The Influence of Collaborative Information Technology Tool Usage on NPD

Abstract

Information Technology (IT) and the process of new product development (NPD) have become completely intertwined. From computer-aided-design (CAD) to video conferencing to traditional tools like email, the act of design, iterating and communicating with team members is touched at every point in the process by IT. Over the last ten years, new, collaborative information technology (CIT) has entered into the NPD process to make the activity of communication and team information sharing easier, more frequent, and distributed. What is not known is how these tools are influencing the design process itself. This research uses a longitudinal multi-method, ethnographic approach to deep dive into actual use cases. Our results indicate that CIT can have a substantial impact on NPD, but does not automatically alleviate traditional problems during NPD. We also find that the propagation of tools via new firms startups has developed a single tool per task paradigm, which is counter to the development of complex platforms offered by established firms. These single use tools are easily adopted but also easily discarded by development teams.

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“…The study suggests that the support for agile practices such as early stakeholder involvement should be improved in today's landscape. Marion and Fixson (2019) have a deeper look into the tool landscape used during product development. The authors find that in general software tools help to share information and knowledge across team members, which applies specifically to virtual teams.…”

Conceptual Product Development through Parametric Optimization: A Case Study on the Design of an Ophthalmic Instrument

“…Computer-Aided Design (CAD) tools have been gradually replacing traditional methods of design prototyping and conceptual product development (Kazi et al, 2017;Camba et al, 2018;Marion and Fixson, 2019). They are also used for concept exploration through various automated mechanisms.…”

“…Human-machine collaboration technologies have consistently been leveraged to enhance the various stages of the design process, including ideation and concept evaluation (Camburn et al, 2020-1;Camburn et al, 2020-2;Yuan and Moghaddam, 2020). Advanced Computer-Aided Design (CAD) and rapid prototyping tools, in particular, are being introduced earlier into the engineering design process (Marion and Fixson, 2019) to allow designers to create physical models and validate concepts quickly and easily.…”