Module-based product family design: systematic literature review and meta-synthesis

Leandro Gauss (), Daniel P. Lacerda () and Paulo A. Cauchick Miguel ()
Additional contact information
Leandro Gauss: Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos
Daniel P. Lacerda: Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos
Paulo A. Cauchick Miguel: Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina

Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, 2021, vol. 32, issue 1, No 17, 265-312

Abstract: Abstract Increased demand for a greater variety of products has forced many companies to rethink their strategies to offer more product variants without sacrificing production efficiency. In this context, research has found that such a trade-off can be properly managed by exploiting the module-based product family (MBPF) design. Over the years, active work in developing methods to design MBPFs has been carried out. Nevertheless, many of them have been created, and consequently exist, in isolation from one other. As a result, the adoption of these methods in industry and academy alike is inhibited by the seemingly broad array of material without a coherent organizing structure. To bridge this gap, this paper performs a systematic literature review and a meta-synthesis, wherein 72 methods to design MBPFs and their respective instances are connected in the form of a functional model and structured classes of design problems. These entities together serve as a meta-method for organizing the research on MBPF design, from which it was possible to identify the common underlying structure among the methods developed over the past 20 years. The main contributions of this work include: (1) constructing a functional model that connects the design methods for MBPFs; (2) suggesting structured classes of design problems that complement the functional model by cataloging the techniques meant to execute each sub-function of the model; (3) proposing a construction heuristic to build and assess functional models and classes of design problems.

Keywords: Modularity; Product family design; Systematic literature review; Meta-synthesis; Functional model; Design science (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10845-020-01572-3 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:joinma:v:32:y:2021:i:1:d:10.1007_s10845-020-01572-3

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/10845

DOI: 10.1007/s10845-020-01572-3

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing is currently edited by Andrew Kusiak

More articles in Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().