Classifying product families using platform coverage and variation mechanisms

The notion of product families is becoming more and more popular, both in research and in industry. Every product family initiative that is started within a company has its own context, such as a particular business strategy and a particular application domain. Each product family has its own specific characteristics that have to fit in with its context. In this paper we will describe two dimensions for classifying product families. The first dimension deals with the coverage of the product family platform. Platform coverage deals with the proportion of the functionality provided by the platform, and the additional functionality needed to derive a specific product within the product family. The second dimension deals with the variation mechanisms that are used to derive a specific product from the generic platform. The coverage of the platform and the variation mechanisms used are not totally unrelated. We will discuss various types of platform coverage and variation mechanisms, including their characteristics. These two dimensions are based on experience gained with a number of product families. We will look at four of these in greater detail to illustrate our ideas. We believe that these dimensions will aid the classification of product families. This will both facilitate the selection of a new product family approach for a particular context, and support the evaluation of existing product families. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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