Product Platform Development: Considering Product Maturity and Morphology

In this paper we continue our development of a structured methodology for product platform development suited to the early design stages. In addition to the previous focus on differences between new and mature products, we now consider how platform development is influenced by the morphology of a product. Purely physical products (e.g., a vacuum cleaner) often pose fewer challenges when undergoing platform design. However, products such as software, service offerings, or process-oriented solutions require adapting previous platform methods in order to accommodate the “amorphous” nature of the system. This paper includes a review of the recent literature in this area, and presents the authors latest platform methodology from the perspective of product morphology and maturity. Illustrative examples are used throughout.Copyright © 2005 by ASME