Thyssen, Jesper

Modular Product Families and Assembly Systems – a Case of Utilizing Product Modularity - A PhD thesis

This research centres on assembly systems designed for utilizing product modularization. Altogether, the task for companies has become an issue of managing the overall trade-off between the external market’s desire for variety and the internal efficiency and effectiveness. Product modularization is often claimed to be the answer to this trade-off in the extant literature. The overall research purpose has been to investigate the phenomena of product modularization as an apparently both powerful and com-plex means. The focal research objective is to obtain an improved insight and understanding of the rela-tionship between variables associated with configuration of modular product families and the interacting assembly system. One core result is the development of a system model based on the longitudinal case study incorporating both structural and performance elements. Based on the system model a number of theoretical and managerial implications are identified. From a management point of view, the most im-portant finding is that modularization needs to be configured for the two competitive situations, i.e. 1) the volume flexible configuration focusing on generational product variety and 2) the mix flexible con-figuration focusing on the simultaneous product variety. These two views are in particular different in respect to the understanding of product modularization. All in all, modularization needs to be, and can be, configured in regard to the specific task, which is believed constituting one important contribution to the understanding and utilization of product modularization

Modular Product Families and Assembly Systems – a Case of Utilizing Product Modularity - A PhD thesis

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