative solution strategies within the hotspot. Within the studied case, the milling process was identified as a sustainability hotspot, therefore two process options - Electro-Chemical Milling (ECM) and Mechanical Milling (MM) - where benchmarked by calculating their NPV in alternative future scenarios, featuring different market and regulatory assumptions. The approach and its constituting models have been preliminarily verified with designers and process owners in co-located industrial workshops

The need for new product development capabilities from digitalization, sustainability, and servitization trends

Apparent from the latest pandemic, the dynamics and rate of change in society accelerate on a global scale. Ongoing mega-trends in society, such as digitalization, sustainability, and servitization, fundamentally changes the conditions for manufacturers when developing and providing new products. This study clarifies the combined impact and consequences on product development capabilities in manufacturing firms of the three mega-trends: (i) digitalization, (ii) sustainability, and (iii) servitization. The research is based on a pre-study, complemented with a semi-structured interview study at small, medium-sized, and large Swedish-based manufacturing companies, and a systematic literature review. The research makes evident that the main challenge is to empower engineers and development teams to model, present, evaluate, and develop expected and smart digitalized solutions in a time-limited environment and prioritize the most resource efficient and sustainable solution. Therefore, four complementary support resources are suggested: (i) a knowledge management platform, (ii) a data management platform, (iii) a set of criteria and metrics measuring progression, and (iv) support methods and tools to define, model, and evaluate solutions. When integrated into a digital platform, developers can simultaneously access and process the necessary information needed for sustainable, digitalized, and servitized solutions. © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.open access</p

Model Based Decision Support for Value and Sustainability in Product Development

Decomposing and clarify “sustainability” implications in the same way as concrete targets on product functionality is challenging, mainly due to the problem of showing numbers and ‘hard facts’ related to the value generated by sustainability-oriented decisions. The answer lies in methods and tools that are able, already in a preliminary design stage, to highlight how sustainable design choice can create value for customers and stakeholders, generating market success in the long term. The paper objective is to propose a framework where Sustainable Product Development (SPD) and Value Driven Design (VDD) can be integrated to realize a model-driven approach to support early stage design decisions. Also, the paper discusses how methods and tools for Model-Based Decision Support (MBDS) (e.g., response surface methodology) can be used to increase the computational efficiency of sustainability- and value-based analysis of design concepts. The paper proposes a range of activities to guide a model-based evaluation of sustainability consequences in design, showing also that capabilities exist already today for combining research efforts into a multi disciplinary decision making environment.Model Driven Development and Decision Support (MD3S

Forming Digital Sustainable Product Development Support

Sustainability has shifted from strategically important to business critical for several manufacturing industries. This paper introduces an implementation framework to increase the capabilities in companies to design, develop and offer sustainable product- and production solutions in line with new regulatory strategies and plans. Based on a questionnaire survey, conducted in ten different product development companies representing different industrial sectors, the status and needs of sustainable product development were captured. Further on, a better understanding of the capabilities for a forthcoming digital sustainable product development support, were identified in an action research-based approach with three industrial companies. This paper presents the rational of a digital sustainable product development support, in relation to global sustainability goals and societal dimensions of sustainability transitions. The main results from the questionnaire presents the challenges and needs of capabilities for product developers and design engineers to develop more sustainable solutions in a resource efficient way. The action-based research with the three industrial manufacturing partners resulted in a set of common key activities and detailed requirements for a digital sustainable product development support. Finally, the paper describes a first prototype of a digital platform, i.e. Digital Sustainability Implementation Package-DSIP, and discusses future work. © Proceedings of NordDesign 2022: How Product and Manufacturing Design Enable Sustainable Companies and Societies.open access</p

A Decision Support Approach for Modeling Sustainability Consequences in an Aerospace Value Chain

Next generation jet engine technologies are typically driven by performance, value and environmental challenges, and appropriate technologies are developed in international research programs. One on-going engine component technology project at an aerospace component manufacturer aims to develop an engine with less fuel consumption. A likely consequence is higher pressure in the core engine, which leads to higher temperature. One way to handle the higher temperature is using a more advanced Ti-alloy for the product component, which will render a different sustainability profile. One weakness in current decision situations is the inability to clarify and understand the “value” and “sustainability” implications compared to e.g. performance features of concepts. Both “value” and “sustainability” include a rich set of features important for successful introduction of new products and product-service solutions to the market. The purpose with this research is to provide decision support for companies in early development phases for assessment of value and sustainability consequences over product-service system lifecycles. A workshop was held with the aerospace component manufacturer and a value chain partner focusing on material handling, to: i) get a better understanding of activities, flows and ownership related to the studied materials at the two companies, ii) to understand the companies’ perspective at new suggested scenarios with regard to these materials, and iii) define relevant scenarios to look into more in depth from asustainability and value perspective. Three different scenarios were developed with differences in ownership, responsibilities and value streams. It is therefore essential to be able to quickly assess and optimize consequences of such alternative scenarios. Based on the workshop experiences and scenarios, a modeling and simulation approach to assess sustainability and value consequences for the scenarios is proposed. The sustainability consequences are based on a sustainability life cycle assessment and a risk assessment. Key features of the proposed tool include: consideration of the time dimension, societal sustainability consequences, risk assessment, company value assessment, and cost/revenue perspectives

Decision Support Approach for Modeling Sustainability Consequences in an Aerospace Value Chain

Next generation jet engine technologies are typically driven by performance, value and environmental challenges, and appropriate technologies are developed in international research programs. One on-going engine component technology project at an aerospace component manufacturer aims to develop an engine with less fuel consumption. A likely consequence is higher pressure in the core engine, which leads to higher temperature. One way to handle the higher temperature is using a more advanced Ti-alloy for the product component, which will render a different sustainability profile. One weakness in current decision situations is the inability to clarify and understand the “value” and “sustainability” implications compared to e.g. performance features of concepts. Both “value” and “sustainability” include a rich set of features important for successful introduction of new products and product-service solutions to the market. The purpose with this research is to provide decision support for companies in early development phases for assessment of value and sustainability consequences over product-service system lifecycles. A workshop was held with the aerospace component manufacturer and a value chain partner focusing on material handling, to: i) get a better understanding of activities, flows and ownership related to the studied materials at the two companies, ii) to understand the companies’ perspective at new suggested scenarios with regard to these materials, and iii) define relevant scenarios to look into more in depth from asustainability and value perspective. Three different scenarios were developed with differences in ownership, responsibilities and value streams. It is therefore essential to be able to quickly assess and optimize consequences of such alternative scenarios. Based on the workshop experiences and scenarios, a modeling and simulation approach to assess sustainability and value consequences for the scenarios is proposed. The sustainability consequences are based on a sustainability life cycle assessment and a risk assessment. Key features of the proposed tool include: consideration of the time dimension, societal sustainability consequences, risk assessment, company value assessment, and cost/revenue perspectives