Leveraging knowledge representation, usage, and interpretation to help reengineer the product development life cycle: visual computing and the tacit dimensions of product development

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Abstract

The rapid proliferation of visual computing technologies, such as three-dimensional (3D) modeling, 3D simulation, and virtual reality (VR), is precipitating changes in the way that designers and engineers work. Visual 3D information processing is replacing traditional two-dimensional (2D), numeric and language-based information processing. Many firms are adopting these 3D technologies (3DT) to support product development, electronic commerce and decision-making, yet very little research can be found in the Information Systems (IS) literature about how firms are strategically utilizing this technology. Our research investigated how 3D technologies mediated the knowledge explication process in product development. In this paper, we discuss an exploratory study on the innovative use of 3DT in two companies. This research contributes to the IS field by providing a theoretical framework on how visual computing technologies can better capture, represent, interpret and share organizational knowledge within a product development context.

Introduction

The trend towards more sophisticated levels of consumer taste and intense product competition has compelled many firms to radically redesign their product development process. Clark and Fujimoto [1] underscored that competition is heavily focused on product development based on the emergence of international competition, demanding and sophisticated consumers, and diverse technological change affecting the product development process. To address the challenge of competitive markets, firms have relentlessly endeavored to compress product development time-to-market cycles in order to migrate consumer taste towards newer and more superior products.

Nonaka and Takeuchi [2] exemplified through several case studies that the key to success in new product development rests heavily in the organizational knowledge creation process. Their research findings suggest that providing the work environment and space for the creation, sharing, and integration of organizational knowledge, both at the tacit and explicit levels, can make a substantial difference in improving the product development process. They further argue that an important key to improving organizational knowledge creation rests in the ability of an organization to make tacit knowledge explicit. When knowledge is explicitly represented or instantiated, it is readily shared, communicated, and cultivated across different expert domains in the organization. The creation of a new product requires the combination and fusion of cross-functional knowledge culled from multi-disciplinary expert domains (i.e. engineering, marketing, design).

The sharing, articulation, or instantiation of certain types of knowledge between these expert domains is not an easy process and can cause delays, errors, and even failure in concurrent and collaborative efforts needed to develop a quality product. These problems can easily translate to additional production costs, profit loss, or erosion of market share for a company when unforeseen product design problem crops up at a later stage in product development or when marketed to consumers. In this respect, the research takes interest in the question—on whether certain emerging information technologies are enabling a more effective sharing/integration of knowledge that are critical in the product development process?

This research investigates how three-dimensional (3D) technologies (3DT), an emerging cluster of visualization technologies, can revolutionize the presentation and utilization of organizational knowledge. Its contribution to the Information Systems (IS) field is to provide a theoretical framework on how 3DT could improve the organizational knowledge creation process, which in turn, could help reengineer the product development process. Such studies are important because IS researchers have a vested interest in providing solid theoretical foundations for the management and use of information technologies in organizations [3]. Although computer-aided design (CAD) drafting tools have been traditionally used as a visual aid to product development and design, we contend that 3DT’s new visualization methodologies are paradigmatically different from traditional CAD drafting tools.

Section snippets

The knowledge process in product development

The product development cycle starts with a vision of a new product (Fig. 1). The vision can be an abstract statement of what the product is (its function/its utility) or it can be an artistic rendering of a product. The vision is a strategic intent to stay ahead of the competitive game. It is where designers draw inspiration to create new product knowledge. The ideation phase is where fragmented thoughts and seed ideas bloom in the mind of designers/engineers in their initial effort to

Features of 3D technologies

This section delineates the unique attributes of 3D technologies and how they can improve knowledge processes within collaborative product development initiatives that demand shorter development cycle time.

Methodology

In this research, we have used a multiple case study methodology [11], [12], [13]. Since little is known about the use of 3D technologies in organizations, a multiple case study method was considered the best strategy. It allowed us to examine a subject matter where there were no conceptual frameworks or theories to support empirical research on the impact and use of 3D technologies. The multiple case approach allowed us to explore and discover relevant features of authentic uses of the

Navistar International

The first case explores the enabling role of 3D technologies within a US truck manufacturer’s product development process. For several years, Navistar International has maintained its position as market leader in the combined United States and Canadian retail markets for heavy-duty trucks, medium-sized trucks, and school buses. Navistar’s sales jumped from US$ 5.75 billion in 1996 to US$ 7.89 billion in 1998. This success was attributed to Navistar’s introduction, in 1996–1997, of a new

Immersive, interactive and intelligent 3D visual representations (creating quality products at shorter innovation cycles)

Allendorph [15], a top-level Navistar manager, said that they understood certain design problems much better with immersive and holistic 3D visual representations, since their engineers could fly-through the internal structure of a truck concept. Navistar engineers faced several design problems that could not be understood with the use of 2D CAD. Allendorph cited a situation regarding the designing of route clip for a hose bundle that goes from one end to the other end of the truck’s chassis.

