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Challenges with Supplier Involvement in Product Development: A Supplier’s Perspective

Part of: Innovation Engineering

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 July 2019

Filip Flankegård ,
Glenn Johansson  and
Anna Granlund
Filip Flankegård*
Affiliation:
School of Innovation, Design and Engineering, Mälardalen University, Sweden;
Glenn Johansson
Affiliation:
School of Innovation, Design and Engineering, Mälardalen University, Sweden; School of Engineering, Jönköping University, Sweden
Anna Granlund
Affiliation:
School of Innovation, Design and Engineering, Mälardalen University, Sweden;
*
Contact: Flankegård, Filip Thomas, Mälardalen University, Division of Product Realisation, Sweden, filip.flankegard@mdh.se

Abstract

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Studies of supplier involvement in product development have revealed potential benefits including faster time to market, reduced cost and increased quality. However, existing literature has mainly focused on the customer's perspective on advantages, disadvantages and factors to be considered when involving suppliers in product development. This paper addresses the supplier's perspective by answering following research question: How do challenges that originate from involvement in customer's product development affect a supplier? The question is answered through a single case study at a supplier that develops and manufacture products primary used in capital goods. Thirteen challenges are identified, classified as being internal or external, and categorised into five areas: (A) Customer requirements, (B) Information exchange between customer and supplier, (C) Product variety management, (D) Design- manufacturing integration and (E) Processes and work instructions. The findings suggest that internal challenges need as much attention as external ones that originate from the customer. Also, an indication of when the challenges affect the supplier during product development is presented.

Keywords

Supplier integrationCase studyNew product developmentIntegrated product development
Type
Article
Information
Proceedings of the Design Society: International Conference on Engineering Design , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , July 2019 , pp. 2179 - 2188
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2019

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