Concurrent engineering practices in selected Swedish companies: A movement or an activity of the few?

Abstract

Speed-to-market is currently becoming a highly competitive issue for manufacturing companies around the world, and much as been written about the potentials hidden in the product development process. The solutions most often called for usually include activities such as Time-Based Competition, Concurrent Engineering, and Early Manufacturing Involvement. The research and management literature on this topic usually draws upon a few well-known and well-cited successes, found at companies such as AT&T, Xerox, and Motorola. However, a lack of broad-based research on the topic has made it difficult to establish whether the shift in competitive priorities and assorted process improvements represent a broad movement in the industry, or whether observed changes merely depict changes found in a few successful, technology-based companies. In this article, Lars Trygg presents some early findings from a broad-based survey (109 cases) within the Swedish manufacturing industry. The results indicate that a substantial part of the Swedish manufacturing industry has implemented a number of actions and methods associated with successful projects reported in the media, in order to increase their speed to the market.