Reengineering the product development process via its knowledge process

The notion that knowledge management plays a pivotal role in business process reengineering initiatives, undertaken within the context of knowledge-based organizations (i.e. technology-intensive manufacturing organizations), is strongly advocated in this research. The efficient management of developmental knowledge can be seen as a way to dramatically improve reengineering initiatives within the product development process. In reference to Fig. 14 (an offspring of Fig. 1), we postulate that by

Conclusion

The strategic importance of knowledge representations in managing organizational knowledge has been recognized by previous researchers [23], [24], [25]. The vast opportunity for representing knowledge in 3D visual representations in lieu of, or in addition to, numeric or language-based representations is that there are several types of tacit knowledge in the product development process that are better communicated by visually observing object shapes, forms, and objects/processes-in-motion (

Alexander Y. Yap, the primary author, is an assistant professor at Elon University, North Carolina, USA. He previously taught for 3 years at Virginia Commonwealth University (USA). He has also served as an information systems consultant at Invensys Corporation. He holds a PhD degree in management information systems from Copenhagen Business School (Denmark), an MBA in international management from Exeter University (England), and a master’s degree in development economics from Williams College

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    Alexander Y. Yap, the primary author, is an assistant professor at Elon University, North Carolina, USA. He previously taught for 3 years at Virginia Commonwealth University (USA). He has also served as an information systems consultant at Invensys Corporation. He holds a PhD degree in management information systems from Copenhagen Business School (Denmark), an MBA in international management from Exeter University (England), and a master’s degree in development economics from Williams College (USA). He was the primary author of a paper that won the ‘Best Paper Award’ at the highly prestigious International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) in 1998. He currently teaches e-commerce, covering management and strategic perspectives and e-commerce application development using Multi-Tier Web Architecture Systems Development. He uses Cold Fusion, Oracle, Macromedia, and 3D technologies to develop e-commerce applications. His papers have been published in the Electronics Market Journal, the Journal of E-Commerce Research, and the Journal of Organizational Virtualness, among others. He has also published and presented several papers in prestigious international conferences, which include the International Conference on Information Systems and the European Conference on Information Systems.

    Ojelanki Ngwenyama earned his PhD in computer science from Thomas J. Watson School of Engineering, State University of New York, Binghamton; MBA from Syracuse University; MS and BGS from Roosevelt University, and Diploma from Humber College, Toronto, Canada. Ojelanki is professor of information systems and director of the International Scholars Program at Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA. He is also research professor at University of Jyväskylä, Finland; and visiting research professor at Aalborg University, Denmark. His research focuses on organizational issues of information technology, and software development and use. His papers have appeared in a wide range of international journals. He is co-author (with Lars Mathiassen, and Jan Pries-Heje) of the book: Learning To Improve: Software Process Improvement In Practice, Addison Wesley Press, 2001. He is currently an associate editor for MIS Quarterly and a member of the Advisory Board of Scandinavian Journal of Information System. He has been a member of IFIP Working Group 8.2 since 1986.

    Kweku-Muata Osei-Bryson is professor of information systems at Virginia Commonwealth University since Fall 1998. Previously he was professor of information systems and decision analysis in the School of Business at Harvard University, Washington, DC, USA. He has also worked as an information systems practitioner in both industry and government. He does research in various areas including: data mining, expert systems, decision support systems, group support systems, information systems outsourcing, multi-criteria decision analysis, cluster analysis. His papers have been published in various journals including: IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering, Data and Knowledge Engineering, Information and Software Technology, Decision Support Systems, Information Processing and Management, Computers and Operations Research, European Journal of Operational Research, Journal of the Operational Research Society, Journal of the Association for Information Systems, Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis, and Applications of Management Science. Currently, he is serving as an associate editor of the INFORMS Journal on Computing, and is a member of the Editorial Board of the Computers and Operations Research Journal.

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