The power of modularity today: 20 years of “Design Rules”

Abstract

In 2000, Carliss Baldwin and Kim Clark published “Design Rules: The Power of Modularity,” a book that introduced new ways of understanding and explaining the architecture of complex systems This Special Issue of Industrial and Corporate Change celebrates this seminal work, the research it has inspired, and the insights that these collective efforts have generated. In this introductory essay, we review the impact of “Design Rules” across numerous fields, including organization theory, competitive strategy, industry structure, and innovation management. We offer perspectives on key themes that emerge from contributions in this issue, including the alignment between organizational and technical designs (“mirroring”), the dynamics of industry evolution, and the role that individuals play in shaping and responding to system designs. We close by highlighting opportunities to apply the theory in Design Rules to new phenomena and puzzles that have emerged in the past 20 years.

Fragility and Antifragility in Cities and Regions

“…We start with this principle as it represents the precondition for many of the following ones. Well known across engineering and industrial domains (Baldwin and Clark 2000;Brusoni et al 2023), it suggests to identify the minimum viable functional unit which could be operational as soon as it is completed, and to devise the policy or the project as a partitioning into such discrete scalable and possibly reusable modules. Such an approach is favoured if the circumstances allow the modules to be relatively functionally independent, and to use well-established and tested modular interfaces among them.…”

Urban policy design for antifragility

“…We start with this principle as it represents the precondition for many of the following ones. Well known across engineering and industrial domains (Baldwin and Clark 2000;Brusoni et al 2023), it suggests to identify the minimum viable functional unit which could be operational as soon as it is completed, and to devise the policy or the project as a partitioning into such discrete scalable and possibly reusable modules. Such an approach is favoured if the circumstances allow the modules to be relatively functionally independent, and to use well-established and tested modular interfaces among them.…”

The strategic role of R&D outsourcing practices and partners in the relationship between product modularization and new product development efficiency

“…Product modularization creates product variety by flexibly recombining modules using standardized interfaces (Bask et al ., 2010; Magnusson and Pasche, 2014), allowing firms to increase productivity and efficiency and provide more customized products to their customers (Gilmore and Pine, 2000; Piran et al ., 2020; Shamsuzzoha and Helo, 2017). Product modularization is also known as a strategic approach to new product and process development (Brusoni et al ., 2023). The modular product design approach enables the creation of a variety of product variations and also facilitates the design of product families (Shamsuzzoha et al ., 2018).…